William Black history

WILLIAM BLACK

b. 1770 North Carolina

d. before 1860 in Richland, Ashland, Ohio

md Sarah Stevens

The families in America by the name of Black are numerous. We have tried in this book to list all members of the family of William Black and his wife Sarah Stevens. Real proof of the origin of this family in America has as yet not been found. From letters and old Bibles and stories handed down from one generation to another we are led to believe the first member of the family in America was either John or William Black, and we are sure he fought in the Revolutionary War in North Carolina around King’s Mountain. The names of William and John are so common we have been unable to find absolute proof of his identity. Until further proof comes to light we are offering this account and hope some day to find the beginning.

The census of 1840 taken in Lawrence County, Illinois, lists this family. William gave his age as seventy and his place of birth as North Carolina.


The Black family was well established in Vermillion, Richland County, Ohio, until 1837, when the elder son of the family lost his farm and decided to move to Illinois where land was to be had for the taking. Judging from the land deal, a copy of which is here reproduced, the rest of the family followed very soon. The sister, Rhoda, with her husband and family were already in St. Francisville, Lawrence County, by the time John reached there, and soon the whole family had taken farms and were settled close to what is now Bridgport, Lawrence County, Illinois. They were staunch Baptists, and when a church was erected the names of the Black family were all engraved on a plaque outside the door. So many of the family lived there the settlement was called Blacksburg; the name, however, was later changed to Bridgeport.

In Ohio, William Black owned and operated on his own land the first grist mill on the Black Fork of the Vermillion River.

In the 1850 census, we find William Black and his wife Sarah Stevens Black had left Illinois and returned to Vermillion, Ohio, but by that time the county had been divided and Vermillion was now in Ashland County. By 1850 Sarah was dead, but William was there with one of the younger sons. He gave his age as 80 in 1850. By 1860 he too, was gone.

William Black, the father of the family, apparently moved to Illinois and lived there for about four or five years. The eldest son John had died in 1839 and their son James “went across the river into Kentucky.” The old people, with Jonathan Stevens Black, Samuel, and Daniel, must have longed for the old home, as they returned to Ohio. William Morley Black in his family record gave the death of Jonathan Stevens Black and his wife and their little girl, and the 1850 and 1860 census of Ashland confirm this information.

By 1850 James was in Kentucky, Jonathan S., John, and Grandma Sarah Stevens Black were dead. William the elder, then 80 years old, was living with his son Daniel in Ohio. Samuel also lived in Ohio. William died sometime between 1850 and 1860 as he was not listed in the 1860 census, which showed no more children for Samuel or Daniel.

We tried to find some descendants of Stevens Black or of Samuel or Daniel. John Wilson Black, who will be referred to later, made a trip to Ohio for us in the effort to locate some of these people. He sent us many addresses of Blacks he contacted, but none of them answered the letters and as there was already so much information we decided not to follow up these contacts. Perhaps some day we will be able to find them.