Assigning documentation to Aquilla Brasher is a risky business. Aquilla and Mary (MNU) Brasher are my husband’s 5X great grandparents. That is, unless Aquilla’s brother, John Brasher, was his 5X great grandfather. Read on, please!

One record that helps immensely in identifying Aquilla is his baptismal record of dated 28 July 1740 in Baltimore County, Maryland.

Aquilla was the son of Thomas and Sarah (MNU) Brasher. It isn’t exactly known when the Brashers left Maryland, but Aquilla migrated with his parents to Orange County, North Carolina by 23 October 1782, when both he and probably his brother, Thomas, not his father, registered land grants in Chatham County, North Carolina.

Family reasons for leaving Maryland are unknown, but I suspect that it may have been related to the Brasher family’s Tory leanings. No records have been found for anyone in this family fighting for independence from England.

Another clue pointing to their political beliefs may lie in the fact that they were friends with and married into the Hamby and Bobo families. The Hambys are also part of my husband’s line and they were offered a choice in North Carolina – get out or get hung! They wisely decided the better choice was to move and they relocated to the Greenville-Spartanburg area of South Carolina before heading en masse to Kentucky.

The Brasher stay in North Carolina wasn’t lengthy either, as the 1790 census shows Thomas, Aquilla, Samuel and William enumerated in Greenville County, South Carolina.

Now, it is likely, just likely, that Aquilla in 1790 is the same Aquilla born in 1740 in Baltimore County, Maryland.

1790 Census
Source: Ancestry

Here is where things get a bit murky. There are two Aquilla Brashers enumerated in Greenville, South Carolina in 1800. We have Aquilla Brasher, page 48, and Equila Brasher, page 66. However, both of these men are aged 26-44, so born between 1756-1774. Neither man is old enough to be Aquilla born in 1740.

Further, if either was born before c1769 and 21 in 1790, he could be the Aquilla Brasher enumerated that year.

There is also a land deed dated 20 November 1808 whereby one Aquilla Brasher of Greenville County, South Carolina sold land to Thomas Jones of the same place.

The question is which Aquilla sold this land??? We have three possible Aquillas from which to choose.

Aquilla born in 1740 might easily still be alive in 1800 and 1810, but no further record beyond the 1790 census can be said with much certainty to belong to him. No probate records have been found for Aquilla Brasher in South Carolina or in Kentucky.

Aquilla and Mary (MNU) have four children attributed to them:

1. Thomas, born c1773, Chatham County, North Carolina; died 7 September 1852, of flux, Christian County, Kentucky; married Catherine Croft. His death record give Chatham County as his birthplace. Catherine was born c1778, North Carolina; died after her husband, but before 1860, probably Christian County, Kentucky.
2. Lawrence, born before 1774, probably Chatham County, North Carolina since Thomas was born there; died before 24 September 1847, Christian County, Kentucky; married Elizabeth Black, c1792, probably in Greenville County, South Carolina.
3. Jane, born c1780, probably North Carolina; died after 1850, probably Christian County, Kentucky, as she was living wit son Matthew’s family; married Benjamin Armstrong, c1800, probably Greenville County, South  Carolina.
4. Aquilla, born c1786, probably Greenville County, South Carolina; married Lucy (MNU); died after 1860, probably Madison County, Missouri.

The big question here is what records were used to assign these children to Aquilla and Mary Brasher?

The answer is simple: I don’t know. I’ve thought myself that Lawrence Brasher, my husband’s ancestor, might be a son of John Brasher and his unknown wife.

Both John and Aquilla Brasher were sons of Thomas and Sarah (MNU) Brasher, so the line goes back to the same grandparents., but John Brasher also left few records.

Take a look at the 1800 census of Greenville County, South Carolina:

1800 Census of Greenville County, SC
Source: Ancestry

#1452 at the top of the page is John Brasher Sr. #1462 is Samuel Braysher and #1463 is Laurance Brasher, my husband’s ancestor.

The Longs in between them married into the Brasher family and also migrated to Kentucky with the Brashers. Aquilla and Equila Brasher, both of whom I mentioned earlier, are on pages 48 and 66 of the same census, while Lawrence Brasher is on page 78.

Lawrence Brasher appears only in a few land records and censuses himself and I can only prove that he died before 1850 when his heirs filed a land deed identifying themselves.

So, the big question remains, who were the parents of Lawrence Brasher?

We need to take one more step backwards to look at the family of Thomas Brasher, baptized 1 September 1701 in Baltimore County, Maryland.