My third great grandfather, Alexander Tuttle, was born in Germanton, Stokes County, North Carolina on 12 August 1828 to William and Elizabeth Martin Tuttle.
He was part of the fourth generation of Tuttles who had lived in Stokes County.
Alexander had three brothers and four sisters and was reared and worked on the family farm.
Emily Jane Hartgrove Tuttle
On 2 November 1854, he married Emily Jane Hartgrove, a fifteen year old girl he had known for many years since she had grown up living about a mile from him. She was born 16 July 1839 in Germanton, Stokes County, North Carolina, the daughter of James and Martha James Hartgrove.
Together the couple had 12 children. My 2nd great grandfather Josiah Tuttle was their oldest child.
Alexander was 33 years of age when the Civil War began. He and Emily Jane had three children at this time. He claimed he was very much against the war and supported the cause of the Union. He was conscripted into the Confederate army as was his brother John William.
To stay out of the army Alexander said he did three things: 1. Hired someone to take his place 2. Took the office of constable and 3. Served in the home guard or militia. While serving with the home guard it was his duty to seek out and arrest deserters from the Confederate army. He said he did find them and instead of arresting them, he warned and fed them. Alexander was so much against the war that he was prepared to leave the state instead of fight.
He served as constable for two years. This was an office under the state of North Carolina. In this position, he was a peace officer under the Justice of the Peace and did not receive a salary.
Alexander and his young family lived in two places in Germanton before the Civil War. Both residences were very close to one another and neither far from his father William or his in-laws. Emily Janes's father, James Hartgrove, claimed Alexander was a poor man.
Near the end of the war, members of the Union army came into Germanton and took whatever they wanted from the residents. Alexander had a horse, a mule and 40 pounds of bacon stolen. The horse had been loaned to a neighbor and it was taken there. The mule and bacon were taken from his father's place since Alexander had neither a corral nor a smokehouse in 1865.
Alexander and Emily Jane had two more children born to them during the war years and four following it. Unfortunately, Alexander died on 4 July 1880 at the age of 51 leaving his wife and their 12 children. Their oldest Josiah was 24 and the youngest Larston was just 4 months old. A big part of supporting the family fell to the older children. They loved and honored their mother and the siblings stayed together as best they could.
In 1895, 15 years following Alexander's death, Emily Jane received a letter from her oldest son, Josiah who was then living in Utah. Josiah told his mother he was giving her an inheritance of land he had received at the death of an his Aunt Olivia. At this time, Emily Jane was still farming the land she had shared with her husband Alexander. Josiah spoke with her about the price she was receiving for her tobacco crop.
Emily Jane continued in Germanton, Stokes County, North Carolina until her death on 12 March 1904.
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