b. December 25, 1832Sterling Malachi was one of the younger children of George and Catharine Watlington and therefore had more opportunity for schooling and health attention. He was a farmer for most of his life and owned land in 1877 near the Sauls, Andersons and Crooms near Pinson Mounds. In many ways his family is better documented than the older children. It was through the documentation of a granddaughter, Mrs. Hildred Watlington Walker of Selmer, Tenn., that the first Daughters of the American Revolution lineage record was filed on William Watlington of Dinwiddie and Brunswick Counties, Virginia. Mrs. Walker and Mrs. Wolford had shared information and research on the Watlingtons.bp. Henderson Co., Tenn.
m. May 24, 1866, Catherine Croom
d. August 27, 1921
pd. Madison Co., Tenn.
Sterling Malachi (called Sterlie) served with the forces of General Nathan Bedford Forrest for over a year toward the end of the Civil War. His brother, Michael C. Watlington, had enrolled earlier with the same unit before the reorganization of the unit. A nephew, Billie Houston, son of their oldest sister Mary (Mollie) Emmaline; who married Wilson Houston, enrolled to serve with Uncle Sterlie under the alias of Tommy Campbell. Thus three descendents of George W. Watlington served with the Confederate States Army, evidently in the same unit of Tennessee Cavalry.
This same Billie Houston was, and continued to be, a close cousin and confident of Mack Roberts Watlington, six years younger, son of Michael C. Watlington. Mack Rob Watlington lived until 1934 and was the author's grandfather and the prime informant for the West Tennessee family genealogy and history. Mack Rob, Mack Harvey (son of William T., d. 1933) and cousin Halbert (``Hal,'' d. 1977) were the story tellers of their generation which overlapped the Fifth generation of Watlingtons in West Tennessee by some years.
We go back now to Sterlie's children, documented by a family Bible record, and other public records. Mary W. Wolford obtained good information on this family and included much of it in her book, some pages of which are included herein. Sterling did not marry until relatively late in life. Re-establishing his life after the Civil War he married the 24th of May 1866 at the home of Isaac Croom, father of the bride Catherine Croom. He was 34 years years of age and she was ten years younger. By 1877 they owned a good farm on the bluff above the south fork of Forked Deer River in the Pinson Mound area.
Sterling and his wife are mentioned as being ``charter members'' of the Big Springs Methodist Church, which would indicate that the church was organized about the time of their maturity, if not their marriage. A Methodist pastor, Rev. P. J. Kirby, performed their ceremony of marriage, which was witnessed and the certificate signed by Dr. J. R. Watlington, an older brother to Sterling. Their known children were born between 1867 and 1881, four daughters and two sons. Their second daughter, Minnie V. m. George Norwood and gave birth to a daughter, Minnie Norinne on Jan. 13, 1903 but died following childbirth, Jan. 26, 1903. Another daughter, Mary Emma, died at thirteen years of age in Dec. 1887. The other four children all have living descendents: Susan Catherine married Thomas C. Stewart; Boneparte Frank m. Lessie Pearl Haynes; Lucy Hildred Watlington m. Oct. 1929, James Carroll Walker.
Halbert Ditzler Watlington married Iva Stanloud Diamond of the Mount Pleasant/Beech Bluff Community east of Big Springs on Aug. 10, 1900. They had one son, Diamond, and he left three children from two marriages. Mrs. Iva Diamond Watlington died in 1917 and ``Cousin Hal'' lived sixty more years in widowhood, all of it on the family farm at what became ``Diamond Grove'' community. They were members of the Mount Pleasant United Methodist Church nearby, and their mail came at times from the Beech Bluff Post Office in Madison Co. The same Beech Bluff Post Office at times served the old Billie Watlington homeplace also.
The younger daughter, Nedda (Nettie) Flowers Watlington was married Sept. 16, 1899 to Leon Allen McGill, of the McGill family which owned land near the Watlington farm. They settled in Pinson, Tenn. and had two sons and one daughter. The older son, Sterling Raymond, and his wife Ann both died in a tragic auto accident in 1965. Nettie Floy McGill married Samuel Fenner Sewell and lived in Jackson, Tenn. where he died in 1936. She continued to operate a furniture store and design interior decorations. Their daughter Peggy Jean Sewell married Frederick Wigel.
Of this distinguished Watlington family there are only two children of the Fifth Generation who bear the Watlington name, but the lineage goes on by other names.