The Anderson-Chappell Families

Mrs. Mary Watlington Wolford has prepared an unpublished booklet on the Anderson-Chappell families in Madison County. Her grandmother was Mary Jane Anderson, wife of Frank Wallace Watlington. Through the marriage of Ralph Whitfield Daniel to America Tabitha Anderson, Ulrich A. Watlington and his siblings had an Anderson grandmother also. America Tabitha and Mary Jane were sisters, and therefore we have a double kinship with William F. Watlington and his descendants, through both Watlington and Anderson lines. This kinship pattern was reinforced by Mack Rob Watlington living close by Pinson for many years, at times share-cropping on the farm land of Squire Frank W. Watlington. Mack Rob and Ulrich A. had a great respect for his Anderson kin as well as the Frank Watlington descendents.   

It is also through the Chappell and Anderson families that we have strong early ties with the Methodist Church. The 1877 Beers Map of Landowners in Madison County shows that the early Methodist Church at Big Springs was located near Chappell/Anderson land, on the road toward Henderson from Five Points, in what is now Chester Co. We know that Mary Jane and America's mother was Winnefred Chappell whose family were Methodists in Middle Tennessee, Sumner County, before coming to West Tennessee about 1840.   

The latter Pauldin (Paulin) O'Neal Anderson married Winnifred Finney Chappell in Halifax, Va. in 1828, several years before coming to join her Chappell family in the migration to Madison Co., Tenn. It is through the Chappell lineage that we have a Churchill ancestor which is traced all the way back to the Magna Carta of England in 1215 A.D. This lineage is shared by Sir Winston Churchill, World War II Prime Minister of England. The Anderson lineage is traced back to the first settlers in America, Richard Anderson (b. 1585 in England) who arrived in Virginia in 1635 with his son Richard, b. 1618 in England.      

Another of the Anderson-Chappell daughters, Virginia, married William H. Croom of Pinson. Sterling M. Watlington married a sister to William H. Croom which gave another connection by marriage to the Anderson family. So the Andersons and Watlingtons and Crooms were strongly related by marriages in 19th century Madison Co., Tenn.  

Generations: Chappell-Anderson

I -

Capt. John Chappell of the Speedwell arrived in America, 1635, from England.

II -

Thomas Chappell arrived in America, August 1635,
on the America.

III -

Thomas Chappell II

IV -

Thomas Chappell III

V -

Robert Chappell

 

VI -

John Chappell

 

VII -

Robert Chappell

    

VIII -

Joel Chappell

  

IX -

Winnifred Finney Chappell

  

Our family is in Chapter XII, Chappell, Dickie & Other Kindred Families [36]. See ``Boddie'' for Chappell, Jones, Tucker family.

-- Mary Watlington Wolford from J. L. Watlington, 1972