The Jennings Family

Israel Jennings 1774 – 1872

What the record says

• [Merged from two sketch windows.] First known ancestor of the Jennings family.
• Supposed native of Maryland, born about 1774.
• As a youth went to Mason County, Kentucky, settling at Maysville, where he married Mary Waters about 1799-1800.
• Moved to Illinois about 1818, locating six miles southeast of Centralia.
• His 1819 government-land entry was the second such purchase in what is now Marion County.
• According to Brinkerhoff's History of Marion County, Illinois, Prominent early settler and one of the largest land owners of the county.
• Leading farmer and stock raiser.
• Methodist and Democrat.
• Elected to the Illinois Legislature in 1827 (Vandalia era), a contemporary of Peter Cartwright.
• Postmaster at Walnut Hill from 1834.
• Owned the only male slave held in the county.
• Operated a store trading goods for produce hauled to St. Louis.
• First wife Mary Waters died October 30, 1845.
• Married again (second wife died April 3, 1885).
• Died April 20, 1872, buried in a metallic coffin he had kept for ten years.
• Grandfather of subject Z. C. Jennings.

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