This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/QJH.2ACIB/254.1.1 Message Board Post: Thanks for the information. I do not have my files handy right now (I am at work) but I know you have given me some information that I do not have. My big question is: Why did William Cannon and wife Nancy Byars move from Missouri in 1833 to Alabama? William Cannon received land patents on two parcels of land in Alabama, but not in Jefferson county where Strippling lived. The next child born to William Cannon and Nancy Byars after their move to Alabama was Jane Stripling Cannon, obviously named after her grandfather. William Cannon and Nancy Byars and family moved to Pike County Illinois in 1839 where William's brother was rather prosperous and sherif of the county. The 1830 census shows Stripling as the head of the house and living with him were two adult women (daughters) and several children. If you have any interest in the family of William and Nancy, let me know. Do you have any knowledge of the political atmosphere in south central Alabama in the 1830's? Seems like that could have some bearing on why they moved to Illinois. I think the land acts passed by the Andrew Jackson administration to encourage frontier settlement probably had something to do with the two parcels William acquired in Alabama, might have just been a little land speculation on Williams part.