Annette: I'm still alive! I monitor the Jefferson County List everyday. I'm just too busy building houses to contribute at this time. Just returned from a trip to Mississippi [my first in thirty-five years] over the Memorial Day weekend to visit land I inherited in Holmes County and to also do research at the MS Dept. of Archives & History in Jackson in search of James Stuart and Leonly Towns. Did not have adequate time, but did find a few pearls...Memoirs of Mississippi-Biographical and Historical, page 83: "James Stuart, one of Richard King's dragoons, was granted two hundred arpents by Governor Gayoso, in 1794, on bayou Pierre." Don't know if this was local dragoon, in light of the Prosper King family and others in Jefferson County at that time, or from the Revolutionary War. We do know he was born in Virginia. Some additional info on Sarah Stuart was found in this book, daughter of James Stuart, who married Col. John Cobun Humpreys. Children were: David George, Kate Cobun, Moreau Stuart, John Cobun, James Leon and Blount Stuart. "She was a woman of superior intelligence, well educated and a great reader." p. 988 Found his name on the list of petitioners on page 167, The Territorial Papers of the US- The Territory of Mississippi 1798-1817 Volume 5 [973.4/c24t Search Room] : Petition To Congress By Citizens of the Territory August 25, 1802: " We the undersigned, Citizens of the Mississippi Territory pray your Honorable Body that the Land Office to be Opened for this Country may be held within the Bounds of the same, and that the Actual Settlers on the Vacant lands of the united States, may have a preemtion right Secured to them. -" I would have loved to spend a week in the archives, going thru books, newspapers from Rodney, Fayette et al. microfesh, but alas, "so many lines ... so little time." The brick wall still stands! All the best to you, Stuart