In reply to Jane: There is no well done, comprehensive history of the Barfield family available, not in print and not online. Sellers is about as good as it gets. There are numerous websites and charts with information on Barfields all over the southeast, including Marion and Robeson Barfields. I have found these sites woefully ailing in good, concrete, cited research. However, some idea of the family may be obtained by doing a web search on google.com or some other search engine for "barfield and marion" or "barfield and robeson". Don't forget the alternate spelling of Barefield. Beware of bald statements of descent with no cited sources. And you won't find many sources. Briefly, the Barfield descendants in and from Marion/Dillon all seem to descend from one or the other of the two Richard Barfields who had early land grants in Bladen/Robeson County. The earliest of these Richards was the one who had a land grant on Ashpole Swamp in 1757. This grant was shown by later deeds to have been near the confluence of Hogg Swamp with Ashpole. This Richard Barfield and his wife Mary moved to South Carolina, apparently between 1763 and 1769, and in 1769 sold his land grant on Ashpole. There are clues, mighty small clues indeed, that some of this Richard's sons may have been Joshua, Nathan, Thomas, and Josia Barfield. This is from the 1763 Bladen tax list, where all those 5 male Barfields are shown in one household. It has not been ruled out that Richard might have been brother or some other relation of the others, rather than their father. Another clue is that all of those Barfields (except for Josia who is never heard of again, and Richard, who was arguably deceased by 1786) were shown in the 1786 tax list for Captain Odom's Company, Prince George Winyaw Parish, in what was to become Dillon County, indicating that whole family group may have moved to Marion. Thus they would be the Barfields "in the fork of Drowning Creek and Little Pee Dee River" as discussed by Robert Bass and many other biographers of Francis Marion. They are the only Barfields for whom record has been found in the fork of Drowning Creek and Little Pee Dee prior to the Revolutionary War. There was another Richard Barfield who had a land grant about 1784 in Bladen/Robeson, over on east side of Hogg Swamp, also not far from the confluence with Ashpole. This Richard was kind enough to leave a will dated 1785, naming his wife Ann and his children. Descendants of that Richard Barfield, mostly through his son Willis Barfield, still reside on his lands in that area. Two of this Richard's sons, Elisha and Shadrach, later moved to Marion County, where they had land grants bounding or near Joshua Barfield, near present day Gaddy's Mills, and not far from the homesite of Barrett Barfield Senior. It remains a matter of conjecture just how this newer Richard was related to the earlier Richard who moved from Bladen/Robeson to Marion. Many theories exist, and many counties in North Carolina have been searched for evidence, but nothing conclusive identifying these two Richards has ever been found. They may have been father and son, uncle and nephew, cousins - who knows. There was also, in Bladen/Robeson, a Charles Barfield with land grants on Ashpole Swamp by 1769, and a David Barfield on Old Field Swamp (Fairmont area), also very early. Most if not all of their male descendants seem to have left this area. There is little to indicate that any Barfields other than descendants of the younger Richard, and the elder Richard along with his family, ever resided in what became Dillon County. There were some Barfields in the western part of old Marion County, and in that part of Marion that became Florence County, near Pamplico, and there is some indication that those Barfield families were closely connected to the Barfields of present day Dillon County. Again, however, little has been found that sheds light on concrete family relationships. It is stated (not surmised or guessed at, but stated as fact) on a number of online Barfield sites that the tory captain Jesse Barfield was son of a Solomon Barfield, that he came down from some distant NC county at the beginning of the Revolutionary War. I find this theory patently absurd. There is nothing in the records to suggest that the Tory, Captain Jesse Barfield, was anything but a homegrown Barfield. I find it most unlikely that a stranger with distant family connections came here and immediately commenced to getting himself elected militia captain, and getting at least a couple of hundred locals to follow him in the campaign against the patriots. In my own opinion, and I stress OPINION here, he was quite likely a son or grandson of the earlier Richard of Bladen/Robeson (perhaps the same as Josia, or perhaps a son too young to be taxed in 1763), who moved with his family to what was to become Marion/Dillon (just a matter of a few miles), became quite popular, was elected captain of the Loyalist Militia, and led men he grew up with - neighbors and relations - against Francis Marion and Maurice Murphee. As noted above, there is some speculation that the Josia in the 1763 tax list may have actually been Jesse. However, no proof of this has ever been found. I have a copy of the original 1763 tax list from the NC Archives. The handwritten list actually reads Josia, with great clarity. While the old, extant list may be an early copy of some original tax returns, and Josia may be a clerk's mistake in copying Jesse, without knowledge of any "original" prior to the list, this line of reasoning rapidly becomes an exercise in futility. Likewise, no proof has ever been found that Barrett Barfield Senior was a son of Captain Jesse Barfield. Sellers, of course, speculated that he was son or nephew of Captain Jesse. And there was an anonymous entry in Bethea's AKPD stating that Barrett was son of Captain Jesse (which statement, in my opinion, was probably based entirely on Sellers' speculations). But NO PROOF, not even a convincing clue, has ever been found. Small clues abound, like the location of Barrett's lands adjoining a land grant to Joshua Barfield, the same Joshua who paid taxes on and apparently administered on the estate of one Jesse Barfield in 1786. The fact that Barrett Senior sold that land grant of Joshua's when he sold his own adjoining lands in about 1838 and moved to Macon Co, Georgia. And the fact that Barrett Senior named one of his oldest sons Jesse. But not so many clues that they add up to a preponderance of the evidence. Barrett Senior's father remains unknown. Barrett's father could have been Captain Jesse, or one of his brothers, or perhaps even some other Barfield. I have been through ALL the Barfield entries in the Marion deedbooks up to 1885 and most of the early Bladen and Robeson Barfield deeds. Through all the early Barfield wills and estates in Bladen, Robeson, and Marion. Through all the land grants and plats for Barfields in all three counties. Through all the census records, and numerous other Marion records, court records and such. Many clues, nothing conclusive. They left many documents, but little trace of their family connections. It is true that we only know of the four descendants of Barrett Senior remaining in the Dillon County area. But the Barfields in this area prior to 1850, both in Robeson and in Marion, were numerous.Young male Barfields in the early census records had a habit of leaving the area about as soon as they reached manhood (perhaps because of the Tory business). It is amazing how many of them were found unnamed in their father or mother's household in an early Marion or Robeson census record, only to disappear in the next census, leaving not a mention of their name in the local records. However, there were just as many early Barfield women. And I would suppose that many of them married and either remained in the area with their families, or moved west, leaving adult children here. There have been many many Barfield daughters born around here since 1757. I'm certain they left a number of descendants. We just don't know who they were... I suspect many of us have Barfield grannies back there somewhere. I've been looking for her for for a long time now - my unknown Barfield granny. I have good reason to suspect early Barfield connections to my Horn, Miller, Brewer, Cook, and Hayes lines. But not an ounce of proof so far.... Other local families who were in close proximity to the Barfields, and may have early Barfield connections (prior to say 1800) were Adams, Barnes, Elvington/Yelverton, Ford, Grantham, Hill, Jones, Lee, Lewis, Moody, Page, Smith, Thompson, and others . Jo Church DIckerson << the Barfield family in Dillon County is today represented only by the descendants of WritBarfield and three of his sisters who married into the Goodyear and Rogers families. Does anyone have a history of the Barfields? Celia Barfield Rogers was my great great grandmother. I don't have much information on the Barfields or on Celia. Anyone that can help, it would be greatly appreciated :-) Thanks Jane------Femail85@aol.com >>

Jo, you should send that information to Davine Campbell at GAMACON-L@rootsweb.com because there are lots of Barfields who ended up there from SC. I enjoyed reading it, even though they are not my line. Good Work! Mildred