The following information was assembled from numerous sources and cannot be used directly as proof of Qualifying Service or Lineage.
It is considered a research aid and is intended to assist in locating sources that can be used as proof.
State of Service: VA
Qualifying Service: Patriotic Service
Peter Holland 1740-1793
Patriotic Service in the American War for Independence
The earliest record found (so far) of my 5th Great Grandfather, Peter Holland, places him in Bedford County, Virginia in 1755 with his wife, the former Mariah Diggins. Additional evidence indicates that he may have been born in Essex County, Virginia or even Calvert County, Maryland. His birth is believed to have been around 1730 and he may have been a descendant of the Holland family line of Cumberland County, Virginia. According to county records of property sales and trades, Peter became a significant landowner in the Bedford and Franklin County area and over time he and Mariah gave birth to, and raised, ten offspring: Thomas, Drury, Peter, Benjamin, Asa, Susannah, George, Jesse, Stephen and Bathsheba.
Peter’s service to the revolution was significant in terms of material and personnel. Records in the Bedford Clerk of County Court Order Book 6, dated 1774-82, on pages 339, 341 and 350 provide some detail of the supplies furnished by Peter Holland to militia forces on multiple occasions. Additionally, no less that three of his sons served in various capacities in the Virginia Militia and Continental Army: Asa—served as a Justice of the Peace in Bedford County, Drury (P-183521)—according to his Revolutionary War Pension #W3419, served more than 5 years with the 1st and 10th Regiments of the Continental Line, was present during the Battle of Eutaw Springs and the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, receiving wounds on at least two occasions during his time of service; and Thomas (P-183581)—who is documented in his Revolutionary War Pension # S17222 as having been born in Calvert County, Maryland in 1759, served with the Virginia militia at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse. Peter’s son, Peter (Jr.), later served as an officer in the Virginia Militia during the War of 1812.
My family are descendants of Peter and Mariah’s daughter, Bathsheba through her marriage to William Spradlin of Bedford County as evidenced in their marriage bond dated 2 December 1789. A later marriage, in 1922, between my grandparents Turner Lee Wilkerson, Sr. and Lucy McKinney Spradlin, brought descendants of the Spradlin and Wilkerson families together in Lynchburg, Virginia.
The Holland family’s ancestry is known to have participated in the founding of our country, beginning with their arrival in Jamestowne in 1620. My family’s association with the Holland family line beyond Peter and Mariah has yet to be proven. But one fact of their history is very clear—like many of our ancestors who sought and found a new life in this grand country—they believed that their freedom to own, develop and govern the land was a divine blessing—worth fighting any foe to keep!
Send a biographical sketch of your patriot!
Patriot biographies must be the original work of the author, and work submitted must not belong to another person or group, in observance with copyright law. Patriot biographies are to be written in complete sentences, follow the established rules of grammar, syntax and punctuation, be free of typographical errors, and follow a narrative format. The narrative should unfold in a logical manner (e.g. the narrative does not jump from time period to time period) or have repeated digressions, or tell the history of the patriot's line from the patriot ancestor to the author. The thinking here is that this is a patriot biography, not a lineage report or a kinship determination project or other report published in a genealogy journal. The biography should discuss the qualifying service (military, patriotic, civil) of the patriot ancestor, where the service was rendered, whether this was a specific state or Continental service, as well as significant events (as determined by the author) of the patriot's life. This is the entire purpose of a patriot's biography.
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Send your submission1, in a Microsoft Word compatible format, to patriotbios@sar.org for inclusion in this space 1Upon submission of a patriot biography, the patriot biography becomes the property of the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, and may be edited to conform to the patriot biography submission standards.