01.09The Journey
By John William Lockhart
(Updated January 18,2010)
The journey began in 1972 after a conversation at dinner when I asked my father, Swanson Banner Lockhart, if he knew anything about our ancestry. He told me he could recall the names of about four generations. He repeated a verbal history that said three brothers came to America together. From there he began a quest to trace our lineage. He wrote two books and expended thousands of hours looking for his roots. For him it was a journey of joy and celebration as he found one ancestor after another.
In 1986, when Swanson died, he believed that the direct lineage of our family went to Captain James Lockhart of Nansemond County, Virginia. My father had traveled in time to 1682, the first record he found of James Lockhart, who got land in Virginia for bringing others to the new world. My father died believing that James Lockhart was a sea Captain. Before his death, I promised him that I would find out who Captain James Lockhart was and document his lineage. I believe, but I have no proof, that James was a Captain of Foot, a soldier, and career Army officer, who traveled to Virginia in 1677 to help quell the Bacon Rebellion.
My quest to find out more about Captain James Lockhart has been difficult. He is elusive. He left records that may tell us who he was and who his family was and where he came from. I know he was from Scotland. I know the history of the Lockhart name and can move backward in time to the year 1125 when Richard Loccard entered Scotland from Flanders. We have found a James Lockhart who called himself “a brother sone of the House of the Lockharts of Barr,” who was one of Charles II’s Heralds in 1672, and who registered his arms in that year. James Lockhart was a Guard and a Herald. Records have him referred to as both. Is this James Lockhart, the Captain James Lockhart of Nansemond County, Virginia? Our research now focuses on the Lockharts of the House of Bar, perhaps there we will finally find the link from Captain James to the Lockharts of the 12th Century.
But there are other issues. Despite my father’s research, we have no proof that Captain James Lockhart was the progenitor of Jacob Lockhart Sr., for whom we do have proof as our ancestor. Meaning that Captain James Lockhart may or may not be the first Lockhart in our ancestry who came to America.
Recently I have been made aware of research done by Greg van der Werf, that suggests Jacob Lockhart Sr. of Augusta County, Virginia, was the son of James Lockhart from Philadelphia. And, further, that James Lockhart migrated to Philadelphia from Ireland where the Lockhart family first acquired lands in 1613/14. We are currently looking for the roots of Hugh and Alexander Lockard (circa 1613) in Scotland whom may have descended from the Lockharts of Bar and Boghall in Ayrshire. Establishing this information as fact is very difficult at best. There is a paucity of records for the period of time we are researching. But, it is a route that we are continuing to explore. What we do know is that an Alex. Lockard, got lands in Moneymore, Ireland, on June 10, 1614, and a Hugh Lockard got lands in Magherybeg, Ireland, on May 1, 1613. What we cannot determine presently is whether theses two Lockards were associated with the Lockharts who flourished in Ayrshire in the 16th Century.
Since the dinner conversation in 1972, I have stood on our ancestor’s bones at Symington Parish Church and have held the Lee Penny in my hand; I have shed tears while staring at Luce Bay and the Irish Sea beyond at BarLockhart Loch knowing that the spirit of my father was with me; I have prayed at Arbroath, along with my ancestors who stood with others in endorsement of that great declaration of freedom; I have stood at Flodden Field amid the ghosts of 10,000 Scotsmen who died there in one battle; and, I have touched the spirit of my ancestors there and in dozens of other places in Scotland where the Lockhart family began and flourished through the centuries.
I have now visited Scotland seven times. Each time I go there I marvel at why anyone would want to leave such a beautiful country. But, I am reminded of Scotland’s history, and of places filled with the bones of thousands upon thousands who died seeking freedom and religious expression.
I know too the valleys of Virginia, the rolling hills of Tennessee, the vast plains of Texas, and the rugged mountains of North Carolina where the Lockhart family found land and helped build a nation where freedom and religious expression were foremost.
The Internet did not exist when my journey began, yet its power has given me great insight into my family’s history and has acquainted me with my brothers and sisters. This Internet site is my portal to the past. Here we tell the story of the Lockharts, a family of warriors who became farmers, and lawyers, and poets, and preachers. Please join with us in this journey.
Be patient with us, we have much to relate about our journey and it will take time to present the sojourn with wit and facts as we have found them. We have learned that each time we think we have found truth what we really found was much more complex and stranger than we ever imagined possible.
It is an endless Journey.