Our Family Documents

History of Jeremiah in the Revolutionary War

Col. Martin Armstrong

Martin was in North Carolina militia from 1776. He became a colonel and served under Gen. Benjamin Cleveland and also Gen. Rutherford. Armstrong was in the Battle of Gates Retreat at or near Camden. He was also out to frontier under Gen. Rutherford versus the Indians and Tories. Martin became Surveyor General of Northwest Territory. He settled in Tennessee and died in Nashville, TN, Sept. 1808. He married Mary Tate in 1766 or 1767 in NC. Mary died June 1836. One child, the third, survived – Mary A.E. McCall, b. 19 Apr. 1775.
Martin Armstrong was a colonel in the American Revolutionary War, from North Carolina. Following the war, he moved to Tennessee. He met John Montgomery and was interested in joining Montgomery in his plan to establish a town along the Cumberland River. The proposed site by the confluence of the Red River was still unsettled and Armstrong, who was an experienced surveyor agreed to help Montgomery explore and map out the proposed new town. North Carolina had declared the region of the Cumberland River as a military reserve in 1782. Martin Armstrong was appointed entry taker and chief surveyor for the military reservation. His office was to be in Nashville, Tennessee. His responsibility was to help eligible soldiers lay claim to their land-grant parcels.
Martin's brother John Armstrong was also involved in distribution of the Western Reserve lands. An office authorized by the state of North Carolina was opened in Hillsboro. Its purpose was the handling of the entries for military land grants. John Armstrong was the entry taker. In these affairs, John's brother Martin Armstrong operated the only other office for the Western Reserve, serving as the military entry taker and chief surveyor.
It was Armstrong who set up the original survey map of the town, soon to be named Clarksville. Lots were laid out along the Cumberland and streets were designated. Both Montgomery and Armstrong sold lots to interested settlers.
Between 1783 and 1790 both John and Martin Armstrong became involved in activities of fraudulent land grant documentation. The initial report of wrong doing was reported to a North Carolina senator by Andrew Jackson. Southwest territory governor, William Blount, was also accused of wrongdoing in the scandal.
Source: THIS LAND IS OUR LAND! TENNESSEE’S DISPUTES WITH NORTH CAROLINA By Gale Williams Bamman, CG, CGL., Genealogical Journal, Vol. 24, Number 3, 1996