America Dixon
America Dixon was born about 1812, by family memorials. She was a daughter of Thomas Dixon of Holmes's militia district, Jasper County, Georgia. A Georgia county was divided into militia districts, each known by its captain's name, and people were enrolled by district for musters, taxes and the land lotteries. The memorials give her birthplace as Fairfield County, South Carolina. Nothing supports that, and it may be her husband's birthplace carried over to her.
Her father was dead by the time she was a child. He was very probably the Thomas Dixon whose body a Jasper County coroner's jury viewed at the house of Isaac McClendon on 19 June 1821. The jury found that "he came to his death by the misfortune of his own intemperance (say the excessive use of ardent spirits)." America was about nine. Only the name and the county tie that inquest to her father, but no other Thomas Dixon appears in the county's records of those years.
His death brought his children land. Georgia gave out its new lands by lottery, and the fatherless children of a dead man could be entered together for a draw of their own. "Thomas Dixon's Orphans of Holmes district Jasper County" drew lot 61 in the sixth district of Coweta County, 202 1/2 acres, in the lottery of 1827. The grant was dated 13 May 1834. By then America and her sister Julia Ann were the two who held it.
America married Albert Beam, a young man from Fairfield District, South Carolina, who was living in neighbouring Newton County by March 1833. Their first child, Frances, was born about 1831, so they probably married about 1830. No record of the marriage is known. In December 1833 Albert bought 108 acres on the Jasper County line from John Webb.
On 13 December 1834, in Jasper County, America, her husband and her sister sold the Coweta lot to James E. P. Hunnicutt of Coweta County for three hundred dollars. The deed opens: "Georgia, Jasper County. This Indenture made this thirteenth day of December in the year of Our Lord One thousand Eight Hundred & Thirty four between Julia Ann Dixon, Albert Beam & America his wife (formerly America Dixon) of the County & State aforesaid of the one part & James E. P. Hunnicutt of the County of Coweta & State aforesaid of the other part." It describes the land as "being the Tract or lot of Land Originally drawn & Granted to Thomas Dixon's Orphans of Holmes district Jasper County said Grant bearing date the Thirteenth day of May in the Year Eighteen Hundred & thirty four."
America could not write. At the foot of the deed she made her mark, and the clerk wrote her name round it as "America Dixon now Beam". Her sister signed as Julia Ann Dixon. Albert Beam signed and sealed between them. The witnesses were James Hinton Senr. and James F. Turner, a justice of the peace.
The same day she made a second declaration. When a married woman gave up her rights in land, a justice questioned her out of her husband's hearing, so that she could not later claim she had been forced. Her release reads: "America Beam wife of the within Albert Beam this day appeared before me & being privately & separate and apart from her said husband examined by me did declare acknowledge & agree that she did of her own free will & accord subscribe seal & deliver the within deed with an intention thereby to renounce give up and forever quit claim to her right of dower and thirds". She signed it "America [her mark] Beam". The deed and the release were recorded in the Superior Court clerk's office of Coweta County on 28 May 1835 by George Pentecost, clerk.
She and Albert had seven children in about sixteen years. They were Frances about 1831, Jesse W. about 1833, Julia A. in 1835, Thomas Z. about 1838, Julius Oscar in 1844, Henry M., called Harry, about 1845, and John B., probably the Benjamin of 1850, about 1847. By the memorials, Julia was born in Cherokee County, Georgia, on 23 June 1835, and Julius Oscar just over the state line in Cherokee County, Alabama, on 28 October 1844. The family had moved from the middle of Georgia to its northwest corner.
America died on 12 September 1847, in Cherokee County, Alabama, by a memorial. Her youngest child was a baby. Albert was dead by 3 September 1849. That day the Inferior Court of Cherokee County, Georgia, sitting as the court of ordinary, appointed her sister, Julia A. E. Dixon, guardian of "Katherine F. Beam, Jesse W. Beam, Julia A. Beam, John B. Beam, Thomas Z. Beam, Julius O. Beam, Henry M. Beam, orphans of Albert Beam deceased". The next summer the census found all seven in Julia's house in Cherokee County.
Her name went on in the family. Her eldest daughter Frances, who married John W. McCollum, named a daughter Marjorie America. Her son Thomas Zachariah named a daughter Emma America.
Her mother is not known. An Amey H. Dixon of Jasper County, a daughter of Elizabeth Smith, was acting alone as an heir to Elizabeth's estate in 1830, nine years after Thomas Dixon's death. She could have been his widow, but nothing names her as America's mother.
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Cite: Heirology, "America Dixon (1812-1847)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/america-dixon-1812-1847-f959f4.