Christopher Columbus Koonce
Christopher Columbus Koonce, called Chris, was born on 15 August 1778 in Jones County, North Carolina. His memorial names his parents as George Koonce Jr. and Susannah Franks. By 1799 he was living in Sumner County, Tennessee.
On 27 January 1806 he married Mary Ann Brinson, called Polly, in Wilson County, Tennessee. He served as captain of a tax district in Wilson County, the militia company district by which Tennessee counties listed their taxpayers. In the War of 1812 he served as a private in the Third Regiment of West Tennessee Militia.
About 1816 or 1817 he left Tennessee for Louisiana with his wife and her parents, the Brinsons. They settled in the hill country of the northwest, in what was then Claiborne Parish. Christopher gathered and organized Baptist churches there. On 11 June 1825 he and Polly were charter members of Providence Church, near Athens. Polly died that November, aged 40.
Their children were Lenora, 1807; Amander, 1808; Hellen Lois, 1810, who married Samuel Gibbs Leatherman; Courtney Alison, called Count, 1812; James Carroll, 1815, who became a minister; George Brinson, 1816; Elizabeth Berlinda, 1820; and Philip, 1822.
On 7 September 1844 the Old Saline Baptist Church was constituted, in what became Bienville Parish, with George Washington Baines as pastor. Christopher Koonce stands first on its oldest list of members, and his son Philip is on it too. He died at Old Saline the next year, on 20 November 1845, aged 67, and was buried in the church cemetery. His government stone reads "Christopher Koonce, Pvt, 3 Regt, W. Tenn. Militia, War of 1812, 1778, 1845."
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Cite: Heirology, "Christopher Columbus Koonce (1778-1845)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/christopher-columbus-koonce-1778-1845-571337.