Phillip  Hoodenpyl.

   Phillip Hoodenpyl, Sr. was born, reared and educated at Amsterdam, Holland.
 His parents were of more than ordinary note, they being indeed of royal descent
on the paternal side.  Some of the blood have obtained great renown, and for
valorous deeds and meritorious lives gained marked distinction and have
been rewarded and honored by their government.  Their coat of arms bore
a great many remarkable devices, representing special acts of valor and
service to their country performed on land and sea.  This coat of arms was
brought to this country by Phillip and preserved by him with jealous
care, and referred to with pride.

   He often told his children that some day he would come into a large estate
from his family in Holland and that the seal and coat of arms would assist in
establishing his identity, and admonished them to preserve them as of value.
 The last authentic knowledge of this coat of arms, it was in the possession of his
grandson, A.J. Hoodenpyl, in 1850, when he moved to Arkansas.
 This grandson has since died and its whereabout is now unknown.

   Soon after the war a notice was published in one of the German papers
making inquiry for the direct heirs of Phillip Hoodenpyl, Sr., and notifying
them that a large legacy was deposited in a bank at Amsterdam, which they
might secure by establishing their identity.  Much correspondence was had
at the time by some of the heirs but for some reason the legacy
was never recovered.

   After Phillip Hoodenpyl, Sr. graduated with the highest honors at an
institution of renown in his native city, he married a lady of good blood and
high social standing, and he being of an adventurous turn and hearing
such wonderful stories of the great country over the seas he resolved to
cast his fortunes with the young Republic, the Revolutionary War having just
closed and the independence of the infant colonies having been effected.
 He received a patrimony of seventy-five thousand dollars.  He invested
this sum in merchandise and sailed with his young wife to the new land of the
west.  He landed at Philadelphia in 1780 where he engaged in business
for many years.  Not having been trained to the accumulation of wealth, but
rather in the polite requirements of the well-bred and noble young men
of his day, his fortune soon became depleted to a few thousand.  His
wife becoming dissatisfied returned to Holland with an only son, and Phillip
refusing to accompany her or she to longer reside in a country she could
not like, the result was a divorce.

   Phillip then moved to Buncombe County, North Carolina where he married
an estimable lady name Jane Roncevill. Here he entered four hundred acres
of land, embracing the famous Hot Springs.  The original grant of this land
from the state is still in the possession of his grandchildren.  The immense
travel from the Carolinas to the great west proved very profitable to Phillip,
who had opened a public house of entertainment and a ferry on the French
Broad River.  He prospered in his new home and soon rebuilt his fortunes.  

   The great tide of emigration to the west seemed at that time to be moving
the whole eastern world and at last the fever laid hold of Phillip and he
gathered up his household and traveled until he reached the Cumberland
mountains and finally camped on Glade Creek near Pikeville, Tennessee,
and hard by the Potter place where Bocter Frady now resides.  Looking
upon the lovely glade, untouched by the husbandman, its luxuriant grasses
and black loamy soil, he decided to locate and at once began the erection
of houses and barns, cutting a long ditch though the rich meadows which
may be traced to this day.  A few years of toilsome work in the sowing
of wheat and the planting of corn convinces him that his fine theories on
cultivation were not adaptable to the mountain lands, whereupon he
returned to the valley bought of John M. Rener the plantation now owned
by Northup Agee and Tulloss & Frazier and built the house still standing.
 His family consisted now of six boys and four girls.

   Phillip having an educated and cultivated mind was an omniverous
reader and as his life declined devoted his whole time to the study of
the Bible with an eye single to the discovery of what he conceived to be
the erroneous teachings of the Book of Books and the theologians of
his day.  He was very pronounced in opinions and expressions and so
engrossed was his mind on this single subject that he determined to spend
the remainder of his years in writing a commentary on the bible for
each of his children, giving his views on what he termed the errors of the
theologians in teaching and preaching.

   So intent did he become on this task he set for himself, that he devoted
several years prior to his death, to it to the exclusion of everything else.
 Even the approach of the grim destroyer found him at work and the pen was
taken from his trembling fingers a few hours before his death.  These books
are a marvel of work with the pen, every letter being as perfectly formed
as if printed by the best modern type and the labor to complete them must
have been very great.  The paper shows no evidence of having been ruled
and few expert penmen of the present day could equal the work, and certainly
for accuracy and neatness could not excel it.  These books originally
comprised some 100 to 150 pages each and have been partially preserved
by his grandchildren.  The peculiar views expounded in these relics of
Phillip Hoodenpyl have not been greatly admired nor concurred in by
his children, but the work deserves preservation for their oddity and the
loving labor and great skill exhibited.

                                                                                             P. J. Norwood.
                                                                                                 Cleburne, Texas, August 1st, 1892

A copy of the manuscript is in The Tennessee State Library & Archives,
Nashville, TN - MS SEC. 71 -95  
                                                                     AC. NO. 

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