Joseph Cloud ~ Traveling Minister

Traveling minister Joseph Cloud was an influential minister who encouraged Friends in South Carolina and Georgia to leave the south and move to the Northwest Territory and who held meetings for worship in Waynesville during one of his travels in 1800.

“In the summer of 1800, Joseph Cloud, from North Carolina and Jacob Jackson, from Tennessee, ministers, paid a visit to Ohio, held their first meetings at George Harlan’s Deerfield; then proceeded to Waynesville and held one or two meeting there, and, lastly one at High Bank. This meeting and that at Deerfield were those alluded to in the memorial of Joseph Cloud on their way to and from Waynesville” (MEMORANDA: of the early settlement of Friends in the North-west Territory, and especially of Thomas Beals, who was the first minister of the Gospel in the Society of Friends who crossed the Ohio River by Gershom Perdue (Indianapolis, Indiana: Edited and reprinted by Willard Heiss, 1974), p. 7).

Joseph Cloud and family would later settle in Waynesville in 1805. He, and fellow Quaker minister, Roland Richards, would be rival ministers in the newly established Miami Monthly Meeting.

Friend Joseph Cloud was born in Chester Co., Pa., on March 1, 1743. His parents were Mordecai Cloud and Abigail Johnson Cloud. He and his second wife, Hannah, were two of the first Friends at Cane Creek Monthly Meeting in North Carolina to be recorded as ministers. According to Cane Creek Monthly Meeting Minutes, Joseph Cloud made many “traveling minister” trips between 1779 and 1804 to Tyson’s’ Settlement, to “Friends on the Western Waters”, to eastern Pennsylvania and to Europe in 1804. In 1799 he visited Pee Dee Monthly Meeting during the time of great decline in the number of Friends in North Carolina as Friends moved into the Northwest Territory. The meeting was set down shortly after his visit. (See, Cane Creek: Mother of Meetings by Bobbie T. Teague [Greensboro, N.C.: North Caroline Yearly Meeting of Friends, 1995], pp. 26, 41 and 94).

“In 1800 Joseph Cloud, a minister of North Carolina who had been among the meeting on ‘the western waters’, visited South Carolina and Georgia, no doubt in the interest of removal. Borden Stanton wrote them urging them to go west in 1802. A certificate from Wrightsboro Monthly Meeting to Cane Creek Monthly Meeting, N. C., dated June 4, 1803 is the last evidence we have of Georgia Friends. They had departed to the great west” (quoted from Week’s Southern Quakers and Slavery, p. 124 in Hinshaw’s Encyclopedia of American Quaker Genealogy, Vol. I (North Carolina) [Baltimore: The Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 1991], p. 1041).

Joseph Cloud died near Waynesville in Warren County, Ohio July 24th, 1816. It is believed that he is buried in the old Quaker Graveyard in Waynesville, although there is no record of it. The burial is mentioned in Memorials of Deceased Friends Who were Members of Indian Yearly Meeting. (Orthodox) published by Direction of the Yearly Meeting (Cincinnati: E. Morgan & Sons, No. 111 Main Street, 1857), p. 30.

Joseph Cloud was married four times. He was married first to Mary Earl Underwood Cloud (b. 3 mo. 22nd 1743 in Chester Co., Pa. ~ d. 1 mo 10th 1789 in her 46th year, buried in Cane Creek Cemetery) in 1763. They had eleven children: Abner (1764), Samuel (1766), Jacob (1767), Jonathan (1772), Anne (1773), Joseph (1775), Mary (1777), Mordecai (1780), Daniel (1783), Joel (1785), Abigail (1788).

His second marriage was to Mrs. Hannah (Beals) Hoggatt on April 22, 1790. Hannah Cloud, the wife of Joseph and the daughter of John Beals, died on 2 mo. 4th, 1804, aged about 59 years and was buried at Center Monthly Meeting on February 6th. She died a little under two years before Joseph and two of his children moved to Miami Monthly Meeting. Joseph Cloud and children Joel and Abigail received on certificate at Miami Monthly Meeting from Cane Creek Monthly Meeting in North Carolina, May 10th, 1805. Hannah Beals Hoggatt was the niece of famous Quaker minister, Thomas Beals, who was the first Quaker Missionary to the Indians of the Northwest Territory in 1775.

His third marriage was to Jane Ridgeway McKay (Hinshaw says she was Jane McCoy) at Waynesville in October 1806 (She died December 1806). For more information about Jane Ridgeway McKay, see The Robert McKay Clan website webmastered by Michael McKay, http://www.geocities.com/mckyrbnsn/lines/mackay/21.html. Andrew McKay was Jane Ridgeway Mckay's first husband.

His fourth marriage was to Mrs. Mary (Cook) Hunt in 1810. Joseph moved his membership to Center Monthly Meeting in Clinton County 5th mo. 30 1810 to marry Mary Cook Hunt on 7th mo. 7 day 1810. See website: http://home.sprynet.com/ ~jrichmon/clou0001.htm. Also see, Hinshaw’s Encyclopedia of American Quaker Genealogy, Vol. I (North Carolina) [Baltimore: The Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 1991], pp. 348, 380, 651, 676 and 1041).

Early Friends in the East petitioned the Continental Congress expressing their concerns about slavery on 4th day of the Tenth Month 1783. They expressed their moral objections and fears for the future of the United States if slavery were not dealt with properly (NARA~Seattle, M247, r 57, I 43, p. 337, Papers of the Continental Congress, 1774-1783). Five years later, Friends at the Yearly Meeting held at Wells Meeting in Perquimans County with representatives from North and South Carolina and Georgia again expressed their concern about slavery pointing out that Friends themselves “had yet to cleanse their hands of slave holding”. A new committee of 24 Friends was appointed to lead the fight against slavery. One committee member was Joseph Cloud, another was John Beals (probably his second wife’s father) (see, http://www.rootsweb.com/~quakers/petition.htm).

The Will of Joseph Cloud is located in the Warren County, Ohio Probate Archives in the county courthouse in Lebanon, Ohio. OCP 13 #15 ~ DE O P.113 ~ 2 SEP 1816. Date Signed: 24 AUG 1813. Residence: Caesars Creek. Exec: Benjamin Butterworth. Heirs: Widow Mary, son Abner, Son Samuel, son Jacob, son Jonathan, son Joseph, son Joel, dau. Abigail, dau. Anne, gr. dau. Lucreta, son Daniel, son Mordecai (Warren Co., Ohio 1803-1859, Will & Estate Records [Cardinal Research, 9500 Creekside Dr., Loveland, Ohio 45140, 1993], p. 22.)