Based on records covering his service in the army during the War of 1812, Henry Burkett was born about 1794 in Tennessee. (Although Tennessee did not become a state until 1796, we believe Henry was saying he was born in an area that later became Tennessee.) After being discharged in Missouri in 1818, he returned to Tennessee.

On August 23, 1819, he married Mary ‘Polly’ Epley in Greene County, Tennessee. They moved to middle Tennessee where all of their eleven (11) children were born.

Henry Burkett was a blacksmith and farmer. Records show he owned a 150 acre parcel of land near Short Mountain, Tennessee for a short period of time and then purchased 270 acres on the headwaters of Carson Creek in the southwestern part of Cannon County. According to a son, David, he was living on these 270 acres when he died March 30, 1875. His place of burial has never been located.

One of the sons, Jacob Lorenza Burkett, moved to Texas arriving there on Christmas day of 1865. When his father died in 1875, Jacob returned to Tennessee and, upon his return to Texas, carried with him his mother, two (2) sisters and their families plus some cousins. The mother, Mary Epley Burkett, died in Texas in 1884 and is buried at Williams Ranch Cemetery near Mullin, Texas.

PLEASE NOTE: HENRY BURKETT HAD A SON NAMED HENRY ISAAC BURKETT. TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEN THEM, WE REFER TO THEM AS HENRY SR. AND HENRY JR. EVEN THOUGH THEY WERE NOT TECHNICALLY A SR. AND JR.

1 Henry Burkett, Sr. b: Abt. 1794 in TN d: March 30, 1875 in Cannon County, Tenn

. +Mary Magdalene Epley b: December 28, 1800 in Lincoln County, North Carolina m: August 23, 1819 in Greene County, Tenn. d: July 29, 1884 in Mullin, Texas

Mary ‘Polly’ Epley Burkett