Valentine Braswell: Vagrant and Horse Thief

North Carolina Genealogical Society Journal February 1995

Article titled: "The Higdons of Prince George Co., Virginia":

The younger Daniel HIGDON was involved in several illegal and nefarious activities involving several Indian Trader families who lived in North Carolina and at Sandy Bluff, South Carolina.

On 23 June 1767 the Georgia Gazette wrote the following article: “Last Monday, George UNDERWOOD Charles HIGDON, John MacKILROY, Valentine BRAZEL (BRASWELL) and Daniel HIGDON, who were taken up as vagrants, and in whose possession several horses belonging to gentlemen in the province were found: were brought to town under a guard of the militia and committed to gaol, by virtue of a warrant from two justices of the peace at Augusta. A sixth brother to the two HIGDONs was killed in resisting the persons sent out to arrest them.”

According to Lucille B. Coone: "Other North Carolinians, who were running in gangs, in the Carolina back country at this time, were Timothy TYRELL (FERRELL), John ARTS, James ASHWORTH and Edward GIBSON... The penalty for horse stealing was death. Somehow Daniel HIGDON, Valentine BRASSWELL, and George UNDERWOOD escaped from jail.”

(The last two paragraphs were from Lucille D. Coone, Colonial Higdons and Some of their Descendants (Manassas, VA 1987, p 27 & 29)