GENEALOGY

Origins of the Parrish Family

The name, Parrish, originated in England around 1500. The origin is uncertain, but some believe that it may have come from the word Parish that was used as a title of the districts. Some families have added the "r." Thomas Parrish came to the colonies on the ship Increase in 1635. They settled in Virginia, Maryland, Massachusetts, and the Carolinas. Edward Parrish (1640-1680) was a Quaker planter and significant landholder in Baltimore, Maryland. History records that there were four Parrish brothers that settled in Virginia and spread to the surrounding colonies. 

The sixth generation from Edward Parrish (1640-1680) was Mager Parrish (1769-1814). He was born in Goochland, Virginia, and fought in the War of 1812. His family moved from Virginia to Kentucky. In 1818 the western part of Tennessee was inhabited by Chickasaw Indians. General Andrew Jackson, ten years before he became president, and Isaac Shelby, who had been the governor of Kentucky were meeting with Chickasaw leaders offering them $300,000 for land, which opened the way for development in what became West Tennessee.

Soon after Mager’s death his family moved to Dyer County, Tennessee. His wife was Judith Shelton (1769-1840). Her ancestry goes back to John de Shelton (1099) England. Her ancestry goes like this: Sir Thomas Shelton (1537); Sir Ralph Shelton (1514), etc. Some of the Shelton titles were: Sheriff of Nottingham, Knight of the Bath, and Knight of the Garter.

Mager and Judith had nine children.
One of his sons Nelson Parrish   (1808) was my great ,great
grandfather. The Parrishes continued to be landowners. 
My great grandfather was a Baptist minister.
My grandfather was a veterinarian.

When he was 40 years old, while doctoring a horse,
was kicked in the stomach and died from the injury.

My dad was seven when his dad died. He had two sisters, so it became his responsibility, as the only man of the house, to become the head of the household, a huge responsibility. His mother married again two years after my grand-father died. She married Homer Oliver Hendren Sr. He had two sons and a daughter who became my dad’s step brothers and sister. Dad’s mother Ola Kee and Oliver Hendren had a one son and one daughter together, who were half-brother and half-sister to my dad.

Counting my dad (John A. Parrish 1913-1973), there were eight children in the Parrish-Hendren family. John Parrish and his wife Lois Tedford (1914-1990), had three children-two sons and one daughter. I was the oldest of the three born in 1933; my brother 1935; and my sister 1943.

This is the story of the Parrish family from their settlement in Virginia up to the present. We are the eleventh generation of the Parrish family. 

Aubrey Ted Parrish

John Gilbert Parrish

Lois Ann Parrish