The information below provided courtesy of Joyce Hetrick.

DANIEL DILLON-2,  had moved to Guilford from Virginia. DANIEL was the son of LUKE-1 and SUSAN __?__ DILLON

First, there is no "Kilkearney" County, Ireland. The name is probably a bastardization of "Killkenny."

Secondly, in the book, Quaker Friends of Ye 0lden Times, the appendix states, on page 184, that the Nantucket Island, Mass. Quakers did not start coming to New Garden until 1771, and that the first of these was a man named Coffin. Mr. Coffin's grandson was quoted relating the time of arrival at New Garden and the place he left. From other sources, though, we know that our DILLONS were in New Garden before there even "was a New Garden." Also, we know that our group did not come down with the Nantucket Quaker group but left the northeast about 40 years before the Nantucket group did, and settled in Frederick County, Virginia.

Frederick County, Virginia, according to Cartmell’s Shenandoah Valley Pioneers and Their Descendants, a History of Frederick County, Virginia, page 509, says that Frederick County was “Situated in the heart of the Shenandoah Valley, shut in by the Allegany ranges on the west which afforded almost a perfect barrier against cyclonic and tornado storms that sweep from the Great Lakes region...” He went on to extole the virtues of the variety of soils and the “early spring grazing on the mountain sides.”

Winchester is the county seat of Frederick County. In March of 1743, George Hodge was one of the Justices of the county who took the bond of the new clerk of the county. Lots were sold for the new town of Winchester. In 1746, the city fathers saw fit to erect a ducking stool on the model of the one at Fredericksburg. It has a pit 7 feet deep and six feet square and lined with rock. The county jail had been erected in 1744.

LUKE and SUSAN [GARRETT?] DILLON had four children listed in the Quaker records, but it is likely that there were other children.

We do know the DILLONS were in Virginia by 1745, because DANIEL's oldest daughter was born there that year. Also, DANIEL's brother, William-2, was in a party to lay out a road.

We have laid off the road from Captain Frosts mill thence to Buffler lick, thence to the Backside of John Bossers' field, thence to David Shrinaers, thence to the usual ford, thence on east side of Wm. Frosts; Plantation thence along a good Ridge by a course of marked trees to Matthias Elmores, thence along Elmores creek to the head  the best conveniensts[sic] way that can be had by widow Dillon’s, .... [Ibid.]

It is possible that the reference to "the widow Dillon" referred to LUKE's widow. It is probable that "everyone knew" to whom the reference was, and that she had lived there for some time by 1744 when the reference was made. William would have been about 30 years old in 1744, and at that time the other children of LUKE were marrying and establishing homes of their own.

The Hinshaw Encyclopedia of Quakers, a compilation of Quaker statistical records, and county deed, will, land and court records, were carefully searched, using the counties stated in the other research and surrounding counties. The minutes of the first 24 years of Hopewell Monthly Meeting were burned, so the records are incomplete, but the DILLONS probably settled in Virginia about 1732 with Ross on Apple Pie Ridge. [Hinshaw, pg 357-360.]

There is some contention about who was the first white settler in the area, and apparently there were two or three that contended for the honor. Unfortunately, it caused quite a bit of problem for settlers who got grants from these earlier settlers. A German man named Joist Hite [many different spellings] was one. There were overlapping claims to grants and many law suits were filed. Lord Fairfax tried to dispossess several settlers that had been there many years. A man named Isaac Van Meter probably proceeded Hite and seems to have the earlier grant, dated in 1730. Alexander Ross took up an even later grant of land.

Frederick County, Virginia, was formed by an Act of the House of Burgesses in 1738, which directed that Frederick and Augusta counties be taken from Orange County, which itself had been formed from Spottsylvania in 1734. That division contained lands that today are not still included in Frederick. Settlement had proceeded the division of the counties. Records for Augusta County, though it was formed in 1734, were not kept separately until the mid-1740’s. The first will in Augusta County was not recorded until 1746. Records for Augusta were apparently kept in the precursor county.

The "Irish Quakers" were usually not native Celtic Irish, but were usually transplanted Scots or Englishmen who had moved into Ireland to escape religious persecution. The Church of England/Ireland [the official religion] persecuted all dissenters, and especially the Quakers, who would take no part in war and make no oaths, which made them doubly suspect by the authorities. George Fox had "started" the Quakers, or Society of Friends as they called themselves, though he had no intention, at the time, of "starting" a "new" religion, but intended, instead, to go "back to the basics" of Christianity and do away with the pomp and circumstance of the then organized religious bodies

A sizable number of American Quakers came from the English settlements in Ireland. They left Ireland due to religious and economic persecution from the British government, and began to arrive in the colonies in large numbers in 1682. Pennsylvania was the "Quaker" Colony founded by William Penn. They dispersed into Maryland and surrounding colonies. They were slower to move into Virginia, whose leaders were firmly Church of England and anti Quaker, until into the second decade of the eighteenth century.

Cane Creek Meeting & New Garden Meeting of Friends

In 1752, DANIEL-2 and Peter Dillon got leave from Hopewell Monthly Meeting in Virginia to move to Cane Creek in North Carolina. Cane Creek was the first Meeting established in North Carolina. [Hinshaw.] DANIEL and Peter were probably either first cousins or brothers. They seemed to be very close friends as well. One entry in Hinshaw mentions Peter Dillon, son of Peter and Susannah, born 1725, in Opecan. This would make Peter a few years younger than DANIEL-2, and at closest, a first cousin, assuming that Peter [Sr.] was a brother to LUKE-1.

Because the distance to travel to the Cane Creek Monthly Meeting was more than 30 miles for some of the Friends, they petitioned to start a new Monthly Meeting called "New Garden." The Friends had been meeting unofficially for some time, but the official "start" was in 1754. Between 1754 and 1770, 86 Friends became members by migration to New Garden.

The story of the earliest meetings of Friends in Guilford County was passed on orally and written down in 1883.

Two large trees were felled so that the upper branches would join to form a triangle, and a third had fallen across the butts of these two trees, making a triangle or corrals, inside of which their horses were hitched. The Friends sat on the last tree to hold their meetings.

DANIEL DILLON-2 and Peter Dillon were both mentioned in the early Meeting Minutes of New Garden. [Hopewell Friends History, pg 540.] Several other families of the Frederick County Friends were also mentioned in New Garden. About 35 members were from Virginia. Some sources mention that DANIEL's wife was LYDIA HODGSON. There were many families of Hodgsons living near them, both in Virginia and in North Carolina and, in fact, one of them signed DANIEL's will as a witness. Both DANIEL and Peter Dillon were listed as received in New Garden in 1753 on the same day, although they may have been in the area for some time previously. [Hinshaw, pg 383.]

Thomas Beals, who had been living in Frederick County, Virginia, is credited with being the first settler in Guilford County about 1748. Cane Creek Monthly Meeting was officially established in 1751, but the first order of business was the request to establish "New Garden." At the time of the official start of New Garden there were "upwards of 40 families" in the New Garden area. [Hilty, New Garden Friends Meeting, The Christian People Called Quaker.]

Reedy Fork River [Creek] runs east and west through the northern one third of Guilford County. Feeding Reedy Fork are three smaller creeks, Beaver, Brush, and Horsepen. There are numerous deeds for land and a mill for DANIEL-2 and his sons on Beaver, Brush, Horsepen, and Reedy Fork Creeks. From the deeds, it seems that the lands probably were strung out along the three smaller creeks and on both sides of the Reedy Fork about where the three smaller ones fed in.

Quaker Life by Joyce Hetrick