Not much information is known about Nancy Rebecca Harman, the daughter of Martha Langford and John Harman. In the previous article about Nancy, we determined Nancy was born about 1855 in Lexington County, South Carolina. She most likely married Martin Harrison Corley in about 1870. Nancy and Martin lived with some children in Edgefield County, South Carolina in 1880.1
The next research phase is to find evidence of the marriage between Nancy and Martin, such as a church record or a newspaper announcement. After that, it is necessary to start to confirm the children listed on FamilySearch with records.
Table of Contents
South Carolina Marriage Records
South Carolina marriage records are a little tricky to find. The government did not officially begin to record marriages until 1911. This means all earlier marriages are found in other sources like church records, newspapers, military records, and obituaries. The FamilySearch Research Wiki article on Finding South Carolina Marriage Records contains a list of marriage record databases. The collections for marriages before 1911 are small and rather limited. It is worth checking these, but the likelihood of finding a marriage in these collections is low. There was no marriage record for Nancy and Martin in these collections.
Church records are also limited to Lexington County, South Carolina. The FamilySearch Catalog only lists two collections of church marriage records for Lexington County. Neither collection includes records for marriages that occurred about 1870. There may be church records for the marriage between Nancy and Martin, but it may require a bit of work to uncover.
There are two really good newspaper collections for South Carolina. The first is South Carolina Newspapers, 1787-2009 on MyHeritage. This collection is expansive and can be searched by keyword and year. The only challenge is the search cannot be easily refined or sorted. A search for Nancy Harman/Corley or Martin Corley returned hundreds of results that would take time to go through.
The Historical Newspapers of South Carolina collections are provided by the University of South Carolina Libraries. This collection includes a large collection of digitized historic newspapers and can be searched by county, publication title, date range, and keywords. Searches for Nancy Harman/Corley and Martin Corley returned a few results, but none that were applicable.
It may not be possible to find more evidence of the marriage between Nancy Rebecca Harman and Martin Harrison Corley. Perhaps there is a family bible or other document that may give a marriage date.
Time Line for Martin Harrison Corley
Martin Harrison Corley’s FamilySearch profile had a lot of records attached. He also has 4 wives and 24 children. Did Martin marry 4 different women and have 24 children? Could his FamilySearch profile be mixed up with other men named Martin Corley? A timeline of events based on the attached records will help begin sorting this out.
The timeline revealed three distinct families or marriages with Nancy, Annie J. Sutton, and Sallie Scarborough. It also revealed multiple locations in three states, South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama. There were no records to support the marriage of Martin Harrison Corley to America Fannie Crosby. The timeline does not list all of the children listed on his FamilySearch profile. Only the children with records are included in the timeline.
This timeline does raise some questions. Why did the Martin Corley family move so frequently? Is the same Martin Harrison Corley from Lexington County the father of these three families? It does seem possible there could be more than one man named Martin Corley.
The 1870 & 1880 U.S. Census does give a possible marriage year range for the marriage of Nancy and Martin. Martin is still single in the 1870 U.S. Census.2 The oldest child listed in the 1880 U.S. Census was born in 1872. This suggests a marriage between 1870-1871.
Children of Nancy Rebecca Harman
This next chart lists all of the children of Martin’s wives based on what is listed on FamilySearch.
The children listed under Nancy raise some questions. James Claude, Robert Lee, Eleanor, Hattie, and Sallie F were all born in Georgia. It seems unlikely that Nancy and Martin moved back and forth between South Carolina and Georgia every other year to have a child. The children born in Georgia were not listed in the 1880 U.S. Census.
The children listed under Annie Jane Sutton follow sequentially the children listed under Nancy. But some of the names appear to be very similar. Robert Lee is listed under both but with different birth years. Same with Eleanor and Ellie Nora, Hattie and Hattie Bell. These children may be mixed up and incorrectly listed with Nancy.
The children listed with Sallie Scarborough overlap the children listed with Annie Jane Sutton. The only marriage with evidence is the marriage between Martin and Sallie. They married on 27 November 1899 in Mitchell County, Georgia.5 It is still not clear if Martin Corley from Lexington County, South Carolina is the same Martin Corley who married Sallie Scarborough. That is still an open question.
Next Steps
Sorting all of this out will be a lot of work. It may even require DNA. My primary focus is to find Langford family descendants. This means only focusing on the children of Nancy and Martin. In this endeavor, it means researching the children listed in the 1880 U.S. Census. The children listed under Nancy, but born in Georgia, will be disconnected and possibly added or merged with potential duplicates. The remaining families will be left for others to sort out because there is not enough evidence to know what to do.
Sources
- 1880 U.S. Census, Edgefield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Huiet Township, enumeration district (ED) 54, sheet 216 (stamped), p. 43 (penned), dwelling 401, family 401, Martin Corley household; digital image, FamilySearch (http://familysearch.org : accessed 25 July 2024); citing NARA microfilm publication T9. ↩︎
- 1870 U.S. Census, Lexington County, South Carolina, population schedule, Lexington Township, p. 72 (penned), dwelling 575, family 569, Joel Corley household; digital image, FamilySearch (http://www.familysearch.org : accessed 25 July 2024); citing NARA microfilm publication M593. ↩︎
- 1900 U.S. Census, Dale County, Alabama, population schedule, Precinct 4, Newton, enumeration district (ED) 61, sheet 177A (penned), dwelling 210, family 212, Martin H. Corley household; digital image, FamilySearch, (http://www.familysearch.org : accessed 25 July 2024); citing NARA microfilm publication T623. ↩︎
- 1910 U.S. Mitchell County, Georgia, population schedule, Dale City, Militia District 1603, enumeration district (ED) 117, sheet 2A (penned), dwelling 28, family 28, Martin H. Corley household; digital image, FamilySearch, (http://www.familysearch.org : accessed 25 July 2025); citing NARA microfilm publication T624. ↩︎
- “Georgia, County Marriages, 1785-1950,” entry for M. H. Corley – Sallie Scarborough, 27 November 1899, page 359; digital images, Mitchell County, Georgia, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 25 July 2025). ↩︎
