My Genealogy Hound

Dr. Humphrey H. Bate, a physician and surgeon, and a successful farmer of the First District, Sumner County, is a son of Humphrey and Anne F. (Weatherred) Bate, and was born in the house where he now resides, in 1844, being the eight of a family of nine children—three sons and two daughters now living. The father was of Welsh extraction, born in North Carolina in 1779, and died September 1, 1856. The grand- father, James Bate, was a son of Humphrey Bate. Our subject’s father received a good common-school and business education, and when quite young was apprenticed to a ship builder and learned the carpenter’s trade, which he followed for years; he also learned surveying, and was engaged with Col. Tipton in Sumner County and in West Tennessee for some time surveying. Mr. Bate was married twice, first to Miss Elizabeth Brineage, October 21, 1803, and by this marriage had six children. Mrs. Bate was born October 21, 1777, and died November 16, 1820; and September 7, 1811, he married our subject’s mother. He moved to Sumner County before the death of his first wife, and soon after located on the farm where he now resides. In 1849 he moved to Texas and engaged in farming and surveying, but five years later he returned to Sumner County, where he spent the rest of his life. He was a man of marked energy and ability, and held the rank of colonel in the militia for a long time. Our subject’s mother was born in Virginia, September 7, 1804, and died April 1, 1875. She was the daughter of William and Patience Weatherred. Dr. Bate’s parents were both prominent members of the Missionary Baptist Church. Dr. Bate was educated chiefly at Rural Academy. He was a cousin of Gov. Bate, their mothers being sisters, and Dr. Bate’s father was the grandfather of Gov. Bate. When only seventeen years of age, in April, 1861, he enlisted in the Confederate Army in Bate’s Second Regiment of Tennessee Infantry, and was in the battle of Bull Run; he served a year in the Virginia campaign, then reenlisted in the Tennessee Army, and at the battle of Shiloh received four severe wounds which incapacitated him for further service, and he has never entirely recovered from one. In 1866 he entered the medical department of the Nashville University and graduated in 1868, and after taking another course of lectures, commenced practicing medicine in Sumner County, and is now one of the leading physicians of the county, carrying an extensive and lucrative practice. October 27, 1869, he married Miss Martha A. Franklin, who was born near Hartsville in 1846, and died February 11, 1871. November 25, 1873, he married Miss Nannie D., daughter of William and Nancy S. (Cook) Simpson, of Tipton County. Two children, Humphrey and Anne, have been born to their marriage. Dr. Bate owns 300 acres of the old home farm near Castalian Springs, and is living in the house that Gov. Bate was born in, it having been built when the State was a part of North Carolina, and is one of the oldest brick residences of the county, and still in a good state of preservation. Politically Dr. Bate is a Democrat, and he is a Mason and a member of the Christian Church, his wife being an Old School Presbyterian. He is an influential citizen of the county and a popular gentleman and fine physician.