Will of Joseph Jackson

My maternal great-great-great-great-great-grandfather was Joseph Jackson, commonly thought to have been born June 17, 1766 in Westmoreland, a former county of northwest England.  He immigrated likely through Baltimore, settling first in Maryland, where he fathered at least the first two of three children with an unknown first wife beginning in approximately 1802 (children: Joseph, Thomas [my ancestor], Peggy).  He married Nancy Elam on November 6, 1810 in Wythe Co., Virginia, having three more children (Sarah, Mary, Nathan), before moving west to Vermilion Co., Illinois.  According to a 1935 publication written by Vermilion Co. schoolchildren (Stories of Historical Days in Vermilion County, Illinois), Joseph Jackson sent two children to the first school there as early as the 1824-1825 school year.  Joseph Jackson's will was written on September 14, 1840, but not probated until November 7, 1846, the year in which he must have died.  (Unsourced research provides an apparently spurious November 8 death date.)  A transcription of the text of the will follows.

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"I Joseph Jackson of County of Vermilion and State of Illinois being weak in body though of sound mind and memory and calling to mind the mortality of man and that it is appointed for all men once to die: do make and ordain this my last will and testament in manner and form as follows (to wit)

First I give and bequeath to my beloved wife Nancy all my real estate so long as she lives it being the east half of the southeast quarter of section fifteen and the east half of the northeast quarter of section twenty two both of township seventeen north of range twelve west, and at her death my will is that my daughter Mary Jackson have sixty acres off of the west part of my land that is thirty acres off of east half quarter above described, and my son Nathan Jackson to have the remainder. My will that my personal property be sold or sufficient of it to pay my just debts and funeral charges and to give to my other children as follows to wit: to my daughter Sarah Nipe [sic] one hundred dollars, to my son Joseph Jackson five dollars, to my son Thomas Jackson five dollars, and to my daughter Peggy full sister to Joseph and Thomas five dollars and the remainder of my personal property (if there should be any) I give to my wife for the use of my family. I do further constitute and ordain my last will and testament and I do hereby dismiss and revoke all former wills and testaments in testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal this 14^th day of September 1840."

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Incidentally, receipts in the estate file show that my great-great-great-great-grandfather Thomas didn't receive his $5 until August 30, 1850, when he and his family were likely already living along the White River in Washington Co., Arkansas (where they are enumerated in November in the Census)!