Nathaniel Pope

Nathaniel Pope (January 5, 1784 – January 23, 1850) was an American government leader in the early history of the State of Illinois. He served as the Secretary of the Illinois Territory, then as a Delegate to the United States House of Representatives from the Illinois Territory, and for over thirty years as the United States district judge for the United States District Court for the District of Illinois. Early life and education Born on January 5, 1784, in Louisville in what was then District of Kentucky, Virginia (but became Kentucky in his lifetime), to the former Penelope Sanford Edwards (1757-) and her husband Col. William H. Pope (1740-1825). Although the youngest boy in his family, Pope could trace his ancestors in Virginia back to around 1650 when Nathaniel Pope moved from strife-torn Maryland into what became called the Northern Neck of Virginia, as did Humphrey Pope and James Pope, probably his brothers. Both this man's parents had been born in Westmoreland County, Virginia, as had his grandfather Worden Pope (1705-1748) and great-grandfather Nathaniel Pope III (1660-1719, sometime called "Bridges" after another of his thrice-widowed mother's husbands), although his grandmother Hester Netherton Pope was born in what was then Stafford County, Virginia. Although the Pope family was well-established in Virginia, its members would only begin holding statewide office after the Revolutionary War, in which they supported the Patriot cause under the leadership of their neighbor, George Washington (whose distant ancestor John Washington had married the daughter of one of the earliest men named Nathaniel Pope. His eldest brother John Pope (1770-1845) was born in Prince William County, Virginia and would also become a lawyer and hold high political office, including in both houses of the Kentucky legislature as well as the U.S. Congress before becoming governor of the Arkansas Territory. Other brothers included William H. Pope Jr (1775-1844) who was born as the family continued moving westward into Fauquier County, Virginia, and Alexander Pope (1781-1826) and Nathaniel Pope (1784-1850), both of whom were born as the family moved to Louisville in what became the state of Kentucky when he was a boy. His birth family included several sisters who survived to adulthood and married including Penelope Edwards Oldham (1769-1821), Jane Pope Field (1772-1852; also born in Fauquier County) and Hester Pope Edwards (1788-1868; born in Louisville).