The Sons of the American Revolution, Piedmont Chapter, of Atlanta, and the descendents of William Peeples (1751-1854), a pioneer citizen of Murray County, will hold a service at Mt. Zion United Methodist Church and Cemetery in his honor March 10 at 11 a.m.

Members of the Peeples family and the public are invited to the event.

A reception after the service will take place in the fellowship hall of the church for members of the family and members of the Sons of the American Revolution only.

The church is located at 30 Wilbanks Road, Chatsworth, Ga. For more information, call Jerry A. Maddox, a descendent of Peeples, at 770-396-6135.

Peeples’ descendents populate counties throughout Northwest Georgia today, including Gordon.

About William Peeples

Peeples enlisted in the Continental Army of the United States of the America to serve as a soldier in the Revolutionary War under Gen. George Washington as a private on April 11, 1776. He was a member of Capt. Robert Fenner’s Company, 2nd Battalion, commanded by Col John Patton of the 2nd North Carolina Regiment. He served for 2 1/2 years and mustered out on Oct. 1, 1778. During the time of his enlistment in 1778, he was stationed near White Plains, NY, in the area close to the Hudson River Highlands and West Point at Camp White Plains. However, the 2nd NC Regiment did not fithat the well-known battle of White Plains, NY, in 1776, as they remained in the south at this time, being involved in skirmishes in Virginia, South Carolina and North Carolina.

Peeples was married first to a woman named Mary, reported to be a Maryland beauty, and she had several children. Records are incomplete regarding his first wife and the names of her offspring. When she died, he married a second time to Rebeckah Johnson of North Carolina. They moved to Georgia in 1795 and became parents of five children.

William was a sixth generation descendent of David Peebles of Edinburgh, Scotland, who came to Virginia in 1649, and with the help of indentured servants, established a plantation on 833 acres called Bon Accord in Surry County. Peebles became a Captain in the militia and was a tobacco farmer. Fights with the Native Americans in the area led to his death in the late 1650s. His plantation was located west of Petersburg, Va., and south of Williamsburg and Jamestown, Va., and today is a soybean farm of approximately 600 acres.

When William moved to Georgia, he changed the spelling of his name to Peeples. His children were twin sons, Drury and John, another son named William, and two daughters, Sarah and Mary. Complete genealogical. Records of the family can be found in “The Peeples Family: Descendents of William Peeples (1751-1854). This book can be found in the Georiga Archives Building in Morrow, Ga., at the Emory University Library, along with public libraries in the following counties: Murray, Whitfield, Gordon, Pickens and Catoosa.

Considerable references regarding the place of interment for Williams indicate a burial site in the Mt. Zion Church Cemetery. The exact location of the grave has not been determined, but a memorial grave marker was donated in the Peeples section of the cemetery to show that William was buried somewhere in the cemetery.

The first Mt. Zion Methodist Church was built by William’s son, Drury, and erected in the 1800s. This church was a wooden structure and was torn down in 1945. Drury Peeples is the ancestor of many members of the Peeples family living in Chatsworth and Murray County today. He is buried not far from the site of the first church.