Introduction: In this article, Melissa Davenport Berry describes a hale and hearty 104-year-old man whose travels and adventures made him a local legend. Melissa is a genealogist who has a website, americana-archives.com, and a Facebook group, New England Family Genealogy and History.

Today, my subject is the renowned and vibrant Captain Robert Westberry Andrews (1790-1894), a centenarian. He was born on 4 July 1790 in Stateburg, South Carolina, and tales of his adventures are still talked about today – especially the long jaunts he made around the country.

He’s also noteworthy for having fathered 12 children, the first when he was 53 – and the last when he was 78!

He was one of 12 children of Robert Andrews Sr. and Rhoda (Drewry) Andrews, and fathered 12 children himself with his second wife, Elizabeth (Connors) Andrews. Except for one son, all his offshoots married and left numerous descendants.

Children of Robert and Elizabeth Andrews

• Henrietta Aadeline Andrews (1843-1884), married Lawrence Newton Barwick
• Oregon Texas Andrews (1845-1912), married Isabella McLeod
• Augusta Sylvester Andrews (1847-1935), married Abraham Ardis
• Mary Elizabeth Andrews (1849-1923), married James Griffin
• Robert Charles Andrews (1851-1932), married Irene A. Bell
• Leonore Unity Andrews (1854-1926), married James Phillips
• Rhoda Victoria Andrews (1856-1935), married Edward Richardson
• John Portor Andrews (1859-1938), married Francis Elizabeth Webb
• Martha Rose Andrews (1861-1897), married Robert Bradwell
• Pinckney Elijah Andrews (1863-1937), married Mamie Scott
• Rosa A. Andrews (1865-1946), married Lawrence B. Nichols
• Joseph Andrews (1868) died in infancy.

Capt. Andrews’ adventures started during the blockade from the War of 1812, when he drove a four-mule team from Statesburg to Boston, transporting Southern products like cotton, and returning with wool and other items made up North.

He also worked at a mill in Newton, Massachusetts, and made a go of the honey business for one year in New York, in which he reported a profit.

He went back down South for a while and caught a terrible fever. While recovering, his physician Dr. Hildreth introduced him to Captain Evans of the ship Sarah and Caroline, and Robert joined his crew in Boston as an “able seaman” and ship carpenter.

After his sailing days he was back down South and worked as a carpenter at the Stateburg Tavern owned by Middleton Brooks. Later, Robert ran his own tavern and noted in his autobiography:

“Innholders were the one who decided all bets and disbursed the news of the day; he was supposed to be authority on horseflesh, an expert at cards, a keen politician, and, withal, a judge of good whiskey. To embody these various qualifications, when becoming a successful Boniface [owner of a hotel or nightclub], it was necessary for me to have connected with my establishment a billiard table, a nine-pin alley, a bagatelle table, and a little side room for a game of “poker”; and it was these accessories which came near bringing my mortal career to a sudden and untimely termination.”

He served a short stint in the Confederate Army during the Civil War, with a position as veterinary surgeon under Capt. Ward Hampton’s command.

After the war he became sheriff of Sumter, South Carolina, and was the local veterinarian surgeon. He was a lover of animals.

Here is a snippet from a news clip covering one of Capt. Andrews’ jaunts to Massachusetts. He visited his son O. T. Andrews, who was employed at Paine’s Furniture Co. Accompanying Capt. Andrews was his little terrier named Fido, who became almost as famous as the captain himself.

This article reads:

THE TRAMP TRAVELER.

Capt. Robert W. Andrews and Fido.

From the Boston Globe.

Capt. Robert W. Andrews, of Sumter, S. C., deserves his reputation as a great American traveler. He is now 96 years old and in the past two years has traveled upwards of 7,000 miles in his pedestrian trips through the country. This is counting for the long trips only, as he does not count walks of 100 miles or so.

This morning the Captain, looking as hale and hearty as when he came into the Globe office over two years ago, was again seen at this office and extended a welcome. Although the captain’s age is 96, no one would imagine him to be over 60 from his looks, and, indeed, there are some men of half his age that look as old. He is a very tall man, straight as an arrow, with long gray beard and moustache, and iron-gray hair.

Some Descendants of Capt. Andrews

The following newsclip mentions two of Capt. Andrews’ daughters living in Sumter.

This article reads:

The late Capt. Robert W. Andrews has two daughters living in this township. Mrs. Mary E. Turner, wife of Mr. Long John Turner, and Mrs. Augusta S. Ardis, wife of Mr. Abe Ardis. In this connection it may be mentioned that Capt. Andrews’s widow died in Georgia on Christmas day and was buried at the Weeks graveyard, near Pinewood. Her maiden name was Connor[s]. She and Capt. Andrews were the parents of eleven children – ten of whom are now living, the oldest one, Mr. Oregon Texas Andrews, lives in Boston.

Below is a photo of Captain George Wilson Andrews (1873-1942), a decorated war hero and son of Confederate soldier Oregon T. Andrews and Isabella (McLeod) Andrews. The War Department in 1932 awarded Andrews the Purple Heart decoration with oak leaf cluster.

Below is the engagement photo of Joan Ellis Goodin (1923-2011), daughter of Charles Ellis Goodin and Louis Nell (Nichols) Goodin. Her grandmother Rosa Anna (Andrews) Nichols, wife of Lawrence Nichols, was the youngest daughter of Capt. Robert W. Andrews, making Joan Ellis the great-granddaughter of Capt. Andrews. This engagement photo was taken in 1947 when she married Robert Day (1915-2003).

I found this photo in the Reading Eagle newspaper announcing the engagement of Miss Betty Jane Bowers, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. L. M. Bowers, to the great-grandson of Capt. Robert W. Andrews, Thomas Vitchell Trembley, son of Vitchel Varis Trembley and Archie Gertrude (Andrews) Trembley, granddaughter of John Porter Andrews and Elizabeth (Webb) Andrews.

The photo caption reads:

Miss Betty Jane Bowers, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. L. M. Bowers, of 406 North Sixth St., whose engagement to Thomas Trembley is announced today, her 21st birthday anniversary. Mr. Trembley is a native of Sumter, S. C., and is a great-grandson of the late Capt. Robert W. Andrews. Miss Bowers is a student nurse at St. Luke’s Children’s Medical Center in Philadelphia. Mr. Trembley served in Africa and Panama for a period of six years.

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Note on the header image: close-up of a colorized picture of Capt. Robert W. Andrews. Credit: Jennifer Mills Martin.