Notes: Judith Bullock Thomson Nesbit, an avid "Bluff Archie" researcher who died in 2012, believed that the Daniel McNeill who wrote the will of 1808 is the son of "Bluff Archie" McNeill and his wife Barbara Baker. Judith was a direct descendant of "Bluff Archie" McNeill. According to his will, this Daniel McNeill owned several tracts on Black River and bought land from James McNeill of the Bluff and John Dickson.
     It has to be noted that on page 458 of Lumber River Scots, its author Edwin Purcell could not identify a record of births from a bible that had belonged to Mrs. John W. McMillan of Stedman, NC a small town just east of Fayetteville. Mrs. McMillan was Lillie E. McCall (1886-1978) who married John Wesley McMillan, Jr. of Stedman, NC, and a daughter of Malcolm Harvey McMillan and wife Mary A. Faircloth McCall. One of the children listed below, Ann "Nancy" McNeill, married Dr. John McCall of Bladen County, NC, and Lillie was Nancy McNeill McCall's descendant. The children listed below are found in a number of Cumberland County deeds and cited in the records of baptisms of old Bluff Presbyterian Church, and thus have been positively identifed as those of Capt. Daniel McNeill and Isabella McLaren McNeill. Purcell or his source suspected that the children on page 458 may have been the offspring of Mary Torrey and "Red Hector" McNeill of Cumberland County. They were not.
     Isabella McLeran McNeill had siblings Archibald McLeran, John McLeran Jr., and Nancy who married Daniel McMillan, children of John McLaren Sr. who died some time before 1816. Daniel McMillan co-signed Daniel's marriage bond, a copy of which is in Daniel's war pension records.
     The dates of their children below come from the baptismal records of Bluff Church, from a bible record in Purcell's Lumber River Scots (that is mislabeled as the children of Red Hector McNeill and Mary Torry), and the graves of Daniel and Isabella McNeill at Bluff Church cemetery and the nearby graves of their three sons.
     Daniel and family lived in the eastern division (Flea Hill district on the east side of the CFR, due east of Fayetteville) and his will showed that he owned land there; he may have been the Daniel McNeill of Black River who bought and sold much land in that part of the county. In 1800 Daniel bought from John Dickson 700 acres on the north side of Great Rockfish Creek around Beaver Creek near McPherson, Gillis and others' properties. This land is near the original lands of his father 'Bluff Archy", afterwards owned by Daniel's brother Malcolm.
     In the 1850 Cumberland County census, Isabella McNeill, aged 81, is living in the eastern division with her daughter, Isabella aged 52 (see below), and together they are next door to her brother Archibald McLaren. Also living with Isabella in 1850 was her grandson Allan A. McCaskill, son of her daughter Sally McCaskill. Allan was aged 24 at the time, a laborer in Isabella's household, who later in life wrote a short article on various Hector McNeills that included his great uncle "Old Colonel Hector" McNeill of Tory fame. He stated in his article that Colonel Hector was the son of "Bluff Archy" McNeill and spoke of the carefully preserved family history of "Gentleman/Bluff Archy" and his beginnings in the region. By living with his grandmother in 1850, it's apparent that McCaskill had received his information directly from the her, as she would have known of her husband's and his brother's each taking opposing sides in the Revolutionary conflict. McCaskill also stated that Daniel was an 'artisan' in the Continental service. Isabella's application for a pension was denied initially because she could "not establish proof of his identity"; she did, however, succeed in getting his pension. Two documents from Daniel's pension records (doc 1 and doc 2) state that Daniel was discharged a private, married 'Isabella McLarran' and that he died 31 October 1807. In the Bluff Church baptismal records Daniel is given the title "Capt. Daniel McNeill" at the birth of their daughter Mary in 1796.