Thomas Drayton's first wife Elizabeth Bull died in November, 1751. Drayton married Lady Mary MacKenzie in England in 1757. Mary was one of ten children of George MacKenzie, third Earl of Cromartie and his wife Isabel. The family had once lived in wealth, but after George MacKenzie chose the wrong side in a rebellion in 1745, his estates were confiscated and the family was forbidden to return to Scotland.

     Mary had married first Captain Robert Clarke and had a son, but the marriage was for some reason dissolved and Mary resumed the name MacKenzie. Thomas Drayton and Mary were married on August 4, 1757. After their wedding Thomas Drayton and Mary returned to Carolina, accompanied by Lady Mary's son and Mary's sister Anne. Anne married Edmond Atkin in May of 1760.

     Thomas and Mary's son Thomas Drayton was born October 1, 1759. The elder Thomas died a year later on November 11, 1760. In his will, Thomas left Mary use of Magnolia Plantation during her widowhood, to pass to Thomas' eldest son William after Mary's death or remarriage.

     Mary Drayton remarried to John Ainslie in 1763. At his death in 1774, he left to wife Mary a plantation called Maroons in St. Pauls Parish (present-day Colleton County) and all of the property Ainslie had from Thomas Drayton's estate.  

     After Ainslie's death Mary married the Hon. Henry Middleton of The Oaks and Middleton Place. Lady Mary returned to England for the settlement of her brother's estate in 1786. She died at sea on the return passage to Carolina in 1788 [7].    

 

     In her will dated October 23 1688, she made several small bequests to friends and relatives. The remainder of her estate she left to son-in-law Edward Rutledge, in trust to her son Thomas Drayton [8].

References Cited