The Cabell Family

Biographies of William Cabell and Select Descendants

Since the arrival of William Cabell in Virginia in about 1726, many generations of Cabells have left their mark on the state and nation. Below are links to a genealogy of the first three generations of Cabells in the New World, and to biographies of several of the most renowned members of that family. Additional biographies are available for close friends of the Cabell family, such as Thomas Jefferson and John Hartwell Cocke, and for prominent twentieth-century Cabells, including James Branch Cabell and Margaret Cabell Self.

In every case, the 1939 edition of Alexander Brown’s The Cabells and Their Kin and Randolph Wall Cabell’s 20th Century Cabells and Their Kin (1993) proved indispensable sources for these brief biographical entries. Where additional materials were used, the sources are indicated in concise citations at the bottom of the page and a link is provided to the complete bibliography.

Genealogy of the first three generations of Cabells in America.

frome2William Cabell (c. 1699 – 1774)

Elizabeth Burks Cabell (c. 1706 – 1756)

Mary Cabell Horsley (1727 – c. 1763)

William Cabell (1730 – 1798)

Joseph Cabell (1732 – 1798)

John Cabell (c. 1743 – 1815)

Nicholas Cabell (1750 – 1803)

William H. Cabell (1772 – 1853)

Joseph Carrington Cabell (1778 – 1856)

William Cabell Rives (1793 – 1868)

Nathaniel Francis Cabell (1807 – 1891)

James Lawrence Cabell (1813 – 1889)

John Cabell Breckinridge (1821 – 1875)

*Additional Biographies