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Just an update on my previous post ... I visited the U.S. National Archives in Washington, D.C., on 31 Oct 2014 and discovered documents stating that Hugh was born in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and enlisted in the Legion of the United States (military after the Revolutionary War) at Bedford County, Pennsylvania.  Perhaps this information will narrow the list of candidates for his parents.  I have posted a list of possibilities at ancestry.com. 

Hi Keith,

Just curious whether you've come across a Hugh Beacom in the U.S.  I descend from the Bickham family, with confirmed ties back to Hugh Bickham, who signed U.S. military papers as Hugh Beacom.  I posted a note in the Common Room about him; I'll reproduce it beloow.  I would appreciate any help you may be able to provide.  Thanks! --L.
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I descend from the Bickham family, but my many-times-great-grandfather Hugh signed a U.S. military paper in the 1790s as Hugh Beacom (we are certain this is our ancestor the military paper was passed down in the family).  Later records show the spelling as Bickham.  Many family researchers have hit a wall and cannot find any earlier family record.

Hugh had a son, also named Hugh, who told the Census in Texas in the late 1800s that his father was b. in Pennsylvania.  But Hugh Jr. was estranged from his father (we know because Hugh Jr.'s whereabouts were listed as unknown in Hugh Sr.'s will), so maybe Hugh Jr. was wrong.  I have to wonder whether Hugh lived in Pennsylvania but actually was b. somewhere in the British Isles.  We know he married in Bourbon County, Kentucky, in 1803, and moved to Logan County, Ohio, in 1823, where he died in 1847.

By searching through information about Beacoms in Pennsylvania, I came across the following information on ancestry.com.  What makes this interesting to me is that Hugh Sr. had a distillery in Logan County, Ohio:

John Beacom, b. 1765 in Ireland, d. 1847 in Franklin, Westmoreland Co., Penn.  "First of the Beacom branch to come to the U.S. -- From Edinburg, Scotland. He settled in the Scotch-Irish county of Pennsylvania, Westmoreland - west of the Allegheny mountains. Particularly Scotch in religion and character. Covenmasters and highly educated and deeply pious. Owned vast amounts of land in Franklin township. Grass/hay and took fifty men with old-fashioned scythes and rakes to harvest the crop. Juice of apple and corn was freely distributed among the haymakers, and John
Beacom prospered abundantly from the hay and had his own distillery located on the farm."

Could Hugh and John have been brothers who came to the United States together? If you have any information that might help me, I would deeply appreciate it.  Hugh's parentage is a mystery, and DNA testing has only served to confirm that the people who previous researchers speculated to be Hugh's parents (Caleb Bickham and Rachel Scull) actually could not have been.

Thanks very much!  Cheers.