James T. Dunlap was born in Knox Co. Tennessee in 1810. He was named after James' father Hugh's friend, James Trimble, who was a lawyer and partner in a lucrative land deal they had in Roane County about that time.
James attended East Tennessee College and earned his A.B. degree in 1830. He became a lawyer as all his brothers had before him.
In 1836, he took part in the Texas Revolution, and was Captain of Henry County's Volunteer Company.
James married Jane B. Tharpe in Paris, Tennessee on Oct. 25, 1838. Her brother Wm. A. Tharpe married a grand daughter of David Crockett. James and Jane had a family of 7 children when she died in 1852.
He was a state senator living in Nashville, and in 1855 married Martha (Jonnie) Spence, a daughter of Brent Spence and Elizabeth Shute, who were of very early families of Davidson Co.
They had 6 children together who survived to adulthood.
James became Comptroller of the Treasury of Tennessee in 1858 under Gov. Isham Harris. When the Union Army invaded TN during the Civil War, James was ordered to take the state treasury and cash assets of The Bank of Tennessee, the archives of Tennessee, and several locomotives of the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad to Georgia. He, along with Joel Battle, Tennessee Treasurer, and J.E.R.Ray, Tennessee Sec. of State took them to Georgia for safe keeping. The archives and locomotives were kept at Buzzard's Roost, while the gold and bank assets were deposited in the Bank at Augusta. After a three year stay in the region, they were forced to surrender to Union forces hunting for him and his Tennessee compadres, and they returned to Tennessee.
After the war, he was prevented from practicing law until he got permission from Congress, which was eventually granted in 1872.
James was involved in investing in a Mexican silver mine, and while visiting it, contracted pneumonia and died after his return to Nashville in 1879.

(bio by: Census taker)