Joseph Rhea, a Presbyterian minister, moved the family to Piney Creek, Maryland in 1771.

He served in the Patriot militia that defeated a loyalist force at the Battle of Kings Mountain in October 1780.

Rhea became clerk of the Sullivan County Court in the proposed State of Franklin, and subsequently in North Carolina, from 1785 to 1790.

He was a member of the North Carolina House of Commons, and served as a delegate from Sullivan County to the Fayetteville Convention that ratified the Federal Constitution in 1789.

[3] He retired from active pursuits and resided on Rhea plantation near Blountville, Sullivan County, Tennessee, where he died on May 27, 1832.