Singletary
A surname most likely derived from a place-name or older personal name, now best known in the United States.
The #2,622 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 22,456 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Singletary is probably an English surname that was altered over time in pronunciation and spelling. It may come from a place-name or from an older personal name, but the exact source is not certain from standard onomastic evidence alone. The ending -ary fits the kind of phonetic reshaping that often happened when English surnames were carried into new regions and written as they sounded.
History
The surname is especially established in the United States, where it appears most often in the South and Southeast. Like many English surnames that settled into a fixed modern spelling in America, it likely reflects older regional speech and spelling variation. Because the name is relatively uncommon and its origin is not securely documented, genealogical research often needs to focus on the earliest local records for a particular family line.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
Its uncommon spelling makes it a good example of how surnames can drift far from their earliest written forms over generations.