All My Ancestors

The Oklahoma Department of Libraries has put the card file they hold for the Oklahoma Confederate Pensions online.

You can browse or search–all 7885 of them.

Here’s the card for my 2nd great-grandfather

and the reverse–

I got a copy of his pension packet a few years ago at the Oklahoma Historical Society.  And my grandmother, James Anderton’s granddaughter, had told me that he’d gone back to Alabama and died there.  Despite the state of Alabama telling me they couldn’t find his death record, I did find it later and he died in 1918.  And then a few years later, one of my friends found his grave for me.  He’s buried in Cochran Cemetery in Marshall County, Alabama.

The ODL website also includes the index for the Confederate Pensions, but looking through the cards that were typed in the early part of the 20th century shortly after the legislation passed 25 February 1915, gives me a better sense of the process.  Something about seeing the work of those old manual typewriters, with a red ribbon used occasionally, and the other various stamps–

Great-great grandfather James applied for his pension 3 short months after the passage of the legislation.  He lived out in the panhandle of Oklahoma, which, even today, can feel isolated from what goes on in the state capital 200 miles away.  I wonder how he got the word?

His wife of 45 years had died in April.  My grandmother told me that her grandmother Anderton had really wanted to go back home to Alabama in her later years.  They had come out to Oklahoma by 1904 when their son, my great-grandfather, married in Mangum, Greer County, Oklahoma Territory.  A few years later they all moved on out to the panhandle and received homestead land.  Three short months after he applied, his pension application was approved.  He apparently used the money to finance his return home.  His sons who had come west stayed in Oklahoma, with the exception of one whose wife had died.  The cemetery in which he is buried include Kirklands to whom I believe he is related.  His youngest daughter had married a Kirkland, and though I don’t see her name there, she may have buried her father where her husband’s family had property.

So it’s another Oklahoma resource online. It was initially fascinating to me to find that my Alabama grandfather’s military pension was available in Oklahoma. But the soldiers who had served as Confederates received pensions much later than did the Union soldiers, and then from the states in which they were living at the time rather than from the states from which they served.

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Hubbo and I are taking a vacation.  The criteria is that it has to be someplace cool but not high altitude.

So we’re going to Wisconsin.

And, interestingly enough, in my family of Southerners, I have something genealogical to research in Wisconsin.

A few years ago I found this Tennessee Historical Quarterly with a copy of a water color painting on the cover.

I don’t remember how I found this particular subject, but it includes an article about the 12th Wisconsin Infantry in West Tennessee, authored by Dennis K. McDaniel.  The cover is one of the watercolors of James Gaddis, a member of the 12th, and this particular painting includes, down in the left hand corner, an image of the home and hotel of my great-great-grandfather, John Osborne, in Humboldt, Gibson County, Tennessee.

Alarm at Humboldt

I have contacted the Wisconsin Veterans Museum and the Research Archivist has confirmed that they do indeed have these watercolors.  I didn’t find them in the online catalog, but they have been cataloged, records generated, and the images and records are in line to be uploaded into the catalog of objects.  Some of them are on display in the Civil War gallery and I can make an appointment to look at the original.  I can also order a photographic reproduction I hope arrives in time for my Osborne family reunion early in August.

A few years ago I had opportunity to do some research at the Tennessee State Library and Archives about this time and place.  As with much research about topics during the Civil War, I didn’t find much.  I was able to read on microfilm extant copies of the Soldier’s Budget, a newspaper published by the Twelfth.  I hoped for a mention of the soldiers staying in the hotel, but I didn’t find any mention of my relative.  It did certainly give me a flavor of the place, though.  The soldiers had decided to publish their newspaper when they found the printing press in a chicken coop.  I thought it was interesting to have watercolors and newspapers from this unit stationed in Humboldt–they evidently had enough time for these ventures and I’m glad to have their records.

So I’m looking forward to seeing the watercolor up close and personal.  And to see if there’s any other info on James Gaddis’ time in Humboldt.  And to vacation in a place cooler than Oklahoma.

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This past month, I spent a week at the glorious Samford Institute of Genealogy and Historical Research.  This was my 5th trip there and this time I chose to take the course on Military History taught by Christine Rose.  Of course, I learned a lot!  It was wonderful to see all those examples of the types of records left by our ancestors when they provided military service.

But I am a little sad, too.  And I was reminded of this as I was reading through many fellow geneabloggers’ posts about their Revolutionary War ancestors.  As far as I know, I have no direct Revolutionary War ancestors who were soldiers during that War.  I haven’t given up finding one, but so far, none.

I have lots of ancestors who provided patriotic service, including a 6th great-grandmother, Amy Williams Jackson.  She filed in June 1783 from Union County, South Carolina for reimbursement for various supplies furnished to the troops.  Her petition is under her own name rather than her husband Ralph’s.  I am curious about this as women weren’t usually listed under their own names.  Her husband had died the previous month, so perhaps this is the reason.  Amy and Ralph has sons who served in the Revolution, but not my direct ancestor, Ralph Jackson, Jr.

There are others–the Mitchells who were in North Carolina and then Maury County, Tennessee, my 4th great-grandfather, Christopher Osborne in North Carolina.  My husband’s 4th great-grandfather John Spindle in Virginia.  All these persons are listed in the DAR database as having provided patriotic service–supplying everything from forage to beef and brandy.

I do have an War of 1812 vet–a 4th great-grandfather John B. Cromwell who served in the Georgia militia.  His son, John Wesley Cromwell, served in the Confederate Army–First Cherokee Mounted Volunteers, Co. A.  I also have a Mexican War ancestor–another 4th great-grandfather, John Mitchel who joined up at the age of 56 (!) from Texas and died in Mexico in 1847.  A second great-grandfather, John B. Cooper, died in the Civil War, along with 3 of his brothers.

None of my grandfathers or great-grandfathers, as far as I know, served.  I have to get to the great-great grandfather level before I find direct ancestors who served–and those all in the Civil War on the side of the Confederates.  [My then 8 year old son asked me years ago if I couldn't find any "winners" who were our relatives in the Civil War.  I told him he was born into the wrong family if he wanted northerners.  He's since reconciled himself to this sad fact.]  :-)

I am grateful for the service provided by ALL of our ancestors.  I have uncles who served in WWI, WWII, and Korea.  God bless them for their sacrifice and their service.  My dad always said my brother and I were his “deferments.”  His brothers just older than him and just younger both served.  So once again, I’ve missed having a direct ancestor who was a veteran.  I guess I’ll have to be happy with the older generations having served AND the fact that some of my relatives may have enabled some of yours to serve in NC, SC, and VA by providing supplies.

Happy Independence Day to us all.  God bless America, from sea to shining sea!

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I began knowing only the unexceptional name of my great-great grandmother–Mary E. Mitchell–and that her first child was born in Texas in 1859.  I have yet to find any sort of marriage record for Mary E. and her husband John B. Cooper.

By consulting Texas school census records and comparing them to the federal census, I found her father’s name –Ephraim M. Mitchell.

This helped me make contact with others who were researching Ephraim and his wife Rebecca R. Jones, and their 13 children!

There is family lore about Rebecca being the daughter of Sam Jones and Itee– Sam, aka Arpeika, the fierce Seminole leader and Itee, 1/2 Irish and 1/2 Choctaw.

But what about the Mitchells?  No one in my family knew anything about them.  Mary Mitchell’s husband was killed in the Civil War and she died shortly thereafter, leaving my great-grandfather George C. Cooper and his sister Rebecca Ann.  The children were reared by their father’s family and very little was known about their mother Mary, much less her family.

But this year, with the help of some other Mitchell researchers, we have connected the dots, as one of them so aptly put it.  With all the apparent relationships so obvious after the fact.

Ephraim’s father has been identified, as have some of his uncles–indentifying the uncles is part of how we got to Ephraim’s father John Mitchell.  And, we found his mother, identified in Lightfoot’s “Let the Drums Roll” about Maury County Tennessee Revolutionary War veterans, only as “Patsy McClain.”   Just this week we not only found her name to be McLean, but we likely found her father and mother and more.

Of course the path was not straight.  John Mitchell apparently died in 1847 in Mexico as the result of illness contracted during his service in the Mexican War.  The probate file for settlement of his estate is missing from the Shelby County, Texas, courthouse.  (of course it is!)  There is another younger John Mitchell enlisted in the same unit–but he cannot be found after the war in 1850–at least not yet.  And is he even the son of John Sr. or is he a nephew?

Gratefully, someone saved some family letters and shared them with the rest of us.  It’s only the transcription of a letter John Mitchell wrote in 1847 from Austin Texas where he’s awaiting deployment to Mexico.  He talks about having stopped by Corsicana to visit his brother D.R., he mentions his horse Charley, and he admonishes his son Ephraim to take care of his mother.  D.R. turns out to be John’s brother David Reed Mitchell, living and working in Corsicana, Navarro County, Texas, and early correspondent from Maury County Tennessee with President Andrew Jackson regarding his deceased brother James’ estate.  Charley the horse is mentioned later in another preserved letter written to Ephraim by an attorney on behalf of his cousin “H. R. Mitchell”–H.R. had evidently traded the sorrel horse Charley for 100 acres of John Mitchell’s head right land  in Rusk County.  H. R. turns out to be Hiram Reed Mitchell, probably the son of David Reed Mitchell.  Researching his family takes us back to Mississippi where there are indications that the Mitchells were between the time they were in Tennessee and Texas.

When a Patsy or Martha Mitchell who would be a good candidate for John’s wife cannot be found in the 1850 Texas census, I go looking in Mississippi.  Sure enough, there’s a good possibility living in an R. L. Boyd’s home, listed as “mother-in-law” and R. L.’s wife’s name is Mary E.  The longer I examine this family, the more convinced I am that this is John Mitchell’s “Patsy McClain” and Ephraim M. Mitchell’s mother.  The name Boyd keeps appearing, too, as a middle name for Mitchells–both Hiram and Ephraim have children with Boyd middle names.  Robert Louis Boyd dies too early for them to be named for him, so where did this name come from?  My search for more info on R. L. Boyd ends up in a dead end, but I believe the Mitchell search has yielded some more clues.

I am grateful that Martha “Patsy” McLean and John Mitchell broke out of the Mitchell’s inclination to name sons John, James, Andrew or David, and named my ancestor for his maternal grandfather, Ephraim McLean, Jr.  And Ephraim McLean, Jr. is married to Mary “Polly” Boyd.  The McLean line is well-documented–there’s even an DAR chapter named for Ephraim McLean, Sr., a Revolutionary War vet who lived to be +90, living in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Kentucky and Tennessee.

So it’s been a very good year for Mitchell research.  Of course, I still have questions–and this is still a challenging search because all of the Mitchell families apparently named their multitudinous sons for their relatives–John and Andrew and James with an occasional David thrown in.  But it feels like a brickwall has come down, and much of it since the 4-days-ago Mad Monday post about the Mitchells.

It’s a great way to end one year and start another.

Still digging.

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I’ve written about my Mitchell quest before.

This is a tough search because it’s a common name, the given names are also common (John, James, Mary, Martha), the family was apparently quite mobile, and most of what I want to know occurred before 1850 so the luxury of the every-name census records are not available.   Add that this family was often in territory before statehood (e.g., probably Mississippi) and in a state I have not extensively researched, and the result is a family that drives me a little mad.

Plus, I also have to question the sanity of a man 56 years of age (according to his service record) who joins up to fight in the Mexican War.

So while I’ve written quite a bit recently about this family, it still fits the Monday Madness meme for Geneabloggers–both because they drive me mad and I do think John Mitchell, Sr. might have been a little off his rocker. 

Here is the latest information I’ve received on a person named John Mitchell, Jr.  I’m still not certain that he is the brother of my 4th great-grandfather, Ephraim Miles Mitchell, son of John Mitchell and probably Martha “Patsy” McClain.  I’ve mentioned before that I have a copy of a letter written by John Mitchell from Austin, Texas, as he is awaiting deployment to Mexico.  He mentions his brother “D. R.,” and his horse Charley, but no mention of a son in the same unit.

He does enlist on the same day in the same place as John Mitchell, Sr–20 May 1847 in Rusk County, Texas.

He enlists in the same unit–1st Texas Mounted Volunteers, Co. I.

Unlike John Sr., he apparently survives the war and he one muster roll card indicates he was mustered out 1 May 1848 by Captain Washington near Vera Cruz, Mexico.

His service record gives no other clues that I can see.  Do you?

I posted most of this info in my 20 Dec post, but by writing about it again, I guess I think I’m emphasizing how frustrated I am with these guys.

Through the years I have found pieces of information on this family that all started from my trying to search for info on my mysterious great-great grandmother, Ephraim’s daughter Mary.  I knew nothing about her family when I started, so with some perspective, I have learned quite a bit about this mysterious bunch–I knew her grandchildren but they knew practically nothing about her.  John B. and Mary are a bit of the “lost generation” in my family since both Mary and her husband John B. Cooper died young–he in the Civil War and she shortly thereafter.

Here’s hoping . . .

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I know, I know.  We’re supposed to be blogging about Christmas.

But I received the second Mexican War service record I’ve ordered.  Ever.  And I’ve written before about my lack of confidence in dealing with military records–mostly because of my ignorance of them, particularly any record other than ones from the Civil War.

This one is for a man named John Mitchell, Jr.  He enlisted in Rusk County, Texas on 20 May 1847.  He is 30 years of age and he enlists in what becomes Co. I, 1st Regiment Texas Mounted Volunteers.  The commander for this unit is the colorful Capt. John “Jack” Coffee Hays.

In this same unit, also as previously posted, is John Mitchell, Sr.  Because of a copy of a letter passed down through the family, I am relatively certain John Mitchell Sr. is my ancestor.

But who is John Mitchell, Jr.  Can I safely assume he is the son of John, Sr.?  They enlist on the same day in the same place into the same unit and for the same length of time.  John Sr.’s horse was evidently of better quality as it is valued at $130.  Jr.’s is valued at $75, goes up to $100 by November and then at the time of mustering out, May 1848, is valued at $50.  Wonder what the process is of valuing the horses?

I looked for a John Mitchell, born about 1817, in Rusk County, Texas in the 1850 census.  I did not find anyone who fit this description.  So I went back to  Mississippi looking for such a person.  There is J. B. Mitchell who is the right age in DeSoto County in both 1850 and 1860.  The Mitchells are variously in DeSoto and Marshall Counties in northern Mississippi–I suspect they came into Mississippi from neighboring Tennessee.  I am stymied by the initials the census taker used for this family–John Mitchell is way too common a name to depend on initials.  I was hoping for a wife’s name that might help me track this John Mitchell.  It appears that J.B.’s wife’s name was Susan–in 1860, the oldest child in the household is Martha.  Wife Susan is not in the household by 1860.  Martha is the name of John Mitchell Sr’s wife.

And here’s another big question–what were the Mitchell men doing in Texas, signing up for the Army, when their homes and families were in Mississippi? Granted, one of John Sr.’s sons, Ephraim Miles Mitchell, had come to Texas by this date, but why were his father and perhaps his brother there as well?  This family seemed to move as land opened up in various places–but unlike Ephraim, these two men do not appear to have brought their families with them.  At least John Sr. did not–his wife Martha/Patsy is found back in Mississippi living in the household of her daughter Mary E. Boyd, wife of Robert Louis Boyd.

I still don’t have enough information to unravel the Mitchells.  But I’ll keep working.  I’ve put off working on this family–a common surname, common given names and much movement prior to 1850.  I keep trying to collect bits to fill in the puzzle, but so far, I don’t even have enough to build the outside edges.

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Military records scare me.

There.  I said it.

I am finally somewhat comfortable with Civil War service records–more comfortable with Confederate ones than Union, probably because of the number of Rebels I have in my own family than Feds.  I’ve worked more with Civil War records–many of them are now available on Footnote.com and I ordered many of them from NARA before that kind of access was available.

But then comes John Mitchell, born about 1790, probably in Orange County, North Carolina.  His family moves to Tennessee, and I believe to Mississippi, and in May 1847, at the age of 56, John Mitchell joins the army in Rusk County Texas to fight in the Mexican War.  One of my fellow Mitchell researchers shared a letter written by John from Austin, Texas, while he was awaiting deployment.  He mentions his horse Charley and assures his son Ephraim that both he and Charley are getting plenty of food.

I found John Mitchell, Sr. indexed in Charles D. Spurlin‘s Texas Veterans in the Mexican War:  Muster Rolls of Texas Military Units.  The first time I ordered his record from NARA, I got a reply that the record was not found.  (The good news is that I did not get charged for the search and it was all done electronically, so the pain was quickly over.)  I took the opportunity to pick Craig Scott‘s brain a little after his presentation on the Mexican War and its records at FGS in Little Rock.   This conversation convinced me that the record was probably indeed held at NARA, but it also planted the seed of wondering if it might be held in Austin.  So I wrote the Texas State Archives and received a wonderfully educational and thorough response.  The author of the letter notes all the inconsistencies in Spurlin’s abstracts of John Mitchell’s records–not because of Spurlin’s work, but, I suspect, because of the common name AND, perhaps, the enlistment of a Mitchell son also named John.  At any rate, the record was indeed at NARA, and a second attempt with a note that it was the second effect, I finally got the file.

It is slim.  Only 4 muster cards–for June to August,  September and October , and November and December for 1847.  The final card is for January and February 1848.    Spurlin notes that Mitchell died in Carmargo in Mexico.  The muster roll cards confirm that he was left sick in Camargo as of 4 Sep 1847.  None of the cards confirm his death using that actual term.

So what other records might exist for this man?  And what about those other John Mitchells who could also be relatives? or not relatives but from the same general area of Texas?

I’m considering hiring a researcher in DC to look into this.  I think I need someone who can look at all the records at one time and make some decisions.  On the other hand, if I had access to them, I could do it myself.  Dallas Public has good military holdings.  Maybe I’ll try them first–

The search goes on.  A pension record would be so helpful, but as far as I can determine, no one applied for a pension based on John Mitchell’s service.  I believe his wife was in Marshall County, Mississippi, living with daughter Mary E. Mitchell Boyd.  John admonishes son Ephraim to “take care of your mother” in the letter,” but so far, I cannot get beyond this point.

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