Tennessee « All My Ancestors

22 January 2010

NEGHS, Patsy, and John

Filed under: Mitchell Family, Tennessee, Vital Records — allmyanc @ 12:18 pm

Since I never met a database I didn’t like, I took advantage of the New England Historical and Genealogical Society’s offer to WorldVitalRecord subscribers for 10% off the membership fee. I’ve heard such good things about this society and its holdings, I thought it was a safe purchase.

I have no New England ancestors that I know of. I do have that one line that was in New York City fairly early, so maybe that counts. I tend to think of New England ancestors as being in places other than the Big Apple. But I am a genealogy librarian, so I think of this as a work-related expense. I need to know what’s out there for my patrons, right?

So imagine my surprise when I found something in the NEHGS’s manuscript collection that a cousin and I recently discovered and have been trying to find one accessible to us. Short of a trip to Boston, this one is still not all that accessible, but I can at least check into having a portion of it copied and mailed to me. I sent off the request this morning. It’s only money.

I’ve documented my quest for documenting “Patsy McClain” as the wife of John Mitchell. We believe we have definitely connected Martha “Patsy” McLean, daughter of Ephraim and Mary “Polly” Boyd McLean, Jr., as the wife of John Mitchell. They probably married about 1810 or so in Maury County, Tennessee. My cousin recently unearthed a Maury Co., TN bond of some sort between John Mitchell and John McLean–but there is no date and no mention of Patsy! It was sent to her as a “marriage bond.” Of course she is pursuing it further. But it is as close as we’ve come to linking the two. What do the headings on this hard-to-read document mean? As with any bit of information, this one engenders the need for still more data.

And hopefully the manuscript will help as well. IF portions can be copied.

If not, a trip to Boston may be in order.

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3 January 2010

Irish Roots at Last. Probably.

Filed under: Carnival of Genealogy, Mitchell Family, Tennessee — allmyanc @ 5:55 pm

This is my post for the 17th edition of the Carnival of Irish Heritage & Culture:

The upcoming 17th edition of the Carnival of Irish Heritage & Culture will be a Genealogy treasure “show and tell”. Here are the details: Genealogists are treasure hunters of a different kind. Instead of searching for riches, we dig for information. Instead of prizing gold, we value documents – the visual proof of the life stories of families that have passed before us.

Share with us the image of and the story behind a document (or documents) that have been valuable to you during your search for an Irish branch of your family. How and where did you find these documents? What are their significance to your research and/or why are they special to you? Here’s your chance to show off some of your genealogical “loot” at our online “show and tell”.

I joined the “Carnival of Irish Heritage and Culture” on faith. When I signed up, I didn’t know of any specific Irish ancestors–I suspect I have quite a bit of Scots-Irish heritage but I have not jumped the pond, as they say.

In September of 2007, I went to Ireland and, like thousands before me, fell in love with the country. I wanted to have relatives from this beautiful, pastoral, verdant place.

Lately I’ve been on a Mitchell quest, and those who follow my blog who are not all that interested in the particulars of my ancestral research, may be tempted to stop reading now from Mitchell overload.

But supposedly, the Mitchells are from Ireland.

I don’t know this from any primary resource so I have no document to share. yet. However, I have seen it in enough other sources that it makes me want to believe it, and of course, to continue my search.

In her “Let the Drums Roll: Veterans and Patriots of the Revolutionary War who Settled in Maury County, Tennessee,” Marise Parrish Lightfoot indicates that

John Mitchell, born in Orange County, North Carolina in 1760, was a brother of James and Andrew Mitchell, discussed above. They were the sons of Andrew and Mary McGowan Mitchell, who emigrated from Ireland in 1752 . . . .

So my document for this carnival is not a precious marriage record or even an online passenger list. It is instead a mention in an apparently well-researched, documented book. It provides the beginning for a search for documentation that my this line were indeed from Erin.

I don’t have a firm plan yet for how to affirm this hope. I feel the need to first explore the immigration history from that time period–I have read some pertinent histories but need to re-read portions now with this date in mind. A quick check of my well-thumbed copy of “Voyagers to the West” by Bernard Bailyn indicates I may have to search for a resource that covers an even earlier time. Were there lots of Irish who came to America during this early time period? The same source that says the Mitchells were from Ireland also say the first settled in the “Scotch-Irish Colony” in western Pennsylvania. What was this colony? Somewhere else I read that Penn’s agents were traveling through Ireland talking up the benefits of the new country, and that they were so successful, they had to eventually “shut the door,” they had so many takers . I do remember going by one castle ruin while we were in Ireland that our guide told us was that of William Penn’s father or grandfather. William Penn lived 1644-1718, so if my Mitchells were influenced by his messages, it was not first-hand.

So it’s not a primary document but it is a clue. And I’m very happy to have a semi-firm connection with Ireland.

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31 December 2009

It Was A Very Good Mitchell Year

Filed under: Cooper Family, Military, Mississippi, Mitchell Family, Tennessee, Texas — allmyanc @ 12:11 pm

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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4 January 2009

Did I find “my” John Mitchell?

Filed under: How to, Mississippi, Mitchell Family, Tennessee, Texas — allmyanc @ 12:29 am

I’ve been obsessessed with searching Mitchells these past few days–probably because I have a class I’m supposed to be getting ready to teach. I call it “productive avoidance.” I set out to try to find out more about my 3rd great grandparents, Ephraim Miles Mitchell and Rebecca Jones. I found Ephraim’s father’s name was John and that he probably has a brother also named John.

I’ve been working in the “Eggleston-Ford Connections” database at RootsWeb’s WorldConnect. There wasn’t much info on any John Mitchell that precisely matched the information I have on Ephraim’s father. There are 3 John Mitchells in the database, one born in NC in 1760, one born in 1788 [place unknown], and one born about 1856 in Tennessee. From Spurlin’s Mexican War index, I figured John’s birthdate at about 1791, so 1788 isn’t all that far off. The database has the 1788 John Mitchell marrying Patsy McClain with no dates, no places and no offspring listed.

I spent a lot of time entering Mitchells into my database today and searching and reading about the people they married and the places they lived. They appear to have moved from Orange County, North Carolina to Middle Tennessee–mostly Maury County, and then on to Mississippi–northern Mississippi when that area opened up–Yalobusha County and probably Marshall and maybe Grenada County.

Now, here’s the leap, and I’m still not sure I’m not looking at two different John Mitchells. I decided I’d look for a Patsy Mitchell living in Mississippi. I knew that John Mitchell’s wife was still alive in 1847 when he wrote a letter to his son Ephraim. I’d searched for a likely person for Ephraim’s mother in Texas but didn’t find a good candidate. I also knew that Patsy was a nickname for Martha so when I wasn’t successful with searching for Patsy, I looked for Martha.

The most likely candidate turned up in 1860 in the household of a man named R. L. Boyd age 59, b. MS), witha wife named Mary d (age 42, b. TN) in Marshall County, Mississippi. There was a Martha MItchell, age 67, born in TN living in their household in both 1860 and 1850. A definite possibility.

Then I went to find out more about R. L. Boyd. Turns out he’s Robert Louis Boyd, son of William A. Boyd and brother to Mississippi senator John D. Boyd. I could find nothing about Robert Louis, but I did find that his brother married in 1821 in Maury County, Tennessee. Still no direct connection but this all looks interesting in that the same places are still in play. I checked the land patent records for Marshall County, Mississippi and found one for a John Mitchell in August 1838 (as well as Robert L. Boyd). Again, absolutely no idea if it’s “my” John Mitchell, but another piece to consider. I also found several John Mitchells listed on the 1846 Marshall Co. MS tax list–at least 4, so who knows? (I also found that at least one of John D. Boyd’s children ended up in Johnson County, Texas–where my line lived prior to the Civil War.)

Then I went back to RootsWeb to do a little more specific searching for a John Mitchell and Martha McClain. I have found a likely candidate and have written him.

In fact, I’ve written several folks this weekend and can scarcely leave my computer, hoping for a return email. Even if this isn’t “my” John Mitchell in Marshall County, Mississippi, I believe he’s bound to be related and that will help as well. Here’s hoping–

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26 November 2008

Wordless Wednesday

Filed under: Cemeteries, Photos, Tennessee — allmyanc @ 6:09 am

As with Randy Seaver, I’m not capable of a wordless posting, but I’ll keep it short.

This is the tombstone for my 3rd great grand-father, John Osborne (1808-1865) in McLeary Cemetery near Humboldt in Gibson County, Tennessee. It is a shared tombstone with his daughter Emily Osborne McGee (1840-1865) who died a month after he did.

The man who sent me the picture told me John Osborne wasn’t very well liked and was perhaps shot to death.

Now there’s an honest man!!

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14 March 2008

Women’s History Month–43rd Carnival of Genealogy

Filed under: Landrum Family, South Carolina, Tennessee — allmyanc @ 4:54 pm

Here are our marching orders for the 43rd version of the Carnival of Genealogy:

Write a tribute to a woman on your family tree, a friend, a neighbor, or a historical female figure who has done something to impact your life. Or instead of writing, consider sharing a photo biography of one woman’s life. Or create a scrapbook page dedicated to a woman you’d like to honor. For extra credit, sum up her life in a six-word biography (thanks to Lisa Alzo for the suggestion!).

There have been a lot of strong, admirable women in my family. I wish I’d been able to interact in person with many of them–I’ve written about some of them already– in another Carnival of Genealogy entry about which 4 ancestors I’d like to have dinner with, an early posting that included my paternal grandmother, multiple entries about my maternal grandmother, her sisters, the tragedy and legacy of my great-grandmother’s suicide, my great-aunt Margie and her sisters, her sister-in-law, my great-aunt Eva, and, of course, “the girls,” my great aunts Edna and Lorene. These women were resourceful and hard-working. I’m fortunate to have known most of them.

There are also some women in my family I’ve come to know through family stories and my own research. I’ve written about some of those as well. There are lots of candidates in my family deserving of a tribute–a 3rd great-grandmother who lost 4 sons in a Civil War she probably didn’t believe in, and who then reared the children of one of those sons; another 3rd great-grandmother who lost her parents as a young child, lost 4 sons as infants and who endured a husband’s wonder-lust and physical ailments, one of my great-grandmothers who saw to it that her own daughters went to college at a time when educating women wasn’t all that common.

The ancestor I will focus on for this entry is sort of a repeat–I’ve written about her before. I know her only through what I found in writing about her and through a story relayed to me by her great-granddaughter, my great-aunt Margie. This is a partial reprint from an earlier post, one I wrote for Mother’s Day last year, but honoring Delilah Jackson Landrum seem appropriate for this exercise. She has become one of my guiding lights–

Delilah Jackson (1780-1870) was my 4th great-grandmother. She was married to Merriman Landrum (1784-1826) and outlived him by several years. What I wouldn’t give for a photo!

I get the impression that Delilah was from a locally prominent family from Union County, South Carolina. She was born in 1780–her father was Ralph Jackson, Jr. and her mother was Delilah Murphy. Ralph Jr’s mother was Amy Williams. Amy is a patriot, in the sense that if I were so inclined, I could use her as my ancestor to join the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) since she is on record as having furnished forage to some of the Revolutionary soldiers’ horses. Delilah inherits, among other things, a “dutch fan” at her father’s death about 1817. I’ve spent some time trying to determine exactly what this item was, and I think it must have been a hand-held fan used by ladies in that day that came from Holland. Simple enough, but probably highly prized in those steamy South Carolina times. And she must have inherited at least some of her grandmother Amy’s strength as well.

Much of the information I have about Delilah comes from a book about her son. Her oldest son was John Gill Landrum (1810-1882), a Baptist minister of some note in South Carolina. He seems to have been a fairly conservative fellow, but I did like the fact that when he married a Methodist woman, he had no issues with her attending her own congregation while he tended his.

The book is entitled The Life and Times of Rev. John G. Landrum, written by H. G. Griffith in 1885. It was reprinted in 1992 by Brent Holcomb, to whom I am most grateful for making this book more readily available. The book was the result of an article Mr. Griffith was asked to write for the Baptist Courier, a South Carolina Baptist publication, about Rev. Landrum. Despite his birth in Tennessee, John Gill Landrum evidently made his claim to fame in South Carolina. After the death of his father, Merriman, he was sent back to South Carolina for schooling and as with many students who go off to study, he made his life where he was educated.

She was as good a woman as ever lived; well beloved by all that knew her. She was an exception–was kind and good to everybody.

Just after their marriage in 1805 in South Carolina, Delilah and Merriman moved to middle Tennessee. Delilah and her husband evidently worked for and lived in the house of Newton Cannon who was then the Surveyor-General of the state. He was later the governor of the state. As the surveyor, he was often gone from his home. The Landrums ran his household for him–the story indicates that Cannon sometimes teased Delilah that she “had not patched his clothes as she should have done, while the clothes exhibited many conspicuous specimens of her handiwork.” She must have had a sense of humor. This, and the fact that Cannon continued to visit in Merriman and Delilah’s home in subsequent years, tells me she must have been a warm, loving, welcoming person. When Merriman died in 1826, Cannon, governor-to-be, paid Delilah and their nine children “a special visit of sympathy and condolence.”

My favorite story from this book is that of Delilah after the death of her husband and while she was still living in Tennessee. Her youngest daughter Mary wanted her mother to go to a neighborhood revival meeting. This was not the church they usually attended, but she agreed to go with her daughter. This description took me right back to my own youth in way too many revivals

“The preacher soon rose to fever heat, and his audience indicated their sympathy by shouts and groans, and many other noisy demonstrations. When the excitement had reached its climax, the preacher, in the tones of a trumpet, demanded that all who wanted to go to heaven should rise from their seats and clap their hands. The whole congregation, with the single exception of Mrs. Landrum, rose and gave the required response. The quick eye of the preacher noted the defalcation, and he immediately added: “And all who want to go to hell, will please keep their seats.” Mrs. Landrum still calmly kept her seat to the grat horror of the zealous worshipers, and especially to that of the little daughter Mary. The latter, on reaching home, came to her mother with a heavy heart, and, in childish simplicity, said: “Mother, do you want to go to hell?” “No, my child,” replied Mrs. Landrum; “but that preacher is not my captain. God knows the hearts of all his people, and it is not necessary to make unnatural and unbecoming demonstrations in order to merely gratify the curiosity of others.”

I don’t know if this passage would have eased my way as I navigated through the religious minefield that comprised my own youth, adolescence and young adulthood. I do know that it mightily soothed me when I found it a few years ago. Part of me wanted to proclaim, “See, it’s genetic!” when I recalled how I couldn’t bring myself to pray aloud when called upon in church to do so, or to stand and give a “testimony,” to resent having to “shut my eyes and bow my head” and to raise my hand when the evangelist was taking some sort of heaven-bound poll. I didn’t have Delilah’s strength, but I like to think some of it has come my way as I’ve worked out my own spiritual path. And I’ve thought about her often as I’ve also worked out my role as the wife of a minister–I’m so glad to have found her and her story.

Some forty years after the death of her husband Merriman in Tennessee, Delilah died and is buried in Texas in an unmarked grave. She probably rests beside that youngest daughter Mary and Mary’s husband Thomas Ballenger in New Prospect churchyard in Rusk County, Texas. She is only one of my great-grandmothers who need a tombstone–another of my projects.

A 6 word bio? Based on what her children and grandchildren had to say and my own conclusions from research: wise, secure, loving, resilient, honorable, revered.

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25 January 2008

Dinner with 4

Filed under: Alabama, Anderton Family, Arkansas, Ball Family, Carnival of Genealogy, Cemeteries, Indiana, Iowa, Landrum Family, New York City, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas — allmyanc @ 8:15 pm

This version of the Carnival of Genealogy asks which 4 ancestors I would invite for dinner, whether we would meet in my time or theirs, and what I would tell them. I can’t hope for my version to be as clever as The Genealogue’s conversation over pizza rolls, but I’ve chosen 4 of my ancestors that I have some questions for. We’ll meet in “my” time and it probably won’t be all that enjoyable an event for them as I plan to quiz them hard!

Jonathan Osborne (c 1771 NC-1826 NC) 3rd great-grandfather
Jonathan’s father Christopher is my brickwall–the family brickwall for over 50 years. I just want to know where he came from and why he didn’t leave deeper tracks. My theory is that if I talk to Jonathan rather than his father Christopher I can find out more about the succeeding generation as well as the preceding one–conservation of resources, don’t y’know? Christopher

I want to know if Jonathan’s brother Christopher had children in his first marriage. I want to know why this Christopher’s mother-in-law, Mary Stutts Furr, disinherited her daughter, Catherine, his wife–did it have anything to do with Christopher’s first marriage or that in 1818 he moved to Alabama with other families to start Valley Creek Presbyterian Church in Dallas County, Alabama?

sign

I want to know if Jonathan and Christopher had another sibling born after their father’s death in 1789–their father says something in his will about his belief that his wife might be pregnant. I also want to know who all his sisters married–there are names like Brown and Smith and Polk among Jonathan’s brothers-in-law and I want to know first names, marriage dates, and where this tribe ended up. Not too much to ask, do you think?

Delilah Jackson Landrum (1780 SC-1870 TX)4th great-grandmother
I’ve written about Delilah before. I first wanted to know here when I read my great Aunt Marge’s memoirs. She was writing about going to a youth camp where there were racial tensions. She was very much for accepting everyone, regardless of color or creed. She was discussing this with her father and he tells her, “You are very much like my Grandmother Delilah.” I found that statement fascinating because as far as I knew, her father, born and reared in Texas, did not have contact with his Grandmother Delilah who lived in Tennessee. On the other hand, she did spend her later years in East Texas with her youngest daughter, so perhaps he did know her. I love her self-possession when she refused to join the frenzy at the revival as I wrote about here. I have lots of questions about her Jackson family back in South Carolina, and I particularly want to know about the “Dutch fan” that her father left her in his 1817 Union County, South Carolina, will.

William Green Ball (1806 NYC-1881 IA) 4th great-grandfather

Dr. Ball is chosen as another bridge between generations. I definitely want to know more about his father–even though he was a young boy when his father died, he must know about his origins, and those of his mother. His parents were married in Baltimore, I think, in 1797, and then his father was a shipwright in New York City. After the death of his father, his mother and family moved to Clark County, Indiana and then some went on to Delaware County, Ohio. His sisters married well–one married twice, first to the district attorney and state congressman, and then to another attorney who was a national congressman. What was the basis of these sorts of alliances? And I also want to know what kind of medical training Dr. Ball went through–I believe he did that while he was living in Indiana, but who was his mentor and how did he come to that profession?

What can Dr. Ball tell me about his wife’s family? Why did they move from Tennessee to Indiana? Who was the minister, John M. Dickey, who appeared on so many of their records? How did his being an abolitionist fit in with their own beliefs?

It was Dr. Ball and his wife who reared their granddaughter Martha Jane after her father was killed enroute to “the West” and then her mother died shortly thereafter. How did they learn of their sons’ deaths? What were the circumstances under which those two sons were moving? Did Dr.and Mrs. Ball plan to join them in the west?

And, finally, what was the impetus for this man to move from New York City to Indiana to Missouri to Iowa to Kansas to Arkansas and then back to Iowa?

Sarah Ann Davis Anderton (1841 AL-1915 OK) Great-great grandmother
I don’t know very much about my Anderton and Davis lines from Alabama. There were about a zillion Anderton families in Marshall County and most of them were named John or James. I believe I have the right line back to a James Anderton, b. Virginia about 1760. This is not work I’ve done myself, but I believe it’s probably correct.

I don’t even have all of Sarah Ann and her husband James’ children all documented. Some of the older daughters stayed in Alabama when they came to Oklahoma after the Civil War. I always have questions about what makes a family move that far to an area that must be unfamiliar to them, not to mention what would possess them to move to the Oklahoma panhandle, aka “No Man’s Land.” Their granddaughter, my grandmother, told me that they did logging back in Alabama–they floated the logs down the river. That kind of work was certainly not a big draw here in Oklahoma. I suppose it was the opening of the land that drew them. They were still in Alabama on the 1900 census, but by 1910, they had “proved up” on their land in Beaver County, Oklahoma. I have their homestead files and they worked hard.

I found this picture of them in a county history, she’s on the left and he’s on the right. One reason she is dear to me is that she doesn’t appear to be “dainty.” And doesn’t he look like the stereotypical Civil War vet?

Andertons

Sarah Ann is buried out in Blue Mound Cemetery in Beaver County, Oklahoma. Sarah's tombstone

My grandmother told me she really wanted to go back to Alabama but she died before that could happen. Her husband James got his Civil War pension here in Oklahoma– he’d served in the artillery back in Alabama. He was approved and apparently went back to Alabama. Years ago, I sent for his death certificate only to be told that it could not be located. Then a few years ago, I was at Samford Institute in Birmingham, Alabama with some friends. The husband of that group was going out to do some research and I told him if her ran across a tombstone for James Anderton, to be sure to let me know. Amazingly enough, he did. He’s been my genealogical hero ever since. James evidently died in March 1918 and he’s buried in Cochran Cemetery.

Anyway, I have lots of questions for Sarah. Her mother’s maiden name was Campbell–another name I haven’t pursued due to the overwhelming amount of info and my lack of familiarity with records in that part of the country. Her father left all of his 1868 estate, 1450 acres, to his youngest son, Joseph Montgomery Davis, with the proviso that he care for the oldest son, William B. Davis. What were the circumstances that required this sort of care? The will did not stand and the estate was eventually equally divided among the widow and 8 children, including Sarah.

So those are the folks I want to interview, two from the maternal and two from the paternal. I want them to know how much I’ve enjoyed learning more about them and how much I honor their lives and their sacrifices. It’s not surprising that I’ve already written about some of these folks–their lives and times are the targets of some of my greatest curiosity.

I don’t know yet what we’ll have to eat, but I’ll definitely cook. I’ll bet those grandmothers could use the rest.

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28 October 2007

What do you know?

Filed under: Osborne Family, Photos, Tennessee — allmyanc @ 6:11 pm

Here’s a good example of answering one question but getting at least two more. When was this photo taken and who is the subject?

entire image

Due to my recent posting about John Wright Osborne, I’ve made another family connection. I’ve very glad as one of my goals is to find descendants for each of the generation that has 10 Osborne sons–the sons of Jonathan Osborne and Martha Roland. I believe that at least one of them had no descendants–Archibald Magruder Osborne died before he was married and I assume he had no children. I’m not sure about the oldest son, named Christopher for his paternal grandfather. I’m certain I’ve found descendants from 3 of the 9 who are known to have had children, so I have plenty more work to do.

This photo came from a descendant of John Wright Osborne’s father, Thomas. I believe I’ve mentioned that he married twice–his first wife, Mary Jane Wright, was John Wright’s mother. His second wife, Eveline Matlock, bore 9 more children for a grand total of 13. Thomas was just younger than my own ggreat-grandfather, John Osborne, and was his business partner in some land deals in west Tennessee, though Thomas lived in the eastern part of the state.

Thomas’ descendant wants this to be a picture of Eveline. The subject’s clothing, hairstyle, and jewelry are the main clues from the photo itself. There is no photographer’s stamp or mark on it–nothing is on the reverse. The original is small, about 2.5″ x 4″. The cardboard backing is not thick but it is rigid.

Eveline was born in 1824, so even if this photo was made in the early days of photography in the 1860s, that would make Eveline in her mid to late 30s. I’ll admit that I have a hard time estimating today’s ages, much less those of folks a century or two old, but I don’t think this person looks 35 or so. I have some books on reserve at the library to see what I can find about the jewelry and the dress style. Her hair looks like its in a snood, but my research on snoods indicates they’ve been used since the middle ages, so that doesn’t help narrow the date. From the little research that I have done, the fact that there are no props in the picture and that it’s a bust shot rather than a full-length shot, and that it’s a small photo, make me think this photo is earlier rather than later.

But what do you think about a date? I’d be happy to hear from anyone with a tidbit of info about photography history, and I’ll be happy to be contradicted–not a common event, trust me.

Here’s another cropped version of the photo–maybe it helps

closeup

Is there a hint of a high waist line at the bottom of this image?

We’d love to know what you think.

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15 October 2007

John Wright Osborne and the Tennessee Civil War Veterans’ Questionnaires

Filed under: Cooper Family, North Carolina, Osborne Family, Tennessee — allmyanc @ 9:52 am

John and I are first cousins, 3 times removed. His father Thomas (1810-1871) and my great-great grandfather John (1808-1865) were brothers. They were two of the ten (!) sons of Jonathan and Martha Roland Osborne of Mecklenburg and Haywood Counties, North Carolina.

I first found John years ago when I was searching through the Tennessee Civil War Vet’s Questionnaires (the index is available there as well). I’d heard about these documents and since so many of my Osborne ancestors went to Tennessee from North Carolina, I thought I should take a look. Sure enough, Cousin John took the time out in Tacoma, Washington, to fill out his form and send it in. As the website says, these questionnaires are a rich source of information about family and life in the early 19th century in Tennessee. He was a veteran of Company F, 43rd TN Infantry, serving from Roane (now Loudon) County. As far as I know, these questionnaires are not available online, but the forms used (questions asked) can be viewed here.

This is a rich resource that not many people seem to know about. The information has been transcribed and published in a multi-volume set and is available in many libraries (published 1983 by Southern Historical Press is one printing). The originals have been microfilmed and are available at the Tennessee State Library and Archives. They are also available through the Family History Library.

John’s questionnaire provided me with an interesting picture of his family life and his schooling. Here’s a summary of his response:

John Wright Osborne is living at 1706 N. Alder in Tacoma, Washington, and gives his age as 79 yrs., 8 mos. & 11 days. He was born in Roane, now Loudon County, Tennessee, states that his father, Thomas Osborne, was a farmer and a trader. Thomas was born in Haywood County, North Carolina, and lived 4 miles from Philadelphia, Tennessee, where he had a white man for an overseer of his 22 slaves and 5000 acres of land. He placed a value of about $110,000 on his father’s property at the beginning of the War. Their home was described as built of bricks, two full stories, 9 rooms, with a full basement and attic. He says that his mother had a white seamstress.
His mother was Mary Jane Wright, and her parents were John Wright & Mary Hines who lived at Wrightsville in Roane County on the Tennessee River. John Wright Osborne states that his grandfather Johnothan [sic] Osborne was of English descent, lived in NC and fought with the patriot army against the British in the American Revolution. His grandfather John Wright was born in Ireland, and came to American about 1810.
He states that he attended a school partly supported by public money, and partly by private subscription. His total schooling is described as 27 months in the semi-public district school, 18 months in private high school, and two years at Ewing & Jeff College.
Of his military experience, he says that he enlisted in June, 1861, in Co. F, 43rd Tennessee CSA. This company of infantry was afterward mounted. His company was first sent to Loudon to guard the railroad bridge across the Tennessee River. About six months after his enlistment, his company was engaged in its first battle at Harrodsburg, Kentucky.

His account of the war:
From Harrodsburg we went back to East Tenn. Then to Vicksburg, was sent from there to exchange camp in Georgia. Then became on of Capt Tom Osborne’s scouts, operating in Upper Tennessee. After his death rejoined my old command in Valley of Virginia with Gen. Earley. Took part in battle of Kernstown, White Post, Newtown, Bunker Hill, Perryville Pike and Winchester. Returned to east Tennessee, was captured near Bristol and sent to Camp Douglas (Chicago). Had small pox and suffered from lack of clothes, medicine and nursing.
He was discharged 8 Mar 1865 at Richmond. He was exchanged as a prisoner and sent to Richmond. There he was put on a freight train, taken a short distance east and dumped off. From there he walked to a sister’s home at Franklin, NC, where he was at the time of the surrender.
After the war, he worked with his father on his farm for 2 years and then went to his own place on Post Oak Island which had been confiscated for Freedman’s Co. for 3 years. He engaged in farming on his own land which he inherited from his mother in 1867. This land was the fertile Post Oak Island in the Tennessee River twelve miles from Knoxville. He remained there until 1882 when he sold out and started west. He went through Texas, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho to east Washington. This trip took about 2 years. He settled on some government land in eastern Washington, but went on over to western Washington about 1885. He resided there except for about a year spent in Arizona, and about 2 years in Alaska–1896 to 1898. The first four years in Washington were spent farming government land and in a mail contract. After his return from Alaska in 1898, he engaged in lumber business with nephews in Pacific County, Washington. “I have been exceedingly fortunate in the lumber business and my financial affairs are in very good shape at present.” He attends First Presbyterian Church.
Among those listed in his Co: Walter Lenoir, James Jones, Lt. Reps Jones 2nd, Hardy Jones. He suggests that a complete roster might be had from Mr. Walter Lenoir, Sweetwater, Tennessee. He lists about 6 other vets as living in Tacoma–indicating that he may have been active in some sort of veteran’s organization.

His account is a fascinating depiction of life leading up to the Civil War and his life afterward. He is also not my only ancestor to serve time at Camp Douglas, sometimes known as the “North’s Andersonville.” Three Cooper brothers from Texas’ 18th Cav., Co. A, were captured at Arkansas Post and sent to this dreadful place where two of the three died. More about them later.

I’ve always thought the Osbornes had a wandering gene, connected to seeking land. John certainly exhibits such traits, though his movement west was fairly typical of the time after the War. I thought it was fascinating that he had been such disparate places as Arizona and Alaska.

John never married. He is listed on the 1920 census as living with his niece Harriet Siler, in Tacoma. He is 77 and she is 43. I believe Harriet is probably the daughter of John’s older sister Martha J., who married David W. Siler in Roane County, Tennessee in 1862.

In December of 1922, John Wright Osborne dies in Tucson, Arizona, of a skull fracture, on a railroad right of way. His death certificate is online at the Arizona Department of Health Services site (thank you, Arizona).

And, of course, this document raises so many more questions–what in the world was a man of his age doing in Arizona? Was he hit by a train? How did this happen? Who was the John Owen who provided the information for his death certificate?

John Wright Osborne’s life is an interesting bridge from pre-Civil War time in east Tennessee to the early 20th century migration to the northeast, with at least a couple of interesting side trips to the southwest and Alaska. Along the way are mentions of schooling, Freedman land dealings, and the timber business. His Civil War Questionnaire is unique in that it meets that desire we genealogists frequently express, to be able to interview those who have gone before.

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13 May 2007

Delilah Jackson Landrum

Filed under: Cemeteries, Cooper Family, Landrum Family, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas — allmyanc @ 1:17 pm

Delilah Jackson was my 4th great-grandmother. She was married to Merriman Landrum and outlived him by several years.

I get the impression that Delilah was from a locally prominent family from Union County, South Carolina. Her father was Ralph Jackson, Jr. and her mother was Delilah Murphy. Ralph Jr’s mother was Amy Williams. Amy is a patriot, in the sense that if I were so inclined, I could use her as my ancestor to join the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) since she is on record as having furnished forage to some of the Revolutionary soldiers’ horses. Delilah inherits, among other things, a “dutch fan” at her father’s death. I’ve spent some time trying to determine exactly what this item was, and I think it must have been a hand-held fan used by ladies in that day that came from Holland. Simple enough, but probably highly prized in those steamy South Carolina times.

Much of the information I have about Delilah comes from a book about her son. Her oldest son was John Gill Landrum, a Baptist minister of some note in South Carolina. He seems to have been a fairly conservative fellow, but I did like the fact that when he married a Methodist woman, he had apparently had no issues with her attending her own congregation while he tended his. My “genealogical advice” here, however, is to repeat the “search the whole family” mantra–if I hadn’t found this biography of my grandmother’s brother, I would be much the poorer for it. Another serendipitous path discovered through the reading of this book is that John G’s son, John Belton O’Neall Landrum, usually referred to as JBO Landrum, authored a history of Spartanburg County, SC, and in the preface to one of his books, he notes he is writing it from Guthrie, Oklahoma Territory. whoddathunkit?

Not all of the family information in The Life and Times is correct–but the general outline is there. The author evidently went to great length to contact Landrum descendants–there is a quote from my 3rd great grandmother, his older sister, Elizabeth Landrum Cooper who was living in Texas at the time. Delilah’s daughter, John G.’s sister, Elizabeth was among the first of my relatives to come to Texas, resulting in my being a 6th generation Texans. Elizabeth and her husband Job Cooper were my entre into the Daughters of the Republic of Texas

My favorite story from this book is that of Delilah after the death of her husband and while she was still living in Tennessee. Her youngest daughter Mary wanted her mother to go to a neighborhood revival meeting. This was not the church to which they usually went, but she agreed to go with her daughter. This description took me right back to my own youth in way too many revivals

“The preacher soon rose to fever heat, and his audience indicated their sympathy by shouts and groans, and many other noisy demonstrations. When the excitement had reached its climax, the preacher, in the tones of a trumpet, demanded that all who wanted to go to heaven should rise from their seats and clap their hands. The whole congregation, with the single exception of Mrs. Landrum, rose and gave the required response. The quick eye of the preacher noted the defalcation, and he immediately added: “And all who want to go to hell, will please keep their seats.” Mrs. Landrum still calmly k3ept her seat to the grat horror of the zealous worshipers, and especially to that of the little daughter Mary. The latter, on reaching home, came to her mother with a heavy heart, and, in childish simplicity, said: “Mother, do you want to go to hell?” “No, my child,” replied Mrs. Landrum; “but that preacher is not my captain. God knows the hearts of all his people, and it is not necessary to make unnatural and unbecoming demonstrations in order to merely gratify the curiosity of others.”

I don’t know if this passage would have eased my way as I navigated through the religious minefield that comprised my own youth, adolescence and young adulthood. I like to think it would have, but I do know that it mightily soothed me when I found it a few years ago. Part of me wanted to proclaim, “See, it’s genetic!” when I recalled how I couldn’t bring myself to pray aloud when called upon in church to do so, or to stand and give a “testimony,” to resent having to “shut my eyes and bow my head” and to raise my hand when the evangelist was taking some sort of heaven-bound poll. I didn’t have Delilah’s strength, but I like to think some of it has come my way as I’ve worked out my own spiritual path.

Mother’s Day 2007 seems like an appropriate time to express gratitude for strong foremothers, and for the satisfaction that comes my way when I find such gems as The Life and Times of Rev. John G. Landrum to make her come alive and inform my own 21st century existence.

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