Category: Williams Family
-
What I Discovered About my Family Tree from my DNA
Photo: Receiving my DNA way back in 2016 / DNA: a decade later In July 2016, I wrote a blog post after receiving my first AncestryDNA results. At the time, the company’s DNA database had just passed 2 million samples, and my results consisted largely of broad ethnicity estimates and a list of possible cousins.…
-
George Williams of Bertie County and the Battle of Stono Ferry
Photo: A British map of Stono Ferry referencing the 1779 battle. Source: South Carolina Battleground Preservation Trust / As I blogged a few days ago, I have been trying to learn more about a George Williams who served in the North Carolina militia during the American Revolution. If further research prooves the connection, he would…
-
Following my Williams Line Back to Bertie County, North Carolina
Photo of four generations: From left: Will, Scott, Bo and Bob Williams For years, I have been able to trace many of my ancestral lines back 10 or more generations. But my Williams line, the one that gave me my last name, has stopped at my fourth great-grandfather, George S. “Brother George” Williams (1797–1852). George…
-
Maggie Williams Sullivan: A Haywood County Tragedy
Maggie Williams Sullivan (1881-1921) was my first cousin, three times removed. Her father, Edward Williams (1853-1893), and my second great-grandfather, George D. Williams (1846-1919), were brothers. Her story shines a light on just how powerless many women were against abuse in the era in which she lived. I knew a little about her tragic life…
-
Remembering Dempsey Williams, a West Tennessee Bird Dog Sportsman
While researching my Williams family genealogy, I came across part of an article in American Field about Dempsey Williams (1929-2014), one of the younger half-brothers of my paternal grandfather, Lloyd “Bo” Williams (1910-2008). I do not believe I ever met him. Demsey Williams and his brother, my grandfather, Bo Williams far right Both were sons…
-
Will and Eva Overton Williams of Haywood County, Tennessee
Photo: Eva and Will Williams / I never knew my paternal great-grandfather, William Lafayette “Will” Williams (1888-1962), because he died the year before I was born. Although I had seen several photos of him, one of my first cousins, Donna Williams Taylor, recently posted several more photos on Facebook. The photographs belonged to one of…
-
Tacky Party
These incredibly strange photos were taken at the house of my paternal grandparents, Bo Williams (1910-2008) and Elizabeth Castellaw Williams (1915-1998). They are unusual for several reasons. This was called a “Tacky Party” and was a fad popular in the late 1950s. The woman in the middle with the flower is my grandmother, Elizabeth Williams,…
-
My great-aunt Jo Williams, Walter Mondale, James K. Polk and Dancyville, Tennessee
Photo: My father and me in the Genealogy Room at the Brownsville library / The last time I was in Haywood County, Tennessee, my father and I stopped by the Genealogy Room at the Elma Ross Public Library. I was glad he was with me because he noticed something I likely would have missed. My…
-
The Bibles of Leonard D. Cobb and Will Williams
Old family Bibles that include genealogy information feel a little like time machines to me. They give me a written connection to ancestors I never knew but still somehow feel close to. A September blog entry included pages from an Outlaw family Bible. Since then, I have received photos from a couple of other family…
-
Sister C. A. Williams Is Gone
Photo: D. G. Beers Co. of Philadelphia 1877 map of Haywood County, Tennessee showing the location of Catherine A. Williams homeSource / “Sister C. A. Williams is Gone.” That was the first sentence of my third great-grandmother’s obituary, written by John Charles Warren Cobb (1830-1914) and W.T. Morris (1842-1924) as it appeared in the Zion…
-
George Williams Brick Wall
Holly Grove Baptist Church, pictured around 1913 is located in Bertie County about seven miles south of Powellsville on the east side of US Highway 13. It was organized in 1804 as Outlaw’s Chapel and was named for Ralph Outlaw. During the early 1820s the name was changed to Holly Grove. / While I have…
-
Red Wallet Photo Gallery
During the holidays, I was looking through boxes of old photos at my parents’ house when I came across an old red wallet crammed full of small Polaroids taken from the mid- to late 1960s. They feature me, the little boy in the photos, and my family as we lived and played more than 50…
-
Finding Castellaws and Cobbs at the National Archives
Since moving to Washington, D.C., a research trip to the National Archives has been near the top of my list. A recent Saturday morning with nothing planned gave me the chance to check it out. I had time that day for only a few quick searches in the Civil War database, but in a matter…
-
The Seeds of my Fascination with Genealogy
I recently found more really old family photos, thanks to my 12-year-old self and my grandmother, Elizabeth Castellaw Williams (1915-1998). I got my first taste of genealogy from “Granny,” as we called her, one summer when I was about 12. I was spending a week with my grandparents near the Holly Grove community in Haywood…
-
Maggie Williams Sullivan
Photo: Recreation of photo of Maggie and Ellis Sullivan A few days ago, I wrote about Ancestry.com making a new batch of death certifcates available. One of them revealed more about my second-great grandfather being buiried in a field that was once called the Williams Family Cemetery. The other person I wrote was likely buried…
-
Williams Family Cemetery Found
Photo: Milton Booth near what is left of the Williams Family Cemetery Since I first began researching my ancestry, I have tried to find the graves of my second great-grandparents, George D. Williams (1846-1919) and Martha Jane Watridge Williams (1852-1888). For years, family stories pointed me toward one place. Now, thanks to a Haywood County…
-
An Old Photo and the Story of Holly Grove Baptist Church
I found this photo of a group of children and adults at Holly Grove Baptist Church in Haywood County, Tennessee, a few weeks ago at my parents’ house. It appears to date to the early 1940s. The people in the photo are hard to identify, but I am fairly certain my grandmother, Elizabeth Castellaw Williams…
-
Home Sweet Home
Photograph that appeared in the Brownsville States Graphic newspaper in an article about my grandmother’s updated kitchen. Growing up, I spent a lot of time at my grandparents’ house in Haywood County, Tennessee. Lloyd “Bo” Williams and Elizabeth Castellaw Williams, whom we called Daddy Bo and Granny, both grew up near the house on Poplar…
-
Happy Mothers Day
Since it’s Mother’s Day, I thought I would share three stories my mother, Shirley Lovelace Williams, has told me over the years. One of my mom’s earliest memories comes from when she was about eight years old. She had been looking forward to traveling with her family from Brownsville, Tennessee, to Memphis to visit their…
-
Stitching keeps church neat amid Providence landmarks
This article, published in the Jackson Sun on Friday, Aug. 12, 1983, includes my grandmother, Elizabeth Castellaw Williams. By BETTYE ANDERSONJackson Sun reporter Jane Carr, Doris Naomi “Nonie” Warren, and Elizabeth Williams, far right, work on a cross-stitch quilt to raise money for Providence United Methodist Church. The women, including the pastor’s wife, Faye Howard,…
-
Will Williams
Trying to get the research posted correctly while figuring out HTML at the same time is proving to be a challenge, to say the least. Tonight I have been working on the Will Williams branch of my genealogy. He was my paternal grandfather’s father. Will experienced a great deal of loss, although that was not…