'33 3900200466131 Ttic Story of My Old Community ii!;n;{I ' I, !l!V!;1l ¦ |iii;:il;il;;Ji!||!:.di»!!':'h^^ ;:!:¦; Is: ii!iriii!lii(iiiil|!ip';^;i^|.M :;;¦¦. '*1hii I! :ii;!i;^ ii i pii:: ; ¦; i^- .:¦: (Z!i^('' '- '^^ Gift of Professor William H. Taft 19/U> L/*rxr\>-^ U ty i >•? WILLIAM J. STEED, My Literary Sponsor. CONTENTS. Page Preface v Introductory vii The Red Man's Rule i Early White Settlements 5 Thomas Walker s A Hundred Years Ago 15 Robert Allen 19 Plankgate Piety 21 A Curious Cure for Calvinism 23 Edmund Murphey 26 Elisha Anderson 35 Absalom Rhodes 39 Lewis B. Rhodes 45 Aairon Rhodes 47 Henry Clay and Daniel Webster in Augusta 55 The Old Rhodes Mill 60 Freeman Walker 64 Charles and Edward Burch 78 Thomas Hill 79 Early 'Religious Development. Liberty Church 81 Hopeful Church 83 New Hope Church 88 The Old Richmond Camp Ground 91 Richmond Bath and the Old Bath Church 97 Love and War or a Bath Romance 100 Jacob Walker or a Slave's Loyalty 103 A Slave Wedding at Baith 106 Rev. Frank R. Goulding 112 Ante Bellum 114 Doim Vivimus Vivamus 115 E^rly Colored Churches 119 Early iSchools 125 Mount Enon Academy 126 The Old Field School 127 Old Time Academy Life 131 Drothersville, A Lost Arcadia 141 The Anderson Brothers 146 William E. Barnes 148 John W. Carsiwell 149 Dr. Samuel B. Clark 153 The Old Homestead , iS4 An Evening Scene 156 A Psychic Mystery 157 William Evans 160 Moses P. Green 161 E^dmund B. Gresham 161 Henry D. Greenwood 164 Seaborn Augustus Jones 166 Rev. J. H. T. Kilpatrick 171 Robert Malone I74 John D. Mongin I77 Alexander Murphey 180 J. Madison Reynolds 181 Absalom W. Rhodes 184 A Brothersville Home Coming 185 Hephzibalh 188 PREFACE ]n the old days at Emory College, students who failed to attend the sun rise prayer service in the antiquated chapel, were required at evening prayer to render excuses for their absence. A professional delinquent along this line fell into the habit of singing out "corporeally indisposed" when the charges against him were preferred. Through frequent reitera tion the plea grew a little monotonous to the grim old President, Rev. James R. Thomas, and one day he answered: "Yes sir, I'm afraid you are morally indisposed and if you don't convalesce very rapidly I shall send you home for your health." And so if the reader feels indisposed "corporeally" or otherwise to tackling this preface no statutory provision, legal or moral compels him to do so. These literary accessories before the fact are not as a rule of specially absorbing interest and usually ex hibit abnormal talent for being skipped by the average reader. And yet in deference to long established custom these initiatory words are penned. And now in patient discharge of this implied duty I do not mind saying to the reader, a la Artemas Ward, that "this is a book." or at least that this in Celtic vernacular is the "intintion." There are mciny books of many kinds and this volume properly classified would probably belong to the "sui generis," "sic trasit gloria mundi" variety. If the reader has grown a little rusty on classic Latin I do not mind saying to him further that the latter phrase has been sometimes translated, "My glorious old aunt has been sick ever since Monday," but I do not think that this revised version has been generally accepted as strictly orthodox. This book can not be said to have been written without rhyme or reason for its pages hold more rhyme than poetry and three reasons at least, have conspired to give it literary existence. First, I have written it to please my friends, who bear personal kinship to its records. Second, I have hoped to please myself by making some little con tribution to a bank account, whose surplus has never been a burden. . Third, a hundred years and more from now it may be that some far descendant of the author, while fingering the musty shelves of some old library, may find some modest satisfaction in the thought that his ancient sire had "writ" a book. vi PREFACE Whatever its shortcomings may be, it bears at least the merit of being the first distinctive effort to gather and preserve the historical, genealogical and traditional records of a rural community in Georgia, and possibly in all the South. Treating largely of the early pioneers it is in a literary way a pioneer itself. It/may not meet a long felt want and yet through all these later years many inquiries have come to me for just such information as this books has tried to furnish. In the morning of our lives our hopes and aspirations like our shadows lie before us, but when the noontide has been passed and our steps are tending towards the sunset our thoughts and feelings, like our shadows still, stretch backwards towards the morning. Our interest in the old- old days increases with our added years and the glamour of the long ago grows stronger as we near the twilight. And yet, dear reader, whether the skies that rest above you are radiant with the breath of morning or paling in the shadows of your eventide, if you will give these old time memories as kindly a rec^tioii as met mj' first attempt at authorship I shall be more than satisfied. INTRODUCTORY Filed away on a page of the writer's scrap book there is a letter that I have treasured and preserved not only for the gifted hand that penned it ibut for the tone of tender kindliness that 'breathes and glows in its every written word — a letter that in large degree must stand as sponsor for the story that will follow. Some years ago I published another story, the record of my company and regiment during four years of Confederate service. A copy was sent to gentle and genial Bill Arp, humorist and sage, always witty and never perhaps unwise, and his reply acknowledging the gift contained these words: "What a pity that every regiment, and indeed every company, did not have a historian." This expressed regret has brought to me the kin'dred thought that possibly it may be equally a pity that every community does not have its chronicler to gather up the tangled and raveled skeins in its own history and preserve them in coherent form not only for the living, but for their children and their children's children, in all the years to come. To fill this need if need it be for the community in which the writer was born and reared will be the purpose of this perhaps imperfect story. Its data has been garnered from many sources — from con ference with many whose memory goes farthest back into the past, from musty and antiquated records, from fading entries in old time family bibles that have been heirlooms for a hun dred years and more, and from the moss stained slabs that mark the mounds where rest our earliest pioneers. For the vein of unpretending humor that clothes in part its storied detail I have only this apology to make. When Henry Clay had closed one of his magnificent orations in the vili INTRODUCTORY city of New Orleans, Sargent Prentiss, who sat upon the stage was called for by the shouting audience. Rising he said, and only said : "When the eagle is abroad owls and bats must hide their diminished heads." AVashington Irving and William Nye have with their own inimitable genius given to dry historic fact a touch of genuine humor, 'but the mountain eyries where these proud eagles fledged their literary young have long been tenantless and in their absence I can but trust that in the lowlier efforts of an humbler pen the kindly reader beneath whose eyes this story falls may find at least no serious ground for cavil or regret. THE RED MAN'S RULE Xo proper historic setting can be given to our rustic ^•iIlag¦e without some reference to its antecedents, '.to the early story of the community in which it stands and to the social, moral and educational forces that brought it into municipal being and without which it would have had no individual entity and no history corporate or otherwise. Looking back ward then to a period some centuries ago, when the writer and the town were both absolutely unknown quantities, a period when this section was covered by primeval forests untouched by the woodman's axe, a period when the policy of "benevolent assimilation" had not begun its fateful work and the Red man's foot had not been taught to press the rugged path that leads to race extinction, roaming over these hills and valleys there lived and loved another race of beings. When Oglethorpe, in the Fall of 1735, established for the benefit of his struggling colony a trading post on the banks of the upper Savannah and gave it the name of his friend and patron the Princess Augusta, he found the territory extending Westward from the river occupied both above and below the post by a tribe of Uchee Indians. Their original habitat had probably been located near the Coosa river, in upper Georgia and North Alabama. On their migration to this section they became a component part of the great IMuskhogee or Creek Confederation, whose domin ion extended from lower Florida to the Cherokee lands in North Georgia. The Uchees were not a large tribe, their ter ritorial limits covering probably only the present area of a few counties adjacent to Augusta, among them Richmond, Burke, Jefferson and a portion of Columbia, the occupation and control of the last named county being shared by the Kiokees, another subordinate tribe owing allegiance to the Creeks. The names of both these minor tribes are perpetuated by gurgling streams that traverse their former hunting grounds in that county. Although seventy-one years have passed since the Creeks were removed from Georgia b)' the Federal gov- ernment and a longer period has elapsed since their moccasined feet pressed 'the soil of this immediate section abundant evidences still exist of Indian occupancy. The Murray Road in this county was once an Indian trail and was probably used by George Galphin in his trips from his home at Silver Blufl on the Savannah to his trading post, at Ogeechee Town or Galphinton, now Old Town, in Jefferson county. The following reminiscence of this celebrated Indian trader may be new to some of my readers. There are probably several versions of it, but I give Rev. George Smith's, first because he is a preacher and ought to tell the truth, and secondly because it is the only one I have. On one of Galphin's visits to Ogeechee town an Indian chief was attracted by the bright red coat he wore. Gazing with admiring and covetous eyes on the crimson vestment he said to the trader : "Me had a dream." "Oh," said Galphin, "what did you dream?" "Me dream you give me dat coat." "You shall have it," said the wily trader. Months passed and they met again. After the usual salu tations Galphin said : "Chief, I had a dream." "Ugh," said the chief, "what you dream?" "I dreamed that you gave me all the land in this fork of the creek." "Ugh," said the chief, with a shrug, "you have it, but we dream no more." Evidences of the Red Man's rule are not confined, how ever, to traditional Indian trails. During my schoolboy days at the old Brothersville Academy, it was the habit of the students to utilize many of the midday intermissions in period ical visits to the 'bathing house Ibuilt by Mr. Alexander Murphy, one of the old-time Brothesville residents, for the benefit of that community. Our pathway led across a stream that finds its source within the limits of our town, and in a cultivated field lying along its borders we gathered a goodly collection of Indian arrow heads. Half a mile away, on a neck of land formed by the confluence of this stream with another, that begins its gurgling life near my father's old home, the subsoil plow in recent years has unearthed many fragments of ornamented Indian pottery. The contour of some of these specimens indicates that they formed part and parcel of large vessels probably used for boiling the beans and other vegetables cultivated by the Indians. How was this done? This clay ware was unable to endure a high degree of heat applied to its outer surface, and the squaw cook, when she decided to "boil the pot" for the midday meal, filled the vessel partially with water and then dropped into it heated rocks until it reached the boiling point. If this was an every day occurrence the Red Man scarcely failed to consume the proverbial "peck of dirt" before making his exit to the happy hunting grounds beyond the sunset. Not far away from where this pottery has lain for nearly two centuries, on the old James Anderson place, and near a spring, whose limpid waters mjngle with the streams already named, there is a mound sup posed to be of Indian origin — a mound within whose hidden bosom there may have rested for all these years the antiquated dust of some old Uchee chief. These corroborating facts seem to furnish satisfactory evidence that w^ithin the limits of our town or just beyond its boundaries, there was once upon a time a thriving Uchee village where The Indian warrior wooed his dusky mate. And like his "pale face" brother, sat up late; Yet wooed and won without the helpful aid Of soda-fount, ice-cream, or even lemonade. And wheii the happy honeymoon was over. He played the gentleman, and lived in clover. While she, his faithful squaw, was up at dawn. To cook his meals and hoe his patch of corn. She kept his wigwam and his food warm, too; And when with trusty bow his aim was true. She jerked his venison and may likewise, Have jerked the scalp-lock o'er his Uchee eyes. Since the above doggerel was written I have learned from a statement made by Col. Charles C. Jones, Jr., who was not only a very learned scholar and historian, but an eminent Indian authority as well, that these dusky sons of the forest were in the habit of doing their courting by proxy. The delicate and generally delightful preliminary negotiations that antedate a matrimonial alliance among the 'whites in all civilized lands were delegated by the Indians to the prosy lips of a mother or sister, whose personal interest in the arrange ment was untouched and untinged by any halo of sentiment or romance. ¥v^hile I can but deprecate the lack of good taste shown by these dusky lovers in foregoing voluntarily the pleasure of "popping the question" I can make no refutation of a fact which seems to throw a shadow of discredit upon the absolute historical accuracy of a few lines in the foregoing verse. But what is writ is writ, and as my learned and clever friend. Rev. L. P. Winter, who sometimes woos the muse and whose opinion, therefore, on the matter of wooing ought to be "expert," has suggested that the unintentional error be charged up to poetic license, the reader can let it go at that. Before closing this feature of my story I am glad to be able to give, as a matter of interest to the reader of these chronicles, the signification of some of the beautiful Indian names still in use in this and adjoining States. This informa tion has come to me through the kindness of Rev. Milton A. Clark, who for more than twenty years has devoted his life to missionary service among the Red Men of the West, and who, at my request, has furnished it for use in these memories: Indian English Tribal Origin Catoosa High-up Cherokee Dahlonega Gold Cherokee Savannah Open Glade Cherokee Oostenaula High Tower Cherokee Chattahoochee Figured Rock Creek Ockmulgee Foaming Water Creek Opelika Owl Roost Creek Ocklawaha Boggy Creek Seminole Wanderer Creek Tallahassee Broken Down Town Creek And now in taking leave of the Brother in Red I can but express my regret that any of my own kith and kin should have been accessory to the spoliation of these aborigines of their broad and beautiful domain — a regret just as keen and possibly a little more sincere ithan that, which shadowed Mark Twain's soul as he stood with misty eyes over the ancient grave of Adam. EARLY WHITE SETTLEMENTS. In the early years following the establishment of a military and trading post at Augusta the whites began to make inroads into the territory adjacent to that point. Rev. George G. Smith, who is never happy save when he is fingering musty records, says in his "Story of Georgia and Her People," that as early as 1753 there were white residents in Jefferson county. In this immediate section, lying so much nearer the protecting arm of the military post, white settlements must have been made at an earlier date. Who was the original pioneer. After all these years and in the absence largely of any written or printed record it is difficult to determine with any degree of certainty or assurance. The men who cleared these primeval forests were making and not writing history, keeping the wily Indian at bay and not keeping diaries or journals for their remote posterity. Collating all the historic and traditional information that I have been able to gather, it seems probable that if not the first, certainly among the very earliest settlements made in the communty, was that of THOMAS WALKER. In the old days the landed estates of the King of England were patrolled 'by royal guards — men who were required to "walk" over and inspect a certain area every day. In this way they came to be known as "walkers," and finally the term denoting their occupation was adopted as a surname. Some of the impecunious members of the tribe have probably been "walking" ever since. During the civil war in England a large contingent of the Walkers were staunch adherents of the Stuarts, and when that dynasty fell into temporary eclipse at the hands of Cromwell and his Roundheads, Cavalier heads were at a premium. Many of the Walkers, having no inclination to lower the price by placing their own on the market, sought on foreign soil the safety denied them at home. Among them there was a family whose roll contained a Peter, w'hose father had spent his fortune in the royal cause and fled to Ireland, where Walkers were practically unknown. The Encyclopedia of Heraldry, in listing the coats of arms of this family name with its "Nil Desperan- dum" motto gives in a record of fifty-two, only one from the Emerald Isle. In 1735, two brothers, George and Thomas Walker, and their sister, Mary, wtho were probably descendants of this refugee family, emigrated to Pennsylvania, settling on the Delaware river. Five or ten years later, Mary, having in the meantime joined the married sisterhood by wedding a Mr. Dallas, George and Thomas came to Georgia, the former locat ing on Brier Creek in Burke county, probably near the bridge over that stream that bears his name. Thomas settled either in this section of Richmond, and near the spot where he now lies buried, or lived for a time in Burke and then came to Rich mond. In 1750, on account of Indian troubles, he left Georgia and lived for eighteen years in Beaufort District, South Caro lina. Returning to this State in 1768, he lived in this com munity until his death in 1809, at the age of 90 years. His wife, Mary, died in 1825, aged 83. Who was she 'before her marriage? On this point my ignorance is about as dense as that of a member of an old time debating society who, on rising to discuss the justifiability of the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, asked the presiding officer if a question for informa tion was in order. "Certainly," said the official. "Well, sir, be fore discussing this question I'd like to know who this Mary Scott was anyhow?" So the writer would like to know who Mary Walker, his great-grandmother, was, but there seems to be no present ac cessible source of information. A penciled memorandum made by my uncle, the late Col, A. C. Walker, states that Thomas Walker, his grandfather, had seven sons and five daughters. A similar memorandum, made by Mr. Peter G. Walker, of Morgan county, says that George, his ancestor, 'had seven sons and five daughters, and it is a rather singular fact in connection with the above that the Bibl^ should stand sponsor for ex actly nine of the names in each of these groups of children. A stranger chancing in at a Christmas reunion of the two fam ilies, when all were present, would have had his acquaintance with old time Bible worthies refreshed by a presentation on the Thomas side of the table to Abraham and Isaac, Rachel and Rebecca, Reuben and Benjamin, Elijah and Amos, wind ing up with the loved and loving John. Across the table George would have taken him back through antediluvian days to Enoch, and then on down, with Rebecca and Moses, David and Esther, closing up among New Testament records with Mary and Elizabeth, Thomas and John. Each group had a William and each a Margaret, while George had a namesake among his children. In this schedule of Thomas Walker's sons I have added an Amos to Col. A. C. Walker's list for two reasons. First, Mr. Peter Walker, who suffered from an attack of pedigree fever some years ago, credits him with a son of that name, and for the additional and convincing reason that the grave of Amos lies beside the mounds that cover his father and six of his brothers and sisters, and in matters genealogical grave yards make mighty good witnesses. Of the personality of Thomas Walker I know but little. The memorandum left by Col. Walker, already referred to, states that he and his sons were a fine looking race of men. As I am one of his descendants and as I have at divers and sundry times been the victim of mistaken identity in being taken or mistaken for four of the homeliest men in Richmond county, there would seem to be strong circumstantial evidence that my share of the family inheritance on that particular line was still an undistributed patrimony. One traditional incident has come down to me that shows at least that Thomas Walker's manly heart was not lacking in the milk of human kindness. He owned a large body of land and many cattle and hogs, the early settlers relying more upon their flocks and herds than cultivation of the uncleared forest. Riding over his estate one day, he chanced upon a poorer neighbor, who had slaughtered one of his beeves and was flaying it for use at his own table. After reprimanding him for the theft he asked: "Have you any salt to cure it?" "No, sir." said the man. "Then send to my house and I will give you what you need," and putting spurs to his horse he went his way, little thinking that a hundred and fifty years later his great-grandson would be placing before the public eye this little story to his credit. It is not the purpose of these records to enter into the construction of family trees, lest such a course might trench upon the domain already pre-empted by a clever friend and relative of the female persuasion, who thinks pedigree, talks pedigree, writes pedigree, and who possibly wanders in happy dreamland through mammoth groves of every blooming family trees. So many inquiries have come to me, however, in these later years on genealogical lines that some information as to the descendants of the early settlers will not, I trust, be lacking in interest to the reader. Taking Thomas Walker's children in the order already given, Abram married a Miss Whitehead, lived at Athens, Ga., and died childless. Isaac Walker married Bethia Whitehead and eleven chil dren were born to them, James B., Thomas, Amos, William, Isaac, Jr., John, Hester, Mary (Garlick), Rebecca (Harlow), and Susan who became the wife of Wm. S. C. Morris. Dr. James B. Walker married Julia Woolfolk, lived in Augusta, Ga., and was a very prominent figure in its com mercial life. His sons, the late James W. and John W. Walker, his daughters Virginia Schley, Lucy Caswell and Mary Wal lace, and his grandchildren through these sons and daughters have filled and are filling now large space in the business and social life of the city. To Wm. S. C. and Susan Morris was born one daughter, Maria, who on July 3, 1861, was married to Major Thomas Spaulding 'Mcintosh, Adjutant General of McLaws Division 8 ELIJAH WALKER. C. S. A. While rallying skirmishers at the battle of Sharps- burg, Maj. Mcintosh was killed, and in 1868 she married Dr. John M. Madden, Asst. Surgeon C. S. A. She and her daugh ter Fleurine (Tucker) are now residents of Brunswick, Ga., while her son Maurice lives in Jacksonville, and her daughter Susan, wife of Samuel B. Hatcher, lives in Columbus, Ga., John Walker married Cornelia Woolfolk, and their de scendants through their dhildren, Woolfolk, Louise and Cor nelia, live in Columbus, Ga., or elsewhere. Isaac Walker, Jr., married his wife, of course, but I have no information as to her identity, nor am I advised as to the place of residence, past, present or to come of either Isaac Jr., and his better half nor of their six children, viz : Isaac, Amos, William, Thomas, Hattie and Polly. Elijah Walker married Elizabeth Collins and to them were born two children, Robert T., who married Anne daughter of Judge William Polk of the Supreme Court of Maryland, niece of President James K. Polk and first cousin of Bishop and Lieut. General Leonidas Polk, and Cynthia Maria, born Dec. 7, 1799, married Col. William A. Carr July 31, 1817 and died July 12, 1833. To Robert T. was born a son, William, who married in Macon, Ga., and died in 1853. His widow was later married to Col. Philip Tracy of Macon who was killed afterward at the battle of Gettysburg. After the death of Robert T. his widow became the wife of Gov. Herschel V. Johnson to whom she bore four sons, Herschel V. Jr., Emmett, Winder P. and Thomas L. To William and Cynthia Carr were born the following children, aside from four who died. in infancy: 1st. Thomas Walker, born Sept. 17, 1822, died unmarried March 28, 1895. 2nd. William Walker, born Aug. 8, 1824, died in 1903, 'married first Caro'line Tucker, children Robert Walker, Florida C, William A. ; married second, Mattie Rawles, children, Charles, Joseph, James and Goode. 3rd. Elijah Walker, born March 28, 1829, married Anna, daughter of Dr. Edwin H. Macon Dec. 19, i860, and died Dec. 24, 1872, children Lilias Amanda, Susan Crawford, Florida Agnes (Orr) and Thomas. 4th. Florida Cynthia, born July 11, 1831, died Feb. 14, 1905. She was the youngest born and was never married. I never knew her but have gathered the following data from a loving tribute paid to her by her niece Florida Orr, now living with her husband, Robert C. Orr, and her children Robert C. Jr., and Julia W. at Carrs Hill, Athens Ga. Cynthia Carr died when Florida was in her babyhood and her childhood years were spent at the home of her grandmother, Elizabeth Walker on the Northern border of Burke county near McBean Creek and now owned by Pauline C. Rhodes. During her girlhood her father married a widow who had been the beneficiary of two previous matrimonial alliances and when after her grandmother's death young Florida returned to her childhood home she found herself domiciled with brothers of her own blood, two batches of step brothers and sisters and a little half sister, a rather strenuous situation. Despite such environment however she retained her sweetness of temper and developed into a womanhood of rare and charming beauty, a claim confirmed by her pictured face. Eschewing marriage she devoted herself for ten years to the care of her invalid father and for many years to orphaned ones committed to her care. And so though childless she was indeed and in truth one of 'God's mothers." For sixty years she kept a quiet nook near the old home all abloom with flowers of every tint and hue, perpetuating among others roses and narcissus, that her mother Cynthia had carried from the old homestead in Burke nearly a hundred years ago, and that are still shedding their fragrance on the summer air at Carrs Hill today. Such in brief is the story given me of her by my good friend and relative Florida Orr, and while she has written lovingly I am sure that she has written truly. Thomas Walker's daughters, Rebecca, Rachel and Marga ret, were never married, but whether from choice or necessity I do not know. After their father's death in 1809 they kept bachelors' hall or old maids' hall at the old home. Aunt 10 "AUNT BETSEY," WIFE OF ELIJAH WALKER and HER GRANDDAUGHER, FLORIDA CARR. Rebecca was the last survivor and her later years were spent at my father's home. In her old age she was rather an odd genius and as Rev. Thomas F. Pierce once said of her : "If the English tongue holds any word that expresses singularity more strongly she was that." * * * In the memorable debate between Alexander H. Stephens and Benjamin H. Hill at Lexington, Ga., during the Presi dential campaign of 1856, Mr. Hill requested his opponent to read certain extracts from his public utterances tending to show marked inconsistency in the positions he had taken on pending political issues at different stages of his public career. In order to ensure faithful rendition of the incriminating record he placed copies in the hands of a little boy with instructions to notify the audience if omissions were made. Mr. Stephens had proceeded but a little way with the unwelcome task when the boy sang out : "He's a skipping — he's a skipping." This incident has no earthly connection with the statement that if any reader of these family details should find them lacking in interest he has my cheerful permission to "skip." Returning then to the Old Testament progeny of Thomas, his son Reuben, my grandfather, married Martha Jones Evans, daughter of Daniel Evans, a Revolutionary soldier whose name appears upon the roster of Captain Patrick Carr's company of Burke Co., Rangers in 1782. As a result of this marriage there were born one son, Alex ander C, who married Virginia Anderson and after her death, Mary Louise Stafford, and two daughters, Celestia V., who was married to Edward R. Carswell and Martha R., who be came the wife of Dr. Samuel B. Clark. Numerous descendants of these families now live in Richmond, Burke, Jefferson and other counties. Reuben Walker died in 1820, aged thirty-two years, his death having been the result of accidental poisoning at the wedding supper given by Mrs. Nancy Bugg on the oc casion of her marriage to Alexander Kennedy. This marriage occurred at the "Goshen Place" near where Hephzibah now stands and as some inquiries have come to me in regard to the details of the accident, the following version furnished by Col. II A. C. Walker to his daughter is given. Some days before the wedding a demijohn, that had lain open or stopperless for months was sent to a wine dealer to be filled. The servant failed to rinse it thoroughly and after my grandfather's death the attending physician found mingled with the wine the re mains of a poisonous species of spider. Other guests were made seriously ill, 'but there were no other fatal results. Among the descendants of Reuben Walker, his son. Col. A. C. Walker deserves special mention. An intimate personal friend of ToomJDs and Stephens, Jenkins and Cobb, he was one of the brainiest men and most brilliant writers in the State. He represented Richmond county in the General Assembly for many years and on the retirement of Mr. Stephens in 1859 from long continuous service as representative of the old Eighth Congressional District Col. Walker was nominated unanimously as his successor. Having no political ambition he declined the honor. A political drama written by him about 1850 and entitled "The Conspirators," created a decided sensa tion and was first accredited to the brilliant and virile pen of Robert Toombs. During the heat and bitterness of the slavery agitation and soon after the death of "Uncle Frank" one of his trusted and valued negroes he wrote for N. P. Willis' Home Journal of New York "The Night Funeral of a Slave," a sketch whose beauty and tender pathos attracted wide attention and was largely copied by the Northern and Southern press. His ability as a writer was acknowledged by Gov. Johnson even when they were at enmity. During the Johnson and Jenkins gubernatorial campaign the former became offended by some thing Col. Walker had said or written against him and when they met in iMilledgeville the Governor declined to speak al though they had been schoolmates and friends from earliest boyhood. Passing each other on the street or in the corridors of the capital for weeks without recognition. Gov. Johnston stopped one day abruptly and said : "Walker, I want to ask a favor of you." "What is it Governor?" said Col. Walker. "I want you to write an obituary of " naming a rela tive by marriage who had recently died. "I know of no man 12 COL. ALEXANDER C. WALKER. about whom I could say less that was comrnendatory," was the reply. "I know that," said Johnson, "and that is my reason for asking the favor. No man within the whole range of my acquaintance can fix up a case of that kind as well as yourself." The paper was prepared and their relations became friendly and cordial again. Anothern prominent descendant of Reuben Walker was Gen. Reuben W. Carswell, who commanded a Confederate brigade in the '60s, was nominated for Congress in the early years following the war and filled for many years the bench of the Middle Judicial Circuit. Benjamin G. Walker, son of Thomas, married Caroline Edwards, and had one daughter Mary who became the wife of Martin and whose descendants now live in Alabama. After the death of Benjamin G., his widow was married to Judge Robert A. Allen of this county. Of the other sons of Thomas, John D., William and Amos, what I don't know would probably fill a book. Beyond the fact that John D. and Amos lie buried near their father and have left no descendants my information does not extend. And now before taking leave of the Walker tribe there are two or three incidents in the general family history that may not be lacking in interest to the reader. During the Revolutionary War, Valley Forge was owned by Joseph Walker and his home was headquarters for Wash ington's officers. During all that cold and dreary winter of 1777 Joseph's good wife Sarah made corn mush and sent it with milk to the sentinels standing guard near her home. Helen Walker of Edinburgh, Scotland, was the original of the beautiful character, Jeanie Deans, portrayed by Walter Scott in his Heart of Mid Lothian. After her death, the tender hearted novelist placed a monument at her grave bearing on its face a beautiful tribute to her memory written with his own hand. Allusion has been made to the marriage of my grandfather Reuben Walker to Martha Jones Evans. Nearly fifty years later William Evans Walker, son of Col. A. C. Walker was married to Sarah Eleanora Evans daughter of William Evans. 13 These two unions of the two families add interest to the fact that some centuries ago the marriage of Hannah Walker to Samuel Evans of Wales, connected the Walker name and blood with the King of Wales and the King of Man both of whom were descended from King Lind who ruled Brittany when in vaded by Julius Caesar in 54 and 55 B. C. Some years ago Camp 1389 U. C. V. secured the services of Rev. Mr. Ledbetter, Pastor of the Methodist Church at Louisville, Ga., in a lecture for their benefit. Major Wm. T. Gary was selected to introduce the speaker. While waiting for the audience to materialize, which I regret to say it failed to do, and while engaged in conversation with the lecturer and Major Gary, the matter of pedigree became the subject of dis cussion. Mr. Ledbetter said that he was a descendant of King George of England, and IMajor Gary, not caring to be over shadowed in ancestral prestige replied that he was more than sixty years of age before he learned that he was a lineal descen dant of King Robert Bruce of Scotland. The writer, absolutely unconscious of any trace or taint or royal blood in his plebeian veins, sat by in still unbroken silence. And yet if I had known then what I really do not know now, that my Evans ancestral line carried me back to Mervyn Vrych tlie King of Man and Essyx his wife the daugh ter of the King of Wales and through them both to old King Lind of Early Brittany, whose brother Caswallon had with his sturdy yeomanry driven back the veteran legions of Julius Caesar from the British Coast, my tongue would scarce have been so silent nor my lips so mute. And yet if my friend Peter G. Walker is not off in his arithmetic and if old King Lind had lived only a thousand years ago and if as Tom Watson would say, he was "some punkins" in his day, and if my Evans ancestral line came directly from him, my share of his royal prestige would be represented by the fraction one divided by one billion, three hundred and seventeen thousand eight hundred and twenty- four. Run it back another thousand years to this old sov ereign's ancient era and there my royal strain would vanish into thin and misty air. 14 A HUNDRED YEARS AGO. Roll back the curtained panorama of the years for an even century and what does its pictured canvas show to our modern eyes? In the forefront of its shifting lights and shadows sits Thomas Jefferson writing Presidential Messages with his virile grey goose quill by the flickering light of a tallow candle. Six years before, he had mounted his horse at Monticello, had ridden unattended and alone to the newly constructed capital at Washington, had hitched his mettled steed to a sapling in its front, had brushed the dust of travel from his Sunday clothes and in republican simplicity had de livered his brief inaugural. In 1807 he was filling his second term as Chief Magistrate of the nation and was filling it mighty well. In a less pretentious structure in the little village of Louis ville, Ga., Jared Irwin was serving his second term also as [Governor of Georgia. But scan the canvas as closely as you may, you will find on its pictured face no railroad, no steam boat, no cooking stove, no sewing machine, and not even a box of matches, nor a postage stamp in all the land. The pole boat and the old time stage were the "public carriers" of those old days, while the tinder box or horn with its flint and steel attachments took the place of the modern match, when the burning "chunk" though carefully imbedded in as'hes failed to preserve its incandescent glow through the long winter nights. Letter writing in that day was a rather ex pensive pastime as every missive, loveladen or otherwise, re duced the writer's bank account just twenty-five cents. And what were the local conditions in this immediate section? Augusta, although it had received its city charter seven years before, was only a struggling town over whose municipal destinies Gen. Thomas Flourney presided. There were only two public roads in Richmond County — one leading to Savannah and the other to Louisville,, where for twelve years the State Government had lived and moved and had its legal being. During the old slave days Mr. James Anderson, who will receive further notice in these records, owned a negro 15 whose name was George. A stranger passing the Anderson home one day found George working in the grove, and being uncertain as to his route said : "Uncle, where does this road go to?" "Well boss," said the old man, "I bin here a long time and I never see dat road go anywhar. It just nach'ully stay right dar." So this old Louisville road that forms the commercial avenue of our town lies today where it lay a hundred years ago and more, with no material changes in its maiden path. Over its ungraded hills and unpaved sandy stretches the old time stage lumbered and jolted and toiled while the driver probably "cussed" his team in conventional Western style. The first stage station on this road was at the old A. W. Rhodes place in our town and the room used for this station still forms a part of the Rhodes dwelling. It was kept by a certain Stringfellow or some other fellow, but I have been able to secure no information as to his antecedents or his post-cedents. Col. Augustus H. Anderson, of old time Brothersville, once went hunting and a little pet dog that had never heard the report of a gun followed him into the woods. When the first shot was fired the dog was standing by his side, but when its echoes had died away the dog had adjourned sine die, and was never seen again. The "Col.'s" solution of the matter was that his canine pet through excessive ,fright had sjmply "evaporated." My friend Stringfellow seems to have suffered a similar fate. Oliver Cromwell once had his portrait painted. The artist thinking to please the grim Protector left off the warts that marred his rugged face, and when the stern old Puritan looked upon the finished canvas he said: "No sir, I won't have it, paint me as I am, warts and all." Tom Watson says that a book is worth only the truth it holds, and so in giving a faith ful portrait of this community in its early days I fear I shall have to paint at least one wart upon its old time face. " 'Tis true, 'tis pity and pity 'tis true," that in the early years of the i8th century Stringfellow or the other fellow, who kept this stage station, not only looked upon the wine when it was red but reddened the noses of the stage passengers by i6 furnisihing them liquid refres'hmenfs at so much per glass. With the exalted reputation this community has sustained for sobriety and good morals for all these years, I regret to place this blur upon its otherwise stainless record but as a truthful chronicler I can not ignore the fact. The patrons of the old stage routes did not enjoy a "two-cent fare" rate in those old days. Rev. Adiel Sherwood in the 1829 edition of his Gazet teer gives the fare charged on a number of these routes but none from Augusta to Louisville, probably for the reason that when the latter place was shorn of its prestige by the removal of the State Capitol to Milledgeville in 1807 the stage line was possibly abandoned. The figures given indicate that the rates were from 8 to 12 cents per mile. One statement made by this clerical authority may both puzzle and amuse the reader. It is as follows: "From Augusta to Charleston $15.00 and found." Those unfamiliar with the provincialisms of other days might infer from this record that passengers on the route named were sometimes lost and that the rates charged covered the expense of finding them. To prevent any misapprehension on this line it may not be amiss to say that the language quoted sim-ply means that the fifteen dollars guaranteed to the patron of this route not only transportation but "hog and hominy" in transit. The early years following the close of the Revolutionary War brought to this section a tide of immigration from other and older States, notably from Virginia and North Carolina. Among those who came to this immediate community there was a Robert Allen who, as his grandson D. R. Allen informs me, was a native of the Tar Heel State and who settled within the present limits of our town. There were so many marriages and inter-marriages among the families of the early settlers and their stories are so largely blended that the clearness and interest of the narrative will be enhanced by an enumeration of Robert Allen's contemporaries all of whom will receive in dividual and special notice in these annals. Among them were Edmund Murphey who located at what is known as the old Murphey place on the Louisville Road and within the present limits of Hephzibah, about 1784, Elisha Anderson, Sr., who 17 lived near what is known as the Miller Spring and Aaron, Absalom and Lewis Rhodes who were named to me by grand sons of two of them as three brothers who migrated to this sec tion with their sister Nancy Ann from North Carolina in the late years of the i8th century. The late Wm. W. Rhodes of Louisville, Ga,, grandson of Aaron gave me this information some years before his death and within the past few weeks Judge R. H. P- Day grandson of Absalom has corroborated the statement and yet other documentary evidence that has come to me later has convinced me that they were both la'boring under the same traditional error. From entries in the old family bibles of Edmund Murphey and Lewis Rhodes I learn that Edmund married Nancy, the sister of Aaron and Absalom in 1785, and that Lewis son of John Rhodes was born in 1787. If Lewis came to Geeorgia with Aaron and Absolom and Xancy, he must have made the trip several years before he was born, and this seems 'hardly probable. In addition to this, John A. Rhodes, son of Absalom referred to A. W. Rhodes, son of Lewis, as his third cousin, and this would have failed to express the true relationship if Absalom and Lewis were brothers. My inference from the above is that John, father of Lewis came with the Rhodes contingent from North Carolina and that he was a cousiji and not a brother of Aaron, Absalom and Nancy. If the reader can reconcile the facts to a different theory he is at liberty to do so and no demurrer will be filed. Within the soil of the old Allen burying ground in our town there lies today, and has lain for more than a hundred years, the dust of another and perbaps the earliest settler within the limits of Hepbzibah. The stone that marks his grave bears this inscription: "Eleazor Brack — Died 1801," but his identity seems largely lost in the mist of the years that are gone. The only information that I have been able to gather is that Elisha Anderson married a Miss Brack and that Mrs. Virginia Davis thinks that Eleazor was her ancient kinsman. But of these matters and of others, as the rural cor respondent said "More Anonymous." 18 ROBERT ALLEN. Between the years 1757 and 1774 a section of land was granted to John Allen in Richmond County, and between 1785 and 1788 other sections were taken up by David, Gideon and Samuel Allen. Between 1787 and 1791 Daniel, Robert, Joseph, William and John Allen located in what was then St. Georges Parish, now Burke and Jefferson counties. The Allen tribe, therefore, seems to have been well represented in this imme diate territory. Whether the Burke or Jefferson Robert was identical with the one under discussion, or whether the latter was related in any way to the others named, I do not know. My friend D. R. Allen informs me that the residence of his grandfather Robert Allen stood about midway between the site of the old Kilpatrick or Mr. J. Carswell home and the Louisville Road, or just in rear of Mr. U. B. Frost's dwelling, and that the blacksmith shop where the first Allen plow was made, glowed and shone with its old-time furnace and bellows and rang with its ancient hammer and anvil near the present site of the Baptist Churc'h. He stated, further, that the sites were pointed out to him by his father, Elisha A. Allen, who lived in the home and w*ho probably in his early manhood hardened his muscles in the blacksmith shop. This seemed to settle the matter beyond a peradventure. But now Cometh my old friend and schoolmate, James A. Carswell, who deposeth and saith that the location named can not be the correct one for the reason that there was no spring near it, and in addition to this that he has eaten fruit from the old Allen ordhard near what was once known as the Allen spring half a mile away. I regret that my friend James has seen fit to "spring" such an objection to what I thoug'ht to be an es tablished fact, and regret likewise that I have fallen into his torical difficulties through the same agency that brought to the life of old Mother Eve her moral troubles, namely, the eating of apples. Since modern research has thrown discredit on the Wm. Tell apple story and on the George Washington hatchet inci dent as well, the value of tradition as a historical asset seems 19 to be on the wane. It may be that in the days to come some skeptic will arise and say that no man ever hit Billy Patterson, but that he was simply struck by an idea and that the resultant injury from so unusual an occurrence was so grave that its distant echoes linger in the corridors of time. Ah well, whatever may have been the exact site of his home, the fact remains that Robert Allen, a hundred years ago and more, lived within the present limits of Hephzibah, and was not only the father of the Allen plow but of a goodly number of sons and daughters. He married Elizabeth Ander son, the only child of Elisha Anderson, Sr., by his first mar riage. His wife must have been a very lovable woman, or she must have had tact enough to induce her husband to think so, as he gave both his sons, Robert and Elisha, her maiden name. His daughters in their matrimonial alliances seemed to develop a predilection for men who wore judicial honors, his daughter Martha having married Judge Wm. J. Rhodes, son of Aaron Rhodes, and Jane having become the wife of Judge Edmund Palmer, son of Jonathan Palmer. A third daughter, Elizabeth, was married to Alexander, son of Edmund Murphey, but the judicial fever in that case did not rise above normal until the advent of a grandson, the present clever and genial postmaster of our town, who is known as Judge H. L. Murphey. Of four remaining daughters by his first marriage, Rosa married Ben jamin Wooding, Polly, Crawford, Sarah, Jackson and Emily was never married. After the death of his wife Robert Allen married a widow living in Columbia county and Hattie, the only child of this marriage, became the wife of Henry Wash burn of Savannah. Of his sons, Robert A. married Priscilla Wood and after her death Caroline, widow of Benjamin G. Walker. Elisha A. married Jeannette Evans, daughter of Daniel Evans. Judge Robert A. Allen for many years a prominent and useful citizen of this county left two sons, Frank and Robert, and one daughter, Cornelia (Hull). EHsha A. had three sons, Robert H., Elisha A. Jr., and D. Richard Allen, and three daughters, Anna, 'Margaret and Jennie. He was a prominent and suc cessful planter in the adjoining county of Burke. Through 20 the marriage of his daughter Jane to Edmund Palmer, Robert Allen became the grandfather of James E., John T., Robert and Savannah Palmer, and through the marriage of Rosa to Benjamin Wooding, of their dhildren Mary, Martha and Ed ward. His descendants through the Rhodes and Murphey al liances will receive proper mention in the stories of Aaron Rhodes and Edmund Murphey. If the information given me by his grandson is authentic Robert Allen in his early manhood varied- his agricultural operations by sowing a lot of "wild oats," but finding the outcome from that particular method of diversion unsatisfac tory he reformed, entered the communion of the Methodist church and for many years was a prominent and useful local minister. During all bis later life Rey- Nicholas Murphey and Rev. Alexander Avret were his co-laborers in the pro pagation of the Arminian Creed in this section. The following story, in which the three were the dramatis personae, was told me by Rev. E. R. Carswell, Sr.„ and is probably absolutely trustworthy. I give it the alliterative h'eading of PLANKGATE PIETY. In the early days of Methodism any effort at ornamen tation either in dress or domestic surroundings was looked upon as a direct inspiration of the Evil One. On one occasion his two co-laborers were traveling together the Louisville Road and in passing through what is now Hephzibah they came directly in front of the Robert Allen residence. Looking toward it they noticed that an old-fashioned set of "bars," that had formed the means of entrance to and egress from his barnyard or lot, had' been replaced by a plain plank gate. It added much to the convenience of the situation and destroyed in that particular case at least the old-time boyish job of "minding the bars." The plank of which it was made was undressed and unpainted, but it looked better than the old and the change furnished to the two preachers strong circumstan tial evidence that Brother Allen was growing worldly minded and in imminent danger of "falling from grace," and they both 21 then and there solemnly covenanted with each other that they would pray for him that he might be delivered from the snares of the Wicked One, and restored to his former strict adherence to the tenets of the Methodist Creed. If old Father Murphey and old Father Avrett were alive today and were to ride together, as in the old days, from Tybee light to Rabun Gap no set of "bars" perhaps would greet their vision through all that weary travel, but gates enough to vex their righteous souls for all the years to come. As it is not my purpose to confine this story to the narrow limitations of strict historic detail, and as my last instalment closed with an incident which may seem to have furnished "one on" the old time Methodists of .this community, and as our town in its denominational alignment is confined largely to members of that creed and of the Baptist faith and order, it may not be amiss to even up by giving a similar reminis cence for the benefit and behoof of my many friends of the last named church. Allusions have been made to the marriage of Edmund Palmer, son of Jonathan, to Jane Allen, daughter of Robert. With the tide of immigration that flowed into this section from the old North State a hundred years ago and more, there came to this country Jonathan, George, William, Nathaniel and Jeff Palmer, with two sisters, Mrs. Rowland and 'Mrs. Wash ington. These five brothers are the progenitors of the numer ous family of that name now to be found in this and adjoining counties, as well as in other sections, and in other States. During my college days at, Emory, Prof James E. Palmer, grandson of Jonathan and of Robert Allen, as well, occupied the Latin chair in that institution, and filled it ably as he did every other position to which public or private duty called him. His son, Howard E. W. Palmer, who has inherited in full measure the gifts and graces of his worthy ancestry, is filling large space in the official, professional and religious life of Atlanta today. In the waning hours of a winter day in 1905, I had just taken my seat in the Augusta Southern train, preparatory to my ride to my 'home in Hephzibah, when a tall, fine looking, 2.2 well preserved man with a ministerial look on his open face and well dressed form, entered the coach and seating himself near me began a railway conversation, which revealed to me that after a break of thirty years and more I was renewing my acquaintance with Lewis D. Palmer, of Nashville, Tenn., son of "Uncle Jimmie" as he was familiarly known, and grandson of Jonathan Palmer. Among the delightful reminiscences with which he entertained me during our hour's ride together he gave me the following story of bis grandfather, which I place among these memories as a sort of offset to "Plankgate Piety" and label it in the same alliterative way as A CURIOUS CURE FOR CALVINISM. Jonathan Palmer, after leaving his home in North Caro lina, crossed the Savannah at old Petersburg, and after passing through the fertile lands and virgin forests of Lincoln and Columbia, by some strange perversity of business judgment, located on the thin pine soil that borders the waters of Sandy Run in Richmond county. Though a Methodist by training and family tradition, he found himself surrounded in his new home entirely by Baptist neighbors, who were holding weekly religious services in one of God's temples, unprotected from sun and rain, save by a rude brush arbor. Jonathan joined in with them and when they were about to suspend on account of the approach of winter he suggested that they build a log church. The plans met their approval, the material was cut and hauled, and when the walls were finished and a shapely piece of timber had been placed in partial position as a girder they suspended work for the day. Frequent friendly spats as to doctrine had occurred between Jonathan and his Calvinistic neighbors and as they were about to separate for the night one of them pointing to the shapely girder said : "That log was everlastingly pre destined from the beginning of time to lie on this church and no other log could take its place." "But," said Methodist Jonathan, "some one may come along here tonight and cut that log in two." "It couldn't be done," was the reply. "The 23 Lord would palsy his hand." They parted, and as they went their several ways Jonathan said to his slave, Ed, who was aiding in the work. "Take your axe and a pine torch tonight, go back to that church, and cut that log in two, but hitch up your team at daylight and have another piece of timber there to take its place when we begin work." Under the shadow of the autumn night Ed carried out his orders faithfully and when the laborers met to resume their work, the shapely girder lay on the ground cut into two sections and unfit for its in tended use. The substitute was used and the work completed, but no palsied hands were found in all that section, and the incident so undermined the faith of the community that it resulted in the establishment of old Ariel Methodist church, that stood for many years near the scene of Ed's nocturnal labors. My friend, Lewis D., gave me an incident in his father's life which while not directly connected with my story, may be worthy of record in these annals for the moral that it bears. On his last annual visit to his father's from his home in Nashville, he found him planting an orchard and though eighty-six years of age, setting the trees with his own hands. To his son's inquiry "why are you planting an orchard when you can have no hope at your age to gather fruit from it?" "I am not planting with any such purpose," was the reply, "I am planting for those who come after me." And then lean ing on his spade he added "Lew, I want to give you two rules, one for working and one for living. A man ought to work as if he were going to live forever. A man ought to live as if he were going to die tomorrow." And his son as he finished the recital said to me : "I have never known more moral wisdom compressed into so short a space," a statement which the reader will scarcely feel disposed to challenge. Two months later, Uncle Jimmie went to his long home, and I am sure few gentler and purer, better men have ever breathed the air of earth or found a warmer welcome at the gate of Heaven. The log church just referred to was not the only one of similar primitive architecture, that supplied the spiritual needs of the early settlers in this section. Contemporary with it and 24 only a little removed from the present limits of our town, there stood in those old days a hewn log c'hurch known in my early boyhood by the rather contradictory title of "Old New Hope." During the old days I enjoyed the friendship of a negro preacher who always referred to his pulpit service as "offish- uating." The proximity of the church just named, and of "Old Liberty," to the residence of Robert Allen, furnishes pre sumptive evidence that at their sacred desks and within their primitive but prayer hallowed walTs, a large measure of his own "offishuating" was done. I have in my possession an old register of New Hope Church, compiled April 9th, 1833. On one of its pages time stained and yellowed with age, there is a record of the baptism of twenty-two of my grandfather's twenty-five children. For the first three entries, made for the year 1812, my father among them. Rev. Robert Allen is named as administrator of the ordinance. The latest similar record with which his name is connected is made for the year 1816. Aside from his ministerial labors, Robert Allen was an enterprising and successful man of affairs, owning a public mill and gin propelled by an overshot wheel on a small stream near his home. To this gin in those old days cotton was brought from sections twenty miles away to be prepared for market. Of the date of his death and the exact location of his burial place, I am not advised, but after his second marriage he moved to Columbia county, and somewhere within its soil his dust has lain for all these years. No trace is left of his old time home where he lived and labored a hundred years ago. The busy clang of his ringing anvil and the drowsy hum of ¦ his rumbling mill have long since died upon the woodland air, and yet in the life and character of his descendants, noted as they are for intelligence, integrity and moral worth, he still lives and will live till earth is childless and time's no more. 25 EDMUND MURPHEY. When Oglethorpe left the English shores in 1736, on his second visit to the Georgia colony, there came with him as immigrants Nicholas Murphey and wife, who settled in the then small village of Augusta. Nicholas served for five years as a member of His Majesty's Troop of Rangers and was granted one acre of land in the town and 250 acres on the river below Augusta. On November 24, 1745, the traditional stork made them a visit, and brought to their home a boy, to whom they gave the name of Edmund, and who by his own claim was the first white male child born in Augusta. I was not keeping a diary in those old days, and cannot therefore certify to the absolute accuracy of this claim ; but from the number of white males now resident in this goodly city, and from the number who have made their entrance and their exit for all these years, this accommodating bird seems to have been kept reasonably busy in supplying prospecitve white voters ever since baby Edmund headed the procession. The boy grew up to manhood and married a Betsey Ann, but of her further "trimmings," as they are sometimes termed, I am not advised. As the fruit of this marriage there was born to Edmund a son, James, whose descendants are now living in Augusta, and in the 1269th district of this county. There was also one daughter, Nancy Ann, who became the wife of Aaron Rhodes. As Edmund in later life married Nancy Ann, the sister of the aforesaid Aaron, and as he gave to a daughter by that marriage the name of Elizabeth Ann, it would indicate that among Edmund's personal family hold ings there was a bunch of exactly four Anns. This seems a little unreasonable, and I have tried hard to figure out a dif ferent result, but the facts seem to be against me. At the morning meal of an old-time family, who kept up the com mendable custom of requiring each of its members to repeat a verse of Scripture, after the "grace" was said, two transient guests once sat. The father asked the blessing, and then led off, while the children, trained to the habit, followed without a break, until the circuit of the table had been made, and the 26 guests were reached. The first responded promptly with, "And Peter went out and wept bitterly." The other ransacked his brain in vain for a familiar shred of Holy Writ; but his Bible knowledge- at that particular juncture was filed away in the column of unavailable assets. Finally, to break the oppressive silence, and redeem his waning reputation he decided to en dorse the last quotation made, and mentally referring to Peter's penitential tears, 'he smiled and said, "He sho' did." And so, in canvassing the evidence pro and con, as to whether Edmund Murphey really had this multiplicity of Anns in his family household, I am compelled to believe that "he sho' did." Some years ago the public mind, mathematically inclined, was puzzling its wits to solve a problem whose main objective point was voiced in the query, "How old was Ann?" I do not know that the problem found its birth in the conditions named above, but if Edmund had ever tried to solve it, it would have surely vexed his worried brain to know which Ann was meant. The first installment of his matrimonial life was marred in some degree by seven years' effort of the colonies to leave the maternal roof and set up 'housekeeping for themselves. He enlisted in the American army, was captured by the British, or Tories, was imprisoned in Fort Grierson, and afterwards in Fort Augusta, and was only released when the last named Fort was captured and its garrison surrendered to Pickens and Lee in 1782. During his incarceration in Fort Grierson, Col. Brown, the Tory commander, in retaliation for the mur der of a British officer after his surrender, ordered twelve of the prisoners hanged on the stairway of the fort. Edmund must have been a man of some shrewdness, for havingno special desire to have any paft or lot in that matter, -he quietly hid away in the cellar of the building until the drawing was over. But for this evidence of his thorough acquaintance with the law of self-preservation, he might have had no part or lot in this story. When the war had ended, Edmund, for Revolutionary service, was granted in 1784 a section of land, and in further evidence of his good sense, he located in this community, 27 building his home within the present limits of our town. This home, with its landed estate, now known as the "Old Murphey Place," has remained in the possession of Edmund's de scendants for all these years, and is now owned by his great- grandson, Dr. Eugene E. Murphey. About the date of this landgrant the Rhodes contingent consisting of Aaron, Abso lom, their sister Nancy, and probably their cousin John Rhodes, came to this county from North Carolina. Nancy must have been a comely maid, for she had lived in her Georgia home but a little w'hile when Edmund Murphey persuaded her to become his second wife. As Mormon elders had not begun missionary operations in this section at that date, it is hardly necessary for me to say that his first wife was not then living. This marriage occurred February lo, 1785. Some years later Aaron Rhodes, in order to recoup himself for the loss of a sis ter Nancy, married Edmund Murphey's daughter Nancy, and thus matrimonial matters between the families were evened up. This marital exc'hange seems to have developed in the family and its connections a sort of hereditary mania, or idiosyncrasy, on the subject of Nancys, Absalom Rhodes, brother of Aaron, gave the name to one of his daughters, while Nicholas, son of Edmund, and grandson of Aaron, aside from having a mother, sister, daughter and granddaughter of the same name, married two Nancys, though not at one and the same time. The writer disclaims very earnestly entertaining any per sonal grievance against the name of Nancy, for in other years his life was blessed by the love of an aunt, who bore that name, and who, like many of her sex, similarly cTiristened, belonged to "the salt of the earth." And yet if I were a young man, and unmarried, and were looking out for some confiding woman, whose tender ministrations would bless my home, and whose gentle hands would darn my socks, and comfort my declining years, it does seem to me that there would be at least some slight inclination to draw the line at Nancy Ann, and Samantha Jane, unless of course there were extenuating circumstances. With a vocabulary of such names as Ruth and Esther, [Mary and Martha, Ethel and Agnes, and others of like euphony 28 and sweetness at their command, I have been at a loss to un derstand why these old-time people, sensible as they were, in other matters, should have been willing to burden and afflict their helpless and innocent offspring with some of the names they were compelled to bear through life, for names, like postage stamps and porous plasters, stick. In a record of the "Old Colony Walkers" of New England I find 10 Mercys, 7 Mehitables, 6 Patiences, 5 Wealthys, 4 Comforts, 3 Keziahs, 2 Experiences, i Thankful, i Rejoice, i Relief, i Mandaua, i Diadama, and i Hephzibah, with several precincts to hear from. In evidence of the fact that the Murphey family did not enjoy an absolute monopoly of the Nancys in that d'ay, I find on this record twenty-two bearing that name, some of them plain Nancys, some of them with an attachment, two of them Nancy Tituses, who were probably also "plain." And now in justice to the Nancys past, present and to come I desire to say that in my humble judgment the name in comparison with some appellatives that were common in other days is as my friend Tom Pilcher would say, "Not only a daisy but a regular geranium." Some years ago there fell into my hands a batch of old letters written to my grand father and running in date from 1806 to 1845. Among the items gleaned from them I found that among my own tribe on that particular line there had been a Peninah, an Azariah and others of like bandsome and rhythmical nomenclature. A fair young relative who had in some way contracted a rather serious type of the D. A. R. fever wrote to me for some information as to her Revolutionary antecedents and in re ply I told her that with a family tree whose branches bore such fruitage her chances for admission surely ought to grade "Strict Middling." Artemas Ward once stood behind the footlights on a London stage to deliver his famous panorama lecture. Having unbounded faith in the skill of the artist wbose hands had traced the canvas he pointed to a figure on its pictured face and said: "That figure is intended to represent a horse — that is I think it is." To any reader therefore who may be unable to trace the connection, logical or illogical between- 29 what I have just written and the story I am telling it may not be amiss to say that it is probably intended as a digression. The dividends from Edmund Murphey's second matri monial investment were larger than from his first, aggregating five boys, Nicholas, Alexander, Leroy, John and Edward; and five girls, Elizabeth Ann, (Ex.ans), Levicy (Hull), Mary or "Polly" (Rheney), Maria (Brown), and Harriet, who died in 1829, unmarried. Taking the sons in order given, Nicholas, who in the waning days of 1785 came as a Christmas gift to his parents, was married February 7, 1805, to Nancy Collins. By this marriage there came to Nicholas two sons, Milledge and Moses C, and seven daughters, Sarah (Clark), Elizabeth, Mary (Daniel), Levinah (Avret), Nancy (Rheney), Jane and ?ilartha (Daniel). Moses C. lived but a few months, and Elizabeth and Jane were never married. March 20, 1819, Nancy, first wife of Nicholas, died, and May 20, 1820, he was married to Nancy Carswell, daughter of John, and granddaughter of Alexander and Isabella Carswell, who came to Georgia from Ireland in or about 1770, and who were the progenitors, not only of the Hephzibah contingent of that name, but of many other contingents in many other sections of the State. By his second marriage the family of Nicholas was in creased by the addition of four sons, Edmund T., John C, John C. No. 2, the first having lived only a few months, and Nelson Wright, and two daug'hters, Caroline Elizabeth, who lived only a few years, and Elizabeth Ann, who married Need- ham Bullard. . Among the descendants of Nicholas through his son Mil- ledge are Moses C. Murphey, Julian, Weems and Curtis Smith of Augusta and their several families. Sarah, who married Charles Clark, had only sixteen children, three of whom survive. One of these. Rev. Milton A. Clark, has been labor ing as a missionary among the Indians for more than twenty years. Other descendants by the last marriage are. Dr. Eugene E. Murphey and Geo. S. Murphey of Augusta, Ell- wood Murphey of Atlanta, Jno. M. C. Murphey of Hephzibah, 30 MOSES C- MURPHEY, Great-Grandson of Edmond Murphey. and Mrs. Ella Salter of Tampa, Fla. The limitations of these records forbid fuller specializing. As a local minister of the Methodist church. Rev. Nicholas Murphey rendered able, earnest and faithful service to his Master. He was a strict constructionist of Mr. Wesley's "Gen eral Rules," evidence of which has been already given in the "Plankgate" incident. On a trip to Atlanta thirty years ago and more, I chanced to get a seat in the railway coach just in the rear of Rev. Lovick Pierce, D. D., the Nestor of Georgia Methodism. The word "picnic" was used by some one in the car, and the Dr. said : "I never hear that word without thinking of old Nickie Murphey of Richmond county. After a social occasion of this kind in his community, he preached on the succeeding Sabbath, and after dwelling at some length on the sin of worldly amusements, he closed with this climax : 'I understand you have all been picknicking it. Yes, you can picnic now, but some of these days "Old Nick" is going to pick you.' " Rev. E. R. Carswell, Sr., once gave me the following il lustration of another "curious cure," but not for Calvinism in this case. During iGov. Wm. Schley's administration of the Richmond Factory Plant, "Uncle Nickie" had occasion to visit his office. The governor, seeing an inflamed wart on the preacher's hand, said : "Mr. Murphey, if you will follow my directions, you can cure that wart. As you ride home, stop at the first smooth pebble you see in the road, rub its under side over the wart, make a cross mark in the road, deposit the pebble carefully in the cross and then drive away without looking backward." The preacher had probably but little faith in the prescription, but took the medicine according to directions, and when he saw Gov. Schley again, two weeks later, the unsightly protuberance had gone "where the wood bine twineth." Uncle Nickie's ministerial labors embraced an "appoint ment" at Richmond Factory and probably at New Hope and Liberty churches, with an occasional service at the old Brothersville Academy. After serving his generation by the will of God, he fell on sleep Jan. 8, 1853. His wife survived 31 him for sixteen years, dying May 23, 1869. They both sleep in the old Murphey burying ground, near Hephzibah, but on the stones that mark their graves, in deference to the wishes of the dead, no line or letter has been traced or carved to tell who lies beneath. Alexander, second son of Edmund, was not a strong be liever in single blessedness, having taken the oath of allegiance matrimonially on three separate occasions. His first marriage, to Elizabeth Kinlow, brought no olive plants to grace or bless his home or hearthstone. By his second marriage, to Eliza beth, daughter of Robert Allen, there came to him two sons, Robert and William, and a daughter, Frances. After the death of Elizabeth, and the conventional widowerhood had passed, forgetting the advice given by Mr. Weller to his son "Samivel," he married Margaret, the widow of Henry Seaborn Jones, one of the numerous tribe of that name, who trace with some degree of pride their lineage back to "Sweathouse Peter," for whom Peters'burg, Va., is said to have been named. When their union occurred, Margaret had already to her credit as a legacy from-her first marriage, four sons, William, Thom as, Batt and Henry Drummond, and three daughters, Grace Sarah and Henrietta. The union of the parents started the matrimonial ball to rolling, and its revolutions never ended until all the marriageable material in the two batches of children had been exhausted. William Jones married Frances Murphey, and Robert Murphey married Grace Jones, and after her death married her sister Henrietta, and William 'Murphey married Sarah Jones, whose gracious presence still today abides among us, as I write these simple annals, as a symbol and a token of the sweetness and the fragrance of the times that seem so olden, and the years that were so golden, and the days that are no more. A father was once urging his son to marry, while the latter did not seem to take kindly to the idea. "When I was no older than you are," said the father, "I married your mother, and I think you ought to marry." "But, said the son, "that was different ; you married ma right here at home. 32 and I'd have to go off and marry some strange gal." The conditions named above certainly relieved William Jones and Robert and William Murphey of the unpleasant necessity of going off to marry "some strange gal." Two children were born to Alexander and Margaret, after their marriage, Margaret, who married William Womack, and Caroline, who died in her early womanhood. Leroy, son of Edmund, married Lucinda Brown, and lived between Hephzibah and Story's mill. Three sons and three daughters were born to them, John M., Emerson, Leroy, Isabella (Hillis), Sophia (Powell), and Maud Alice (Ratcliffe). Mrs. John W. Hillis, daughter, and Mrs. O. B. Stoughton, granddaughter, are now living in Augusta. To Charles Rheney and his wife, "Polly" there came ten children: John W., who married Nancy Murphey, and after wards Mary Eleanor Clark, Elisha A., who married Julia Rhodes, Frederick, who married Nancy Moore, Edmund, who married Martha Denham, Levicey (Rogers), Mary Ann (Cook), Rosa (McNair), Lucinda (Agerton), Amanda (Duke) and Harriet, who never married. Many descendants of "Polly" through her numerous offspring are now living in Richmond, Burke, Jefferson and other counties of this and other States. Robert Evans and Elizabeth Ann, 'his wife, had only two children, Marcus, who married Emeline Palmer, daughter of Jonathan Palmer, by his second marriage, and Mary J., who married first William T. Malone, son of Robert, and after wards John H. Rhodes, son of John A. Their children and grandchildren may be found at Bartow, Wadley, and in other sections of Jefferson, and at Tennille, in Washington county. Edmund Murphey died December lo, 1821, and Nancy, his wife, August 12, 1825. Their bodies rest in the old bury ing ground near his old home, and on their graves there are lying today stones, the counterpart of -wbich I have never seen on any other graves in all the land. Quarried in old time coffin outlines from a granite boulder that lies only a mile away, and weighing each a ton or more, they rest the full length of the graves, with seeming intent to bar a possible 33 resurrection of the sacred dust that has lain so still beneath their massive weig'ht for all these years. Edmund's generation of many names forms a material share of the present population of this section of the State, adding largely to its thrift, its intelligence, its good citizen ship, its business integrity, and its moral and religious tone. And now with the blood of these old-time people trickling through the veins of my wife and children, with personal knowledge in early life of four of them who bore these names, and with kindly reverence for them all, why have I empha sized this Ann and Nancy feature of these records? A story given me by my old friend and comrade, W. J. Steed, may illustrate the reason. An old time negro, who had been in the service of a prominent Augusta family for years, came into the office to make his tax returns. In the conversation that ensued, he told my friend Phunie that he had found a large snake coiled in a nest where his hens were laying. When the intruder had been despatched it was found that he had gulped down not only the fresh eggs, but the porcelain nest egg as well, and the old man, with a twinkle in his honest eyes, said : "Speck he would a found that chiny aig right hard to injest." So this little side line or by play has been interjected as a sort of mental peruna to aid the readers in "injesting" the genealogical meals my pen is trying to furnish. And now in winding up the matter not only sine die, but forever and a dayj I am glad to give it a happy and fitting climax'. On the day in which my tribute to the Anns and Nancys met the public eye there came to bless the home of my young friend, John E. Murphey and his charming wife, a baby girl, the great, great, great-grandaughter of Edmund Murphey. Her little brother, six years old, was so delighted with her advent that he went out to make announcement to the world, and when the question came, "What are you going to name her?" he promptly answered "Nancy Ann." 34 ELISHA ANDERSON. Elisha Anderson was probably an earlier resident of this community than any of those to whom special reference has been made in these records, save Thomas Walker. Between the years 1757 and 1774 James Anderson was granted a section of land in Richmond county, and between 1764 and 1774 simi lar headrights were taken out by James and Elizabeth Ander son in Burke county. The frequent recurrence of these two names among the descendants of Elisha Anderson and the ownership by him of landed estates in both of the counties named indicate very strongly that he was the son of this James and probably the nephew of Elizabeth. A hundred years ago and more Elisha lived near what is now known as the Miller Spring in our town and not far away from the site of the present residence of our townsman, Frank W. Carswell. I know very little of this earlier resident's characteristics, but his record shows that he entertained a very high regard for what is known as the better half of creation, having married four different and distinct times. His first wife was either sister or daughter of Eleazor Brack, whose dust has lain en tombed in the old Allen graveyard since Oct. 11, 1801. By this marriage there was only one child, Elizabeth, who became the wife of Robert Allen. His second marriage to Miss Cald well seems to have been barren of any issue. His third wife was the widow of William Rheney, and was originally Mary Holzendorf, whose parents lived in Glynn county and were probably descendants of German Salzburghers, who came over with Oglethorpe in 1736 and settled at Frederica, St. Simons and other points on the Georgia coast. By her first marriage Mrs. Rheney had three sons, John, William and Charles, and a daughter who married John Devine. My friend, Rev. George Smith, in his Story of Georgia gives the name of William Rheney in the list of settlers, who were granted headrights in Burke and Jefferson counties between the years 1783 and 1788. This was probably the William who married Mary Holzendorf, and who I am informed by his grand daughter Mrs. Vicie Rogers of Wrens, Ga., came to Georgia 35 from Virginia. To Elisha Anderson his wife Mary bore three sons, James, Elisha and Augustus and a daughter, Rosa. James Anderson married first Sarah Bradley, to whom the following children were born : James, Augustus, John, Mary, Elizabeth, Rosa, William and Lawrence, the last two dying in childhood. By his second marriage to Malvina Kinlow there were three children, Ella, Susan and Martha, the first named being the only one who survived her childhood years and reached maturity. James Jr., son of James by his first marriage, married Julia W. Clinton, of Burke county, who bore to him one daughter, Mary, who is now living in Augusta. After the death of James Jr., his widow, Julia, was married to Gen. James Barnwell Hayne, to whom she bore one son, Linwood C. Hayne, now the popular and efficient president of the Na tional Bank of Augusta. Augustus H. Jr., son of James, mar ried Susan, daughter of Augustus H. Anderson, Sr., and their children, Martha, Howard and James now live in Burke coun ty, Cora (Shewmake), the eldest, having died some years ago. Their mother still survives at a good old age. John and Mary, children of James, died unmarried in early manhood and womanhood. Rosa V., was married to J. Jones Reynolds and her surviving children, Foster, Joseph and James, are living in Burke county. J. Jones was so well pleased with his first wife that after her death he married her sister, Lizzie W., who survives him, and is now living in Waynesboro, Ga. Ella E., daughter of James, was married to Rev. J. O. A. Clark, D. D., and she and her children are now residents of Macon, Ga. Elisha Anderson, Jr., son of Elisha Sr., married Jane Mc- Cullers. My friend Steed, who seems to have an unlimited supply of illustrative stories, once told this : A lady was asked the number ol her children and after the information was given there followed this additional inquiry : "What,^ are they?" "Mostly boys and girls," she replied. Elisha Ander son's offspring seems to bave differed from this descriptive family catalogue as they were not only "mostly," but entirely, 36 girls. They were four in number, Sarah, who was married to Edmund B. Gresham ; Harriet, who married Henry D. Green wood ; Rosa, who married Elisha Harris, and Louisa, who died unmarried. Some further notice of these families will be given in the Brothersville feature of this story. Augustus H., son of Elisha Sr., married Sarah Jones, and two daughters came to bless their union, Martha, who was married to Moses P. Green, son of Jesse, and Susan, who has been already named as the wife of Augustus H. Anderson, Jr. Two children were born to Martha and Moses P. IGreen; George, who married Kate Thomas, and Edward, who married Fulcher. Rosa, daughter of Elisha Anderson, Sr., was first married to John Morrison, to whom she bore a son, Robert, and a daughter, Sarah (Dowse). After the death of her first hus'band she became the wife of Dr. Baldwin B. Mil ler, a Virginian, who came to Georgia in one of the early decades of the last century, and after his first marriage lived for a time at the old Elisha Anderson home in our town. Two children were born of this marriage, Baldwin Jr., and a daugh ter, Frances, who married Henry J. Schley. After Rosa's death Dr. Miller married Cornelia, daughter of Rev. Joseph Polhill. Dr. Miller, after his residence at the old Anderson home, lived for a time at Mount Enon, then in Burke county, re turning in his later years to Hephzibah, where his last days were spent and where his widow and two daughters Lavinia (Carswell) and Lula (Frost) now reside. The Dr. was a skillful physician, an eminently successful planter, a man of exceptional energy and business sense and accumulated during his long life a large landed estate. Elisha Anderson, Sr., after the death of his third wife, married a Miss Womble, who bore him one daughter, Virginia P. After Elisha's death his widow married a Mr. Danforth and spent her later years in Alabama. Virginia first married Dr. Edward Hughes, brother of Judge William W. Hughes, and son of Capt. Henry Hughes, who served as an officer through the Revolutionary War. Capt. Hughes belonged to the order of the Cincinnati, organized by the American of- 37 licers after the close of the war and there is now in possession of his grandson, Benjamin S. Hughes, the original certificate of membership handsomely engraved and signed by "G. Wash ington, President." Dr Edward Hughes lived only a year or two after his marriage and his young and handsome widow became the wife of Col. A. C. Walker. Elisha, Sr., died and was buried at his Burke county home where his great-grand son, Foster Reynolds, and bis family, now live. Some future reference will be made to his three sons in the Brothersville period of these records. 38 THE RHODES TRIBE. ABSALOM. Rev. Patrick H. Mell, D. D., learned, and witty, and wise, and probably in his day the most distinguished exponent of the Baptist faith in Georgia, once said to himself, if he failed to say aloud, as Simon Peter once did, "I go- a fishing." The genial D. D. was amply able mentally to row his own boat or paddle his own canoe, but on this particular occasion, not wishing to be handicapped in his enjoyment of the sport, he engaged a rustic citizen living near his fishing ground to pad dle for him. His companion for the day proved to be rather a garrulous individual and entertained the doctor with many "wise saws and modern instances," chiefly of an autobiograph ical character. But a single shred of that discourse has sur vived the wear and tear of time, and as reported by Dr. Mell to my friend, W. J. Steed, it was couched in the following words : "I was born mostly in Emanuel county." And now what on earth has this incident to do with the story of Absalom Rhodes? Only this, that after exhausting all available sources of information, weighing the evidence and giving the defendant the benefit of the doubt, I have been unable to decide positively whether Absalom was born "mostly" in Georgia or "mostly" in North Carolina. My friends, Richard H. P. Day, John H. and Absalom Rhodes, all grandsons of Absalom, Sr., unite in giving me the traditional information that the latter came from North Caro lina to Richmond county, and Judge Day fixes the date at 1765 or 1770. A recent inspection of the stone that marks the grave of Absalom and of a transcript from the family Bible of his daughter. Mrs. Nancy Loyless, has convinced me beyond a peradventure that the 1765 theory will not hold water, for the reason that Absalom did not make his advent into the world until five years later, April 8, 1770. It also renders it rather improbable that he should have been wandering around this section in long dresses and before he had cut his teeth, prospecting for a place to plant his baby feet in 1770. Even at the date of his sister Nancy's marriage to Edmund Murphey 39 'in February, 1785, he had not completed his fifteenth year, and giving Nancy reasonable time after her arrival in Georgia to make the acquaintance of her neighbors, time to sit up at night by the light of a tallow candle during her courting days, time to consider Edmund's proposal and time to "make her clothes" for the wedding, and it would reduce Absalom's age to twelve or thirteen years. This seems rather early in the then unsettled state of the country, for a boy to be rambling around several hundred miles from home, looking for a job. And, as Mr. Dooly would say, "so there you are." The reader has as much right to a guess as to the real facts in the matter as the writer, and he is at liberty to draw his own conclu sions. I do not know that it will throw any light on the matter, but it is perhaps not amiss to add in this connection that headrights were granted in ante-Revolutionary days to Samuel and William Rhodes in St. Georges Parish, now Burke and Jefferson counties, and that John Rhodes, possibly the "John" already named as the father of Lewis was a Revolutionary soldier from this State. And now whatever may have been the place of Absalom's nativity he was for the first three decades of the last century a very living entity and a very prominent factor in the busi ness and official life of Richmond county. He lived for a time at the corner of Greene and Jackson streets where the engine house now stands. In 1808 and '09 and again in 1812 and '13 he was sheriff of the county and lived at the old jail building, corner of Broad and Center. During the last named term James Murphey, son of Edmund by his first marriage and great-grandfather of W. J. Murphey, now in similar service with Gen. John W. Clark, was appointed by Absalom, deputy sheriff. From 1818 to 1822 and again from 1829 to 1836, he served as judge of the inferior court for this county. He was as sociated in that service with such prominent citizens as Val entine Walker, Holland McTyre, John and Abraham Twiggs, Samuel Hale and Edward Thomas. This court had control not only of the administration of county affairs, but dis- 40 charged the duties of the present court of ordinary and ex ercised large judicial powers in the litigation of civil cases. In addition to these public services rendered by Absa lom he was a member of the General Assembly, serving both at Louisville and Milledgeville, former Capitals of the State. I made an effort to secure through my old classmate and war comrade. Prof. Joseph T. Derry, of Atlanta, the years in which this legislative service was rendered, but through loss of some of the House Journals and through interruption in his search caused by his attendance on the Richmond reunion the data are not yet at hand. Joe would rather miss his breakfast than to miss a reunion of his old comrades in greyj and his desire to attend on this special occasion may have been intensified by the following fact. In the fall of '6i, through the carelessness of a Yankee bullet, he lost a tuft of his curling hair. In these later days his ambrosial locks, like my own, have been grow ing thinner and thinner, year by year, and his trip to Richmond may have been in part another Argonautic expedition in search of the Golden Fleece lost on Virginia soil long years ago. In the absence of railway transportation in those old days Absalom, in addition to his public duties organized a wagon train, which brought merchandise both from Charleston and Savannah for the merchants of Augusta. During the war of 1812 there was some apprehension of the occupancy of Savan nah by British troops and this train was utilized to transport the specie and other funds of the city's banks to Augusta for safety from military spoliation. Absalom Rhodes in his later life left the city and engaged in the milling business in the country districts. He built a mill on the waters of Spirit Creek, managed for a time by his son, Aaron, and afterwards sold to John Houghton, of Au gusta. Later he built another just below the junction of Grindstone and' Friendship branches, that still belongs to his grandson, Absalom Rhodes, and has always been known as the Rhodes Mill. The site of both these mills are on the Patter son Road and only a little way removed from the limits of our town. He built homes near these mills and occupied each of them for a time, living also at a place known as "Tranquilla" 41' within what is now Hephzibah. During his residence in the country he was known as the political boss of his district, dictating to his neighbors what they should eat, what they should drink, and how they should vote. Absalom Rhodes was twice married, but of the identity of his first wife, I have no information. One son was born of this marriage Absalom Rhodes, Jr., who though dying in 1820, when only twenty-nine years of age seems to have been a man of some prominence as his name occurs frequently on the records of the old inferior court in some official way. His grave lies in the old Edmund Murphey burying ground. After the death of his first wife, Absalom, Sr., married Mary Barton, who belonged to a prominent ante-Revolution ary family of this county. Willoughby Barton was a Revolu tionary soldier, and was granted a section of land in this coun ty between 1785 and 1788. Dr. Willoughby Barton of Jeffer son county, informs me that his ancient namesake was a noted Indian fighter and at one time commanded a brigade of troops under Andrew Jackson. Mary, wife of Absalom Rhodes, was probably his daughter or otherwise nearly related to him. She was born in 1773, married in 1796, and died in 1825, having borne to Absalom two sons, Aaron and John A., and five daughters, Elizabeth, Nancy, Mary, Lavinia, and Caroline. In addition to the children named there were born to Absalom Rhodes by his marriage with Mary Barton three others, who died in infancy or early childhood, viz : Maria in 1795, George W. in 1800 and Mary A. B. in 1804. Absalom Jr., the sole issue of his father's first marriage, died in 1820, leaving a son, Thomas, who migrated to Alabama where his descendants are now proba'bly living. John A. Rhodes, son of Absalom, and Mary, was born March 11, 1787; and on Feb. 11, 1819, married Margaretta Trippe, of Port Royal, S. C. Two children were born of this marriage, Mary (Chaplin) and Robert, who died unmarried. His second mar riage to Cynthia Brown resulted in the following issue : Julia, who married Elisha A. Rheney; Andrew J., who married Ann Sheehan ; John H., who married Mary J. Malone, widow of Wm. T., afterwards Cola Rentz, and last Eva Whigham; 42 Whitney H., who married Rebecca Rheney ; Aaron, who mar ried Anna Coursey; Absalom, who married Frances Cogle, and Seaborn, who died in later boyhood unmarried. Of these children four now survive : Andrew, Augusta, Ga. ; John H., Bartow, Ga. ; Aaron, Tifton, Ga., and Absalom, Hephzibah, Ga. John A. died Jan. i8, 1897, having rounded out almost an even century of existence. Aaron, son of Absalom, married Eliza beth Beale and had one son, Charles A., who lost a leg in Confederate service, and died in Augusta some years ago. Nancy Barton, daughter of Absalom and Mary, was born' Feb. 22, 1809; married Rev. Elliot B. Loyless, Oct, 27, 1829, and died in Dawson, Ga., Aug. 11, 1887. There were born to Nancy and Rev. Elliot B. eleven children, as follows : Mary C. M. (Sanders), born Nov. 16, 1830, and died Sept. 12, 1869; Sarah Lavinia, born March 7, 1832, and died Aug. 15, 1832; Ann Elizabeth (Cheatham), born May 3, 1833, and died May 5, 1869; Martha Jane (Sanders), born Aug. 7, 1835, and died March 19, 1888; Henry Melville, born Nov. 9, 1837, married Mollie Wooding, and died Jan. 3, 1876; James Elliot, born Oct. 6, 1839, married Lizzie Williams, and died Nov. 11, i86i ; Lucy Hinton, born Aug. 16, 1842, and died Sept. 27, 1843 ; Thomas Wesley, born Sept. 13, 1844, married Susan M. Von Aldehoff, and died Nov. 2, 1874; William Arnold, born Sept. 4, 1846, married Hattie Jackson; Francis Cassandria, born March 25, 1848, married John H. Harp ; Samuel Anthony, born May 7, 185 1, and married Louise J. DeLagle. Rev. Elliot B. Loyless was a local minister of the Meth odist church and at one time a large cotton merchant in Au gusta, having branch houses or connections at Athens, Ga., and other points. He was the son of James and Mary Butt Loyless. Some years after his marriage to Nancy Rhodes he moved to Southwest, Ga., and his last years were spent in Dawson, Terrell county. A grandson is now living in Au gusta, Thomas W., son of Thomas Wesley, whose brilliant and facile pen adorns the columns of the Augusta Chronicle. Elizabeth, daughter of Absalom and Mary, was married to Richard B. Day, and lived at "Tranquilla," in the present limits of Hephzibah. Six children were born to them: John 43 A. R., who married Sarah Griffin ; Alary Barton, who was mar ried to William Cochran ; Sarah Ann (Scale) ; Richard H. P., who married Mary L. T. Averet; Fanny Elizabeth (Farrar), and WilliamA., who never married. Judge R. H. P. Day is now a magistrate and employed at the Richmond county home. Of the present location of other descendants I am not advised. Caroline, daughter of Absalom, was married to Robert W. Bugg. As a result of this marriage five children were born, Samuel, 'Slary (Kelly), ^^'illiam J., IMoses P. G., Lizzie (San ders), Alex H. S., and Louise E., who never married; Samuel, \\'m.Jr., and i\I. P. G. Bugg are now farming in this county. Rev. A. H. S. Bugg is an able, earnest and useful member of the North Georgia Conference of the Alethodist church. Alary, daughter of Absalom, was married to Henry John son, and bore to him the following children : Charles J., ^^'il- liam H., Larry. Danforth, Samuel and Alary. I am not ad vised as to their matrimonial alliances, except as to Alary, who married 'Air. Coursey. ^^'illiam H. is now living in Au gusta: Lavinia, daughter of Absalom, married Thomas Beale and their marriage brought to them three sons and three daughters, George, John, Absalom, Ella, Bettie and Louisa, whose de- scendents are probably living in this and adjoining counties. LEWIS B. RHODES. Lewis B., son of John, was born March 10,1778. Where this event occurred, whether "mostly" in Richmond or "mostly" in some other county, who John was, where he came from or where he went to, either in this world or the next, I am not advised. As Johns of the Rhodes name were not as common as John Smiths and as there is only one of the name mentioned by George Smith in his "Story of Georgia and Her People," it is probable that Lewis was a son of this Revolu tionary John, who seems to have been a cousin of Aaron, Absa lom and Nancy. The first authentic information I have been able to gather of Lewis after the incident of his birth is that he married Mary White, Feb. 5, 1810. Some years after his marriage he bought from some Stringfellow, William prob ably, what has been known for so many years as the old A. W. Rhodes home in Hephzibah. Here were born to him the fol lowing children : John R., who married Araminty Haynie, Absalom W., who married Susan C. White, Thomas R., who married Alaria Watson and afterwards Sarah A. Pardue, Val W. Rhodes, who married Mary G. Fox and afterwards Mar garet M. Jones, Mary B., who married W. W. Walker, Tilman W., who married Sarah R. AA^olfe, James William, Lewis Allen, Lewis Bobo, William. Peyton and Hiram James. I find from entries in the old Lewis Rhodes Bible that in 1820 Matilda Rhodes was married to Thomas Hatcher, and in 1821 Al^erne- mia Rhodes was married to Thomas Al^arshall Ligon, Matilda and IMernemia were evidently daughters of John and sisters of Lewis. I have no information as to the descendents of John R., if any. To Abscilom W. were born Robert L., James W., Harriet (Byne) (Murrow), Martha (Kuhn), Charles J., Margaret and Mary. Charles J. and Harriet Murrow are living at Blythe, Ga., and Martha (Kuhn) in Texas. Fannie Wilder, daughter of Robert L., lives in Atlanta, and a son of James W. in New Jersey. To Thomas R., by his first marriage were born Mary (Watson), George Crawford and Henry A. Rhodes. 45 The last named enlisted in Confederate service as a mem ber of the Richmond Hussars at the age of seventeen, and was killed at .Barbee's Cross Rhodes, Va., Nov. 5, 1862. By his second marriage there came to Thomas R. three children, Henry who died in boyhood, Sarah A. (Pardue) and Anne May, who married W. C. Boykin, an4 who with her hus band and Harriet, Grace and Annie, her children, now live in Augusta, the eldest Rhodes Boykin being engaged in the lumber industry elsewhere. Thomas R. merchandised very successfully for a long time in the store now occupied by A. B. Saxon & Bro. The writer once served with him on the Board of Jury Commissioners and recalls the following inci dent of that service. In our examination of the list, whose fitness for jury service was to be considered and determined by us, we reached the name of a young man who in his physical makeup had developed some of the characteristics of a dude. As his name was announced Thomas R. said: "Pass him, he isn't fit for jury duty. He always wears his coats either too long or too short," and he was passed. To Val W. Rhodes were born Thomas V. W., now living in Texas, Wallace, who died in Atlanta, and Jennie, who mar ried Jno. W. Brown, local manager of the W. U. Telegraph Co. Henry C. Brown, manager of the Interstate Cotton Oil Co., in Augusta, and Annie B., wife of Mareen Duvall, District Superintendent of the Postal Telegraph Co., are children of John W. and Jennie Brown. Hiram Rhodes, son of Thomas R., married in Jonesboro, Ga., and his children are now living there. 46 AARON RHODES. I have not been a'ble to fix definitely the year in which Aaron, Absalom and Nancy Rhodes, and probably their "Cousin John" came from North Carolina to Richmond county. That they were here prior to Feb. lO, 1785, is evidenced by the fact that on that date Nancy was married to Edmund Murphey. During my school-boy days at the old Brothersville Academy, my classmate Jasper Daniel at a Fritday afternoon exercise in 1854, gave voice to his embryonic oratorical pow ers by declaiming Catiline's oration to the Roman Senate. At its conclusion Mr. Thos. H. HoUeyman our teacher, said : "Jasper, do you know who Catiline was?" "Yes, sir," was the prompt reply. "Well, who was he?" asked the teacher, and Jasper ransacked his boyish brain, scanned the ceiling closely and probably twitched with his nervous hands the periphery of his bifurcated garment and then replied, "I was not per sonally acquainted with him. Sir." And so while Nancy in her infant years was often lullabied into happy dreamland by the soothing strains of the old- time ditty, "Oh, Miss Nancy, don't you cry. For your sweetheart will come bime-by." And while Edmund "bime-by" came it is hardly probable that his coming involved a horseback ride to North Carolina to marry a girl between whom and himself as between Jasper and the old Roman Conspirator there had been no "personal acquaintance." Making due allowance therefore for the probable duration of Edmund's courting days, which as a widower he would scarcely have unduly extended, their migration must have oc curred as early as 1784, and possibly 1783. Some time after their arrival Aaron located at what is now known as the War ren Place on the Washington road a few miles above Augusta. Nancy Murphey was only seven years old in 1783, and Aaron must have waited for her as long as Jacob did for Rachel, for they were probably not married before 1797. Two children were born to Aaron and Nancy, a son William J., 47 Jan. 13, 1799, and a daughter Lavinia some years later. Aaron's wedded life was of short duration as he died in 1805. He was probably buried on the Warren Place where he had lived, but like Moses the JDrother of his ancient namesake, "No man knoweth of his sepulcher to this day." His son Wm. J., after growing up to manhood made diligent effort to locate the grave, but without success. Soon after the death of her hus band. Nancy Rhodes moved to a location near the present site of the Albion Kaolin Co., and only a little way removed from the house of her father Edmund Murphey. Her selection of this location in such close proximity to what was known for so many years as the old "Chalk 'Bed" may possibly have been influenced by the fact that it would enable her the more easily to compel her offspring to "walk a chalk line." Here she reared her children and here on a fall day in 1833 (Oct. 6) she left them to take her last sleep beneath the shadow of the trees in the old Murphey burying ground. About three years before her death her son, William J. married Martha, daughl:er of Robert Allen of "Allen plow" and "plank gate" fame. Soon after his marriage he built the home near Edie station so long occupied in later years by Judge James Brandon, and now owned by Mrs. Brandon, his widow. William J. lived at this home until 1828 or '29, then sold it and removed to what is now known as the Rhodes Place on the Walker's Bridge Road between Hephzibah and Story's Mill, where the remainder of his life was spent. To William J. and his wife Martha, there came from Oct. 8, 1820, to June I, 1843, twelve children, five of whom died in early childhood. Martha Maria died in her twentieth year unmar ried. Lavinia Allen was married to Roberson Palmer, son of Benjamin and grandson of George, who was a brother of Jonathan of the "Calvinism Cure." Evalina Amanda became the wife of Rev. James Allen, an earnest and able Methodist minister and a noted temperance evangelist. William W. married Mary Ann Bostwick, scion of an old ante-Revolution ary family of this section. James W., like his kinsman, Alex ander Murphey, unmindful of Mr. Weller's advice, married Pauline C. Allen, widow of Elisha A. Allen, Jr. Robert A. and 48 Alary J. died unmarried in early manhood and womanhood during an epidemic of typhoid fever that swept over this sec tion in the early months of i860. Of ^^'illiam J.'s immediate family either by blood or mar riage only Pauline C, widow of James 'W., now survives. For some years she has been a citizen of Hephzibah and re tains in large measure the charming grace of her early days. I use the word "citizen" advisedly. In ante-bellum days my father owned a slave whose name was Jonas. He and his wife Mary were exceptionally good negroes and remained on the plantation for a long, time after "freedom came out." Finally they drifted away and chancing to meet him one day I solicited his return to the old home. In reply he said : "I would like to go back, Alas' AA^alter, but Mary wants to go to Waynesboro. She has a great idea of becoming a city-zen." Few men have lived in Richmond county, who were gifted with a larger share of the sense that counts than William J. Rhodes. His marked success in the administration of his own affairs brought to him many fiduciary trusts. To the private obligations as well as to the public duties that fell to him as Justice of the Inferior Court and as Representative of Rich mond County in the General Assembly he always brought eminent skill and faithfulness. 49 A WORRYING WELCOME TO HENRY CLAY. No resident of our town, perhaps, recalls from personal recollection the fact that Henry Clay, one of the immortal trio, was once entertained in this community, that the giant oaks that line our sandy avenues once met his beaming gaze and that the air that lends its ozone to our wasted frames once fanned his lordly brow. And yet it is a cold, cold fact. I have had occasion more than once to quote in this story from genial and gifted Dr. E. R. Carswell, Sr., my fathers' long time friend and my own as well. It may not be amiss, therefore, to give one incident in which the Dr. played a lead ing if not a happy role. In 1844 Henry Clay was unanimously nominated by the Whig Convention as its presidential candi date. In the campaign that followed he made a general tour of the Southern States and his itinerary included both Savan nah and Augusta. His engagement in the Forest City occur ring first and the Central railroad having been completed to its terminus at Macon in 1843 it seems but natural that Mr. Clay should have availed himself of the rail line to Millen and then when no other alternative was available should have taken private conveyance to Augusta. My friend W. Phuny Steed, however, who needs only an "n" to make him "phunny," and who, half a century ago, more or less, was engaged in teaching the young ideas how to shoot in the wilds of Screven county, insists that memories of the carriage bearing the "Mill Boy of the Slashes" over the old Quaker Road on the oc casion referred to were at the date of his advent into those parts, figuratively speaking, as thick as blackberries in J[une. He made some allusion at first to the natives having pointed out to him the imprint of those four particular wheels after thirteen years had passed, but on cross examination he ad mitted that this was to be taken simply in a Pickwickian sense and that he did not care to be summoned as a character witness on this feature of the story. However this may be, whether the great Kentuckian left the Central at Millen or at "No. 6" it is historically certain that he and his attendant escort struck the Richmond county line at what is now Story's Mill, that they passed over the Walker's Bridge and Louisville Roads directly through what is now the town of Hephziba'h. The home of Judge William J. Rhodes, who was an ardent Whig supporter of Mr. Clay, lay directly on their route and arrangements were made to give the distinguished traveler an hour's rest and probably a lun cheon at the Judge's residence. The community was advised and a large crowd assembled to honor the occasion and to feast their eyes on the face and form of the man who had said : "I would rather he right than President." Mr. Clay, in order to be in good form and unimpaired voice for his Augusta speech had exacted a pledge from his attendants that his trip should be absolutely unadorned by any oratorical frills. The carriage halted in front of the Rhodes home, Mr. Clay alighted, bowed to the assembled crowd and was conducted to the res idence where he hoped to have an hour of absolute rest and quiet. Fie had just entered the spacious hall when he was confronted by a young man with raven locks and flashing eyes, whose clarion voice broke the silence of the mid-day air. "Hail, Sage of Ashland, hail immortal Harry of the West." And on and on the torrent of unwelcome welcome poured like a young Vesuvius on Mr. Clay's unwilling ears. If the wearied guest had been asked to "stand and deliver" he could not have been more astonished, and the mobile lips that oft had swayed a listening senate at their will were voicing only mild and gentle protests at this unexpected number on the program. Col. A. C. Walker, who was an eye witness of the scene, gave me the incident long years ago and I do not now recall whether Dr. Carswell exhausted his pent up eloquence or whether Mr. Clay's manifest annoyance caused a large measure of it to lie upon his gifted lips unborn. The Dr. was evidently unadvised as to Mr. Clay's expressed desire. He entertained me often with memories of the past but on this particular episode of his long and useful life, his tongue was silent and his lips were mute. 51 AARON RHODES— Concluded. On June i, 1843, Frances Virginia, the last child born to Wm. J. Rhodes by hi_s wife Alartha, came into the world, and on June 30th, following, the mother's life faded out, the little babe surviving her only a few days. Their graves lie in the Allen burying ground in our town. Some years later 'Wm. J. married Alaria, sister of Governor Geo. W. Crawford, but their union was childless. On January 2;^. 1866, Judge Rhodes died, and his dust lies by that of his first wife in the old Allen grave yard. His descendants trace their lineage back to a larger number of these old-time settlers than any others who bear a personal relation to this story. His grandsons, Robert A., AVilliam J., Alillard, Edward H., sons of AVilliam AA\ ; Carroll Rhodes,son of James W, ; William R. Allen, son of Evalina, all at Louisville, Ga., are not only descendants of Aaron Rhodes, Edmund Murphey and Robert Allen, whose records have come into this story, but of Elisha Anderson. The children of my brother, Samuel R. Clark, Rev. AVm. H., Dr. S. Allen, W. Edward, Lillian, Gertrude and Harold, as well as Prof. E. P. Clark and his sister, Essie M., all of whom are great grandchildren of Judge Wm. J. Rhodes, not only claim descent through their mother from the four early settlers named, but through their fathers from Thomas Walker and Alexander and Isabella Carswell. Any lack of interest shown bj^ them there fore in this story can scarcely be attributed to want of personal relation to it. Lavinia, sister of Wm. J. Rhodes, and daughter of Aaron, was married in the early years of the nineteenth century to James A. Carswell, son of Alexander and Isabella Carswell, whose lineage, as I am recently informed by my clever friend and relative, Mrs. Ella Salter, of Tampa, Fla., has been traced back to Lord and Lady Ruthven, the former being, as she states, head of the "House of Cassiles." If these statements are entirely authentic, and not simply "Cassiles in the Air," I fear I shall have to bring the arithmetical skill of my friend, Peter G. AA^alker, into requisition again to ascertain what billionth trace of noble Ruthen blood trickles through my own veins under this brave May sun in 1907. My clever friend, however, has promised to furnish me the proof, and I await its forthcoming before taxing my friend Peter again. There were born to James and Lavinia Carswell two sons. Edward R., who married Celestia V. Walker, daughter of Reuben, as already noted in the story of Thomas Walker, and James A. Carswell, who married Maria Loring. There were also three daughters, Caroline, who married John Whigham, and afterwards Thomas Poland, Lavinia, who became the wife of John Denny, and Jane, who was married to Michael King. The children of Edward R. have been already named as descen dants of Thomas Walker. James Carswell had one son, Wil liam, and three daughters, Lula (Evans), Lily (Evans), and Mamie (Rhodes). Caroline Whigham had a son, and two daughters, Mattie and Lavinia. To Lavinia Denny there were born two sons, William and James, and a daughter, Delia (Baston). Jane King had two sons, James and William, and a daughter, Isabella. Of these descendants of Aaron Rhodes there still survive Lily, wife of Jones Evans, Bartow, Ga., William Denny and William King, Wrens, Ga., and Delia Baston, Stellaville, Ga. Some allusion has been already made to !Geh. Reuben W. Carswell as a descendant of Thomas AA^alker. His prominence as a descendant of Aaron Rhodes also may justify the incorporation into these records of these additional incidents. On making his debut into the world, General Carswell tipped the scales at exactly two and a half pounds, but in mature manhood his avoirdupois would not have fallen far short of a hundred times that weight. His appetite and his digestive attainments would both have classed "good midding," and his enjoyment of "table comforts" ran pari passu with them. Seated at a hotel table on one occasion, the attendant waiter "took his order, and after the usual delay en circled his plate with the ordinary array of miniature dishes. Casting his eye over the display for a moment, he turned to his white-aproned attendant and said : "Your samples seem to show up all right; now bring me a dinner." During the General's college course at Oxford the students took occasional Saturday outings by boarding the Georgia 53 railroad train, riding down to the dinner house at Social Circle and returning in the afternoon. On one of these occasions Reuben W., and his collegemate, Dan Saffold, were members of the party. Neither of them needed a tonic to whet their appetites, and at the dinner hour their comrades pitted them against each other in a gastronomic race. I have no informa tion as to who umpired the game, or who won at the finish, but I do recall that when they approached the desk to settle for the meal the proprietor said : "Young gentlemen, my usual charge for dinner is fifty cents, but I make a rebate in your case. I charge you only twenty-five. I sell cheaper by whole sale." But General Carswell's development was not confined solely or mainly to physical lines. With marked gifts, large culture and much magnetic humor, he was a man of wide in fluence and a delightful companion socially. 54 HENRY CLAY AND DANIEL WEBSTER IN AUGUSTA. After writing up the reception given to Henry Clay at the home of Judge Wm. J. Rhodes, there came to me a natural desire to learn from some old time resident something of the great Kentuckian's address in Augusta on the following day. Chancing to meet my old friend Hal Moore, he said : "See A. M. McMurphey, he heard the speech I know, for I heard him say so." The 'phone was brought into requisition, but I found that the memory of my friend Hal had slipped a cog, for Mr. McMurphey was in Abbeville, S. C, at school at the time of Mr. Clay's visit. I then attempted to interview over the same instrument another old time resident, an honored citizen, whose genial personality, wonderfully preserved physical and mental powers and retentive memory suggested the thought that Mark Twain had made the mistake of his life in failing to secure him as a compagnon du voyage in his search for Adam's old time grave. I failed to reach him, but a lady friend, who had been advised of my unsuccessful effort, chanced to meet him and kindly secured for me the following story : He was absent from Augusta on the date of Mr. Clay's address, but some time later attended a banquet given to Dan iel Webster during his visit to the city. While the post prandial feast of reason and flow of soul was at its flood tide, Hon. Andrew J. Miller entertained the banqueters at the ex pense of his friend. Judge Benjamin H. Warren, with the fol lowing incident of Mr. Clay's visit. The electric belt line had not been then completed and Mr. Miller, Judge Warren and Gov. Charles J. Jenkins were giving their distinguished visitor a carriage ride over the city. Driving down the northern side of Greene street they passed what had been known in later years as the Coleman residence, recently purchased by Marion Reynolds, and removed to a lower block on Ellis, and Mr. Clay said : "That is the prettiest home I have seen. Who owns it? And Judge Warren, laying his hand on his manly breast and making their guest his blandest bow, replied, "That, Mr. Clay, is the home of the subscriber." 55 I had still another friend, a very dear friend, whose life has long since passed the Psalmist's limit, and yet upon whose sunset years no shadows seem to rest. I found him in the cozy corner of an upper porch in the home to which he had been long confined, and for an hour and more he entertained me with charming memories of the past. He told me of his friendly association with A. B. Longstreet and William T. Thompson when in "Georgia Scenes" and "Major Jones' Court ship," they were making Georgia humor classic; of Judge Longstreet's mother, who lived where now the Dyer building lifts its lofty head, and of her asking her gifted son one day to draw her will ; of his mild protest based upon the fact that she owned nothing to bequeath ; of her insistence and of his final drafting of the instrument in solemn, legal form, willing bequeathing and devising a certain pair of worn out shoes that lay beneath her bed, and other personalty long laid aside as absolutely valueless, and of his reading it to her with solemn face and of her sharp and sudden interruption : "Get out of here, Gus. I always thought you were a goose, and now I know it." He told me of his visit to Headden's studio- while he was engaged in painting Longstreet's portrait, of the witty judge's coming in one day for a final sitting, but looking wan and care worn; of the artist's asking for a story to brighten up his face ; of Longstreet's prompt compliance, and of Headden's be ing so convulsed with laughter that he was forced to lay his brush aside and ask the judge to close his story and his mouth. He told me of standing in front of Washington Hall that stood at the corner of Broad and Mcintosh streets, and of listening to Daniel Webster as he spoke for a little while from the balcony of that building, but that the great defender of the constitution was suffering from such excessive hospitality at the hands of his Augusta friends that it had "superindenced," as my friend John Heidt would say, an attack of acute inability to stand on his feet for any length of time, and his address was therefore, in Bill Arp vernacular "short but brief." He told me many other things that I cannot refer to now, and then I asked him: "Did you hear Henry Clay in 1844?" 5^ "Oh, yes," he said. "I was standing only twenty feet away when he spoke. He reached Augusta just 'before the hour, drove directly to the court house and alighted looking hot and dusty and tired, for it was a scorching summer day. Retiring to one of the court house rooms for only a few moments to re move the dust of his morning travel he came out fresh, tall, erect, with his hair thrown back and looking every inch of his more than six feet of sturdy and wiry physical manhood. For an hour or more he charmed the audience with a magnificent address. I can never forget the easy grace of his manner, the flashing glance of his eagle eye nor the silver tones of 'his ringing and rythmical voice. He was entertained during his stay in Augusta by Mrs. Emily Tubman, who had been his ward during her girlhood days in Kentucky." As my friend thus talked in glowing terms of Henry Clay, words of the great commoner that had lingered in my mem ory for nearly 50 years came back to me and I could picture him as he stood on the floor of the National Senate with his right hand raised in forceful and yet graceful poise, while from his gifted lips there fell these trenchant and defiant words : "I stand here today erect and unbroken, unawed and unsubdued and ever ready to denounce the pernicious meas ures of this administration and ever ready to denounce this their legitimate offspring, the most pernicious of them all." AARON RHODES— Resumed. If Aaron Rhodes were to rise from his ancient grave and walk the earth again and were to meet what I have written above, in the public road he would scarcely recognize dr accept it as a part of his family history without identification at the hands of my friend Steed, who is kind enough to act as my literary sponsor and endorses without question and without mental reservation every emanation of my homely pen. If it were possible for the contingency named above to occur, my " friend Phuny recalling his ancient familiarity with the Latin tongue would probably explain that while Henry Clay and Daniel Webster, Judge Longstreet, and Charles J. Jenkins, Andrew J. Miller and Judge Warren were probably not re lated to the Rhodes tribe by ties of blood, their incorporation into these records may properly and legitimately be assigned to what the legal fraternity would term the "res gestae" of this story and as my friends rulings are always ex cathedra in lit erary matters, it would have to go at that if it went at all. And now it seems a long call from the empyrean heights through which Clay and Webster soared down to the gastro nomic plane where yellow-legged chickens scratch and crow and have their short-lived being and yet the exigences of my story seem to require that I should take the call. Filed away in the brain cells of my memory long years ago, there is an incident in whidh Judge William J. Rhodes and one of bis inti mate friends were the dramatis personae and the judge's home furnished the scenery for the play. It might perhaps be ap propriately termed, "Larcency from the Lane." Capt. William S. C, Morris has been already referred to in these records as having married Susan, daughter of Isaac Walker and sister of Dr, James B. Walker, of Augusta. He was an old-time southern gentleman, in partial evidence of which it may be stated that when he had raised a company known as the Poythress' Volunteers for Confederate service in '6i he went to the firing line wearing a silk beaver hat, carrying an umbrella and though assigned to the infantry department of Cobb's Legion, carrying along for his own use his favorite 58 saddle horse. When advised by the military powers that be that army regulations did not sanction the use of a horse by an infantry captain, he replied that he had bought the horse and paid for it, bought his feed and paid for it, that he preferred riding to walking and he didn't see what the Confederacy had to do with it anyway. He was a practical joker with a post graduate diploma in his pocket. His summer home was at Bath, in this county, his winter residence on his Burke planta tion and the route between them lay directly in front of Judge Rhodes' home. Riding up one day from Burke with a large empty hamper basket tied to the rear of his buggy fie found the lane in front of the Rhodes residence filled with chickens foraging with tireless feet for their midday lunch. Visions of crisp fried chicken, chicken pie, chicken salad and other en trees of the chicken kind flitted through his brain and then there came an inspiration. Reining up his horse he secured him at a hitching post and then began to cair loudly for Judge Rhodes, who came out hurriedly and after saluting his friend said. "What is the trouble. Captain?" "Why, Judge, I've had terrible luck. I started from Burke with a basket full of chickens and just as I reached the front of your place the top of the basket came off and they all got away right here in your lane. Can't you help me?" And the judge promptly summoned a squad of "hands" from a nearby field and as the captain pointed out the comeliest specimens of the feathered tribe the nimble footed darkies would capture them until the basket was taxed to its full capacity. Thanking the judge kindly for his timely aid he went on his way rejoicing with fowls enough to supply his table for weeks and weeks to come. Of the aftermath when Judge Rhodes learned that he had been accessory to the purloining of his own chickens I have no traditional record. 59 THE OLD RHODES MILL. A Water Idyl. During my boyhood days Saturday was always "mill day" at the old homestead. If a rainy day occurred during the week it was utilized in shelling from the glistening ears that lay heaped in the old log crib the usual "turn" of corn, and on Saturday Peter or Joe or Alfred or Henry or old "Uncle Moosher," whose name I have never learned to spell, would take it over to the old Rhodes mill, where, under the skilful manipulation of "Uncle Jack" Rhodes, it would be transformed into the softest and whitest and purest of meal. And then during the coming week, whether in the old-time hoecake patted smooth and thin by old Aunt Hannah's honest hand, or in crisp and flaky muffins, or in corn dumplings, dished from the cavernous pot that hung from the crane, or in old time "cracklin' bread" that I have tried to canonize in homely verse, it was the sweetest, the most tempting, the toothsomest that ever touched or tickled my hungry palate, for "Uncle Jack" and old Aunt Hannah were simply adepts in their special lines. The memory of its sweetness and its wholesomeness as it comes back to me today over the waste of vanished years has prompted and inspired this unpretending tribute to this old time mill, that furnished for me the staff of life for nearly forty years. Nestled away in a shaded cove, not far away from our little town, there is a gurgling spring, whose limpid waters form the source of Grindstone Branch. Aeons and aeons ago, when the world was young, it began its babbling life and trickling and gliding through sunny valleys, whose spring time air was laden with the fragrant breath of bay and jasmine and honeysuckle, it passed on its maiden path a mammoth boulder from whose granite heart long years later, grindstones and gravestones and millstones were chiseled into form, giving the stream its peculiar christening. It had rambled but a little way from its bubbling home when there came to meet it another stream, that finds its birth near Friendship Church, and has been known in later years as Friendship Branch. 60 Reluctant each to travel alone the long journey that lay before them, they agreed to wed and as their fates were joined a tiny rainbow that spanned the rim of a gleaming bubble formed the marriage ring while the silver throat of a mocking bird caroled their wedding march and the soft brown eyes of a startled fawn witnessed their plighted troth. For ages and ages their mingled waters rippled and sang and gurgled and foamed on their winding way to their far away ocean home. Through the tangled thickets that lined their shores the In dian hunter pursued his game or at eventide on its shaded banks he fished in its eddying pools. But the years went by and the "Pale Face'' came and he said to the Brother in Red, as Greely said at a later day, "Go West, young man, go West." And he went, but the streamlet rippled on with never a thought of a rumbling mill or a dam to bar its flow. But it chanced one day that Absalom Rhodes Looked down on its waters clear. And he thought to himself, if he failed to say, You've loitered and idled for many a day, With never a thought, but to gambol and play; I'll harness you up in the old-time way. And I'll put you to work, without any pay. For many and many a year. And across from the slopes on either side. Sturdy and strong and tall-. There rose a bulwark of solid earth Like an old-time fortress wall. And over the water's glint and gleam He builded an old-time mill. With many a rafter, many a beam And many a twelve-inch sill; With an old^:ime wheel and hard grey stone, And a hopper that opened wide; And the mill boys came from far and near. From village and country side. 6i And the old mill grumbled and ground away. In summer and winter's cold. While the miller stood by and tolled the corn. And many a story told. But the years went by and Absalom Rhodes was called to his last long home, but the drowsy mill ground on and on, for a sturdy son was there to take the old man's place. And for nearly the half of a hundred years he stood in the old mill door with a smile always on his sunny face and a word of cheer on his genial lips. But there came a time when age and feeble ness became his lot, a time when the strong men bowed them selves and the keepers of the house trembled, and he was forced to yield his post to younger and less skillful hands. And still the mill ground on and on till it chanced one day that the rains descended and the floods came and the waters chafing and fretting in their long confinment rose and swelled and beat against their bars, but the sturdy dam held for a time its own. But inch by inch the waters crept up towards its crowning summit and then at last a tiny streamlet trickled over, wearing a tiny pathway in the solid earth. And then the rent grew larger and larger and broader till, with a mad rush, the whirl ing waters burst their bonds sweeping away timbers and earth together and roaring and raging in their madness wrecked other mills below. The mission of the old mill had been for all these years a peaceful one, save for a single day. Once on a summer's morning in '65 the miller's baby boy, the youngest of his flock and then just budding into manhood, had taken his father's station by the grinding stones for only a little while. He stepped out on the uncovered sleepers that spanned the deep fore-bay and missed his footing and then was hurled into the seething waters that lay below. Stunned by the fall they bore him to the whirling wheel, whose cruel arms chrushed out his young and buoyant life. And now for years and years the old mill has stood but the ghost of its former self, idle and tenantless and dumb. The gaping hopper is empty and the drowsy rumble of the 62 hard grey stones is hushed and the busy wheel feels the cool ing splash of the rippling waters but stands in its utter loneli ness useless and barren and still. The beautiful inland lake that stood beside it and in whose limpid waters perch and bream and wide-mouthed trout sported and splashed and on soft spring days laid their spawn in the shining sands below, no longer gleams and glistens in the morning sunlight and the mill boys come no more. The active brain that planned it and the sturdy arms that built it and the patient hands that served it, have long since mouldered back to mother earth, and the old mill, like its master, is crumbling, piece by piece, back to its kindred dust. But the rippling waters still dance merrily on their journey, laughing at the old mill as they pass it, and singing as they gurgle : "For men may come and men may go." And mills may bar my liquid flow For fifty or a hundred years or so, "But I go on forever." 63 FREEMAN WALKER. Among the families not so prominently identified with this community as those already noted and yet bearing such per sonal relation to it as to warrant recognition in these records was that of Major Freeman Walker. With the tide of immi gration that flowed into this section of Georgia from Virginia in the later years of the eighteenth century there came four brothers, George, Freeman, Valentine and Robert Walker. Some reference has already been made to Valentine as Justice of the Inferior Court for Richmond county from 1812 to 1836. George Walker was a prominent member of the young Au gusta bar in 1797, and an intimate friend of Peter Crawford of Columbia county, who gave to his son, afterwards member of Congress, twice governor of Georgia and secretary of war under President Taylor, the name of George Walker Crawford. Robert Walker was also a lawyer serving as solicitor general of the Superior Court from 1804 to 1808 and as judge of that tribunal from 1813 to 1816. Freeman Walker was born at Charles City, Va., Oct. 25, 1780, came to Georgia in 1797, studied law in the office of his brother George and was probably afterwards associated with him in its practice as I find in the records of the old Inferior Court that Walker & Walker represented either the plaintiff or defendant in a large number of cases coming before that tribunal in those early days. In 1803 Freeman married Mary Garlington Creswell, a native of Wilkes county, and a niece of Governor Matthew Talbot. Some years before, George Walker had married Eliza Talbot sister of the governor, and at a later date Valentine Walker, after the death of his first wife, who was a Miss Arrington, married Zemula Whitehead, a widow and a sister of Mary, wife of Freeman Walker. These matrimonial alliances closely connected the Walker and Talbot families, a fact perpetuated in the names of Gen. William Henry Talbot Walker and his son William H. T. Jr., Laura Talbot Gait, the charming Kentucky girl, who won the love of every Confederate soldier by refusing to sing "March ing Through Georgia,'' at the behest of her Northern teacher, 64 IS a lineal descendant of Capt. Isham Talbot, a Revolutionary officer and a cousin of Gov. Matthew Talbot and is therefore connected by ties of blood with the descendants of both George and Freeman Walker. Before or after his marriage Freeman built the residence recently removed from the corner of Greene and Washington streets and that Flenry Clay during his visit to the city in 1844 pronounced the prettiest home in Augusta. Here the larger number if not all of his children were born. He owned also a summer residence known as Bellevue stand ing on what are now the Arsenal grounds and sold in Novem ber, 1826, to John Quincy Adams, as President of the United States for Arsenal purposes. He lived at one time also, at Spring Hill, near Gracewood, Ga., on or near the site of the present residence of Allen W. Jones. His home was destroyed by fire and his exposure on the night of the burning brought to Major Walker a pulmonary complaint that ended his life September 23rd, 1827. I am inclined to believe that after the loss of his residence he built the home known as Tranquilla, that stood within the limits of our town in the rear of the Turner dwelling, was occupied by his widow after his death and was sold to Absalom Rhodes. During the residence of Mrs. Freeman Walker at Tranquilla in 1833, the "stars fell," as it was termed and Mrs. Walker believing with many others that the world had come to an end sent for Rev. Robert Allen, who lived not far away. He came, the family, white and col ored were gathered into the home and a prayer service was held. During my boyhood or early manhood, I was told that Madame Octavia Walton Levert the brilliant and fascinating daughter of George Walton, Jr., the friend of Henry -Clay, Washington Irving and many other distinguished men, hon ored during her European tour by presentation at the courts of both England and France, endowed with mental gifts of the highest order and a personal charm that made her a favorite in the salons of Paris and among the poor of Mobile, had once lived at Tranquilla. I have made much effort to verify the statement but with no marked degree of success. The remark 65 ¦was probably suggested by the appearance of her "Souvenirs of Travel," and may have been based upon an extended visit made during her girlhood to the home of her relative Mrs. Freeman Walker. Madame Levert was the grand-daughter of George Walker, her father having married his daughter Sallie, thus giving her close relationship to both Freeman Walker and his wife Mary. Though dying at the compara tively early age of forty-seven Freeman Walker filled large space in the professional and official life of his day. Many times a representative of Richmond county in the General Assembly and four times Mayor of Augusta he was chosen in 1819 to succeed John Forsyth as U. S. Senator from Geor gia, but after two years' service he resigned to resume his law practice. His distinguished friend Richard Henry Wilde speaks of him as a man of engaging personal appearance, bril liant talents, a graceful and fluent speaker with a vein of pleasing humor in his mental make-up, but above and beyond these and more than these as a man of gentle, generous heart in whom the milk of human kindness never curdled, as the fol lowing incidents that have come to me at various times and with no purpose of their being used in these or any other rec ords will serve to show. In the early years of the 19th cen tury a young Virginian came to Richmond county looking for employment and a home. The school at Mont Enon had re cently been established and he was chosen as its teacher. Freeman Walker met him and was favorably impressed with his character and talent, and urged him to abandon the school room and enter his office as a law student, offering to give him the benefit of his own experience and legal learning. He accepted the offer, was admitted to the bar, won success as a lawyer, filled the bench of the Superior Court for a longer term perhaps than any other occupant in all its history and I am sure no man in all the State has worn judicial ermine more ably or more honorably or held the scales of justice with more impartial hand than William W. Holt. One day a client from one of the country districts came to Major Walker's office to ask advice about the drawing of a will. A little boy was with him and his brightness so attracted 66 the genial lawyer that he offered to take him in his office and aid him in securing an education. The offer was accepted and the aid extended. The boy grew up under Major Walker's guidance, studied law in his office and in time became United States Senator and the efficient and honorable head of one of the largest corporations in Georgia. To Major Walker's country home there came one even ing an impecunious pioneer preacher, who asked accommoda tions for the night. He was kindly invited in for the Major always kept an open house. The preacher was riding a regular Rosinante, rawboned and probably old enough to vote. When ready to resume his journey on the following day. Major Walker called one of his servants and naming one of his favorite horses, said : "Put the preacher's saddle on that horse and leave his in my lot. I am going to swap with him." The preacher's sermon as he preached that day showed probably added fervor and effectiveness for the difference in his mount. I am glad to know that this gospel of helpfulness, of human brotherliness that shone in the life of Freeman Walker has been in large measure transmitted to those in whose blood and lineage he lives today. The following incidents in the life of Major Walker though differing in character from those already cited may be worthy of record in this story. The late Col. Charles C. Jones in evidence of the fact that Major Walker's usually genial and affable temper could be aroused to honest ire on proper provocation gives the following. At a session of the court at which the famous Judge John Dooly was presiding, a bar supper was given. The wine flowed freely. Judge Dooly's wit was at its keenest and Major Walker was made the special butt of his jokes. The genial victim bore it until forbearance ceased to be a virtue and then rising in his wrath he seized a chair and advanced upon the Judge with the evi dent intention of acting as chairman of the meeting and of giving to his antagonist "the floor" but not in the usual parlia mentary way. Judge Dooly grasped a carving knife from the table and rose to defend himself when one of the guests seized Major Walker, while three encircled the Judge to stay the 67 threatened trouble. Judge Dooly turned to the barricade that invested him and said, "Two of you go and hold Major Walker, one man can hold me." The remark created a laugh in which the Major was forced to join, the war-clouds were lifted and "peace reigned again in Warsaw." The following story is vouched for by my good friend. Rev. W. E. Johnston, a grand son of Major Walker. The Major owned a trusted slave named Harry whom he made his coachman. 'While his master was a strictly temperate man, Harry developed an abnormal propensity for looking upon the wine when it is red, and his attacks of inebriety sometimes occurred on very inopportune occasions. The Major did not have the heart to punish him but finally said to him, "You've got to quit it. You simply can't drive me when you are drunk." Harry promised amend ment, but when the next session of the court was about to convene, and his master after ordering his coach came out to begin his journey, he found that Harry had fallen from grace. He was barely able to sit upright, the reins were held with unsteady hand and he was furnishing a fairly good object lesson for the present paramount issue in Georgai legislation, "Get down," said the master and Harry slowly dismounted from his seat. And then opening the door of the carriage the Major with a courtly bow said, "Get in there, you're too drunk to drive me and I'll drive you to court." The negro begged and pleaded without avail and finally clambered in while the Major mounted the driver's seat, grasped the reins and began his journey. After driving for some miles the master felt some curiosity to know how his passenger was faring and bending over he looked into the window to find the carriage empty. Further investigation showed that the negro humiliated by the lesson had raised the rear curtain clambered out and sitting on the dickey seat or standing on the rear of the axle was playing the role of footman. And in this style the coach wended its way to its destination with a driver and footman but with "nary" a passenger. Whether the lesson given was effective in bringing about permanent amendment in Harry's ways I am not advised. 68 While on a story telling line the following incidents in the life of Gen. Val. Walker, brother of Freeman may not be lacking in interest to the reader. The General seems to have been a rather unique character, a sort of rara avis, in his day. During his service as Judge of the Inferior Court and at a date when Holland AIcTyre, uncle of the late Bishop Holland N. McTyre of the Southern Methodist Church and Absalom Rhodes already written up in these records, were his conferes on the bench, a traveling showman applied to them for license to exhibit an Egyptian mummy in Augusta. In making the application he stated that the mummy was three thousand years old. "AA^hat," said Judge AIcTyre, three thousand years old? "Why that's mighty old." Judge Rhodes in order to digest the statement more effectually took an abnormal pinch of snuff and Gen. Walker said to the applicant, "And is it a living creetur?" AA^hether the permit was granted does not appear on the traditional record at least. Aside from Gen. Walker's long, continuous service as a member of this tribunal he was for many years a member of the General Assembly from Richmond county. During this service a body of Unitarians in Augusta decided to build a church and requested Gen. Walker to secure the necessary legislation. The bill was introduced and when it had reached its third reading he rose to explain its purpose and advocate its passage. While doing so a country member interrupted him with the following question: "Gen. Walker, do the peo ple that want this bill believe in the Trinity?" "Oh, ele gantly, elegantly." responded the General with one of his blandest smiles. The bill was passed without further inquiry or objection and a house of worship was erected as I am in formed on the site of the present Opera House. Many years ago the late Clarence V. Walker gave me the following story : After Gen. Val. Walker had been a Representative from Richmond for many terms, a young and aspiring lawyer from Augusta decided that rotation was in order and announced himself a candidate against the General. On election day two of the young lawyer's friends drove out to one of the 69 country precincts on electioneering purpose bent and taking with them a bottle whose contents were to be used as a snake bite remedy or a political persuader as occasion might require. Reaching the ground they tackled an old time resident of Pinetucky who had been a uniform supporter of Gen. Walker. Argument proving unavailing they reinforced it with a draught from the bottle, but the Pinetucky voter after partaking of their liquid hospitality said, "I am not ready to vote yit." At sun dry and divers times they repeated the dose but with the same result. Finally the bottle was exhausted and they urged him to deposit his ballot. "No," he said, "I want another drink." "We're sorry but the supply is exhausted." "Oh, I can't vote for your man, my man's jug never gives out." Sherwood's Gazetter of Georgia says that Gen. Walker was like his three brothers a lawyer, but if so, as Col. Charles E. Nisbet, son of Judge Eugenius A. once said of himself, he was probably not "one to hurt." He lived near Belleville Factory, the site for that manufacturing plant having been sold by him to George Schley and others, who were its projectors and owners. Eleanor Lexington, in describing the characteristics of the general Walker tribe both in the old world and the new, says that they are a fighting race, always ready to defend any flag under whose protecting folds they chance to live. The de scendants of Freeman Walker furnish striking verification of this statement. While his elder son, Beverly, devoted himself to the peaceful pursuits of law and agriculture, his younger boys, both developed an early taste for military life, and both fell victims to "grim- visaged war." Gen. William H. T. Walker entered the military academy at West Point at the age of i6 and graduated in 1837, with the rank of second lieutenant. Assigned to a regiment then serving under 'Col. Zachary Taylor in the Seminole war he received tfiree wounds in the engage ment that occurred near Lake Okeechobee in December, 1837. As ambulances were not then a feature of military equipment, he rode seventy-five miles on horseback to reach a point where medical attention could be given his wounds. For gallantry in 70 this action he was promoted to first lieutenant. After his recovery he served with his regiment until the close of the Indian troubles in Florida in 1842. In 1845 he was made -captain and served with distinction through the Mexican war, being twice promoted for heroic conduct in battle. In the charge on the stone fortress of Molino del Rey, September 8, 1847, and while leading his regiment, he received a desperate wound, which confined him to his bed for a year. In 1847 the State of Georgia presented him with a handsome sword for meritorious service in the Florida and Mexican wars. From 1854 to 1856 he was commandant of the military academy at West Point with the rank of colonel, and was later assigned by Jefferson Davis, then secretary of war, to duty in Oregon. In i860 he resigned his commission and threw himself body and soul into the Confederate cause, serving as brigade commander in Virginia, and on the coast of Georgia and Florida, and later as Major General in Mississippi under John ston, and from Chickamauga to Atlanta with the Army of Tennessee, giving always brilliant and daring service. As a soldier he seemed not only absolutely indifferent to danger, but rather to court its presence. Gen. W, L. Cabell in recalling his association with Gen. Walker in the '6o's said that the breath of battle always brought an unusual glitter to his eye, and that he thought him the bravest man he had ever known. On the morning of July 22, 1864, as Hardee's corps was be ginning its attack upon the Union left. Gen. Walker rode to an exposed position in front of his division to see that the lines were in proper form, and a cruel minnie from the enemy's vidette line ended his brave, historic life. A hero of three wars, I feel assured no battle soil on God's green earth in all the ages was ever stained by braver or by nobler blood than William Henry Walker's. And now I cannot close this brief, imperfect notice of Gen. Walker more fittingly than in the words of one, who was the fittest of all men living or dead to utter then ; fittest be cause for a year and more before his leader's death he was a trusted and honored member of Gen. Walker's immediate military family; fittest because his own brilliant courage and 71 soldierly devotion to the cause for which he fought, best quali fied him to speak of one, whose life from boyhood to the grave was marked by infinite courage and devotion, fittest because in the purity and sweetness of the limpid English that falls from his gifted lips no human tongue excels him. They are words spoken by Hon. Jos. B. Gumming at the unveiling of the monument reared to iGen. Walker on soil made sacred by, his hero blood : "What can any feeble word of mine add to the facts of his honorable life and glorious death? If I tell you that he was the bravest of the brave, the soul of honor and generosity, the incarnation of truth, the mirror of chivalry, the devotee, I had almost said the fanatic, of duty, what do I say which his life and death have not proclaimed with more of eloquence? I who knew him best in the latest and most marked period of his life, pronounce, in addition to all I have said and to what his life and death have eloquently proclaimed, that of all things under the vault of heaven, for nothing, not even whistling bullet, nor shrieking cannon ball, nor bursting shell, nor gleaming bayonet had he any fear — for nothing save failure to obey to the letter and to do his soldierly duty to the uttermost." "Lifting our eyes from this span of human life and regard ing the ages which will roll over this imperishable monument, what a gainer he was by the day which we are commemorat ing ! On that day he exchanged for what of life may have re mained to him in the order of nature, filled as it might well have been with sorrows and trials and disappointments, and which in any event would have terminated long before this morning — on that day he exchanged for that fragment of mortal life the everlasting fame, which this monument will make perpetual. "We therefore salute thee, thou stately shade, who we fain would believe dost move invisible across this scene ; we salute thee not only with honor, but with felicitations, thou brave and gallent soldier, thou true and knig'htly gentleman, thou of the generous heart, thou of the dauntless spirit, who didst fall on this spot, which we can only mark, but thou didst con secrate." 72 John D. Walker lacked the military training of his older brother, but he shared in full measure his courage and military spirit. Enlisting at the age of 21 for service in the Mexican war, he participated in all the engagements fought by Scott's invading column until the battle of Churubusco, Aug. 20, 1847, in which he was severely wounded in both legs. The surgeon decided on amputation for both wounds, but the knife was stayed by the imperial will of the older brother, and John recovered, though not, in time to rejoin his regiment before the end of the war, in February, 1848. In 1853 the United States were at peace with the whole world and the rest of mankind. Gen. William Walker, a native of Nashville, Tenn., graduate in law and medicine and a journalist in New Orleans and San Francisco, not related in auy way to the Walker family now under consideration and yet bearing in his blood and temperament the fondness of the general Walker tribe for military life, decided to inaugurate a little war of his own. Organizing a small body of troops he made a descent upon La Plaza, Lower California, with the in tention of conquering the State of Sonora, in Northern Mexico, but the effort came to grief. In 1855 he organized another fili bustering expedition against Nicaragua. Landing in that Central American republic with 62 men he enlisted a number of malcontents and in his second engagement completely routed the government forces, compelling them to accept him as an ally with the rank of Commander-in-chief of the com bined army. In a war with Costa Rica, which occurred soon afterward, he defeated the Costa Ricans and secured his own election as president of Nicaragua. His autocratic methods in this position brought about disaffection among the people, the army revolted and he was forced to leave the country. He organized several similar expeditions and in the last against Honduras he was captured by a British vessel, turned over to the Honduras authorities, courtmartialed and shot to death at Truxillo. After his return from Nicaragua he visited Augusta and during his stay my father and one of his neighbors, Judge John W. Carswell, called to see him. He was referred to by the press as "the grey-eyed man of destiny" but was a very 73 mild mannered personage, his appearance giving no indication of his adventurous and danger-loving spirit. If he had waited a few years his genius for war would have found ample play in a much broader field. And what has this to do with John David Walker? Only this, that fifty years ago I attended services at the old Rich mond Camp Ground near the site of the present plant of the Albion Kaolin Co. There I met John David Walker for the first and only time and there I was told that he had returned a short time before from a round of filibustering with Gen. AA'illiam Walker in Nicaragua. The following incident connected with the camp meeting service and with John David as well has remained as fresh and green in my memory for all these fifty years as if it had come to me but yesterday. St. James Methodist Church, Augusta, in the opening years of its life, 1856 and '57, was served by Rev. William M. Crumley as its pastor. He attended the Richmond camp- meeting on the occasion named above and there met John David Walker. On the night after the meeting, while the preacher's body was wrapped in slumber his mind wandered into dreamland. Traveling with a large concourse of people a public highway their journey was suddenly obstructed by a deep, impassable gulf. While debating what steps to take in order to cross the obstruction Mr. Crumley dreamed that the Saviour appeared in their midst and. laying himself across the gulf said to the waiting crowd : "Pass over on my body." The bridge, human or divine, seemed so slender and so frail that the travelers were afraid to make the venture until John David Walker stepping out in front of the assembled company said, "I'll take the risk," and was the first to make the passage. On the following evening Mr. Crumley led the services, preach ing from Peter's words as recorded in Matthew X, 24th and 25th. It was a very earnest appeal and at its close the usual request was made for those who felt moved to lead a better life to come to the altar for prayer. With absolutely no knowl edge of the dream and yet in strangely seeming fulfillment. 74 John David Walker was the first in that large assembly to rise and accept the earnest invitation given by the preacher. In the early months of 1861 he enlisted, probably with the rank of captain, in the first regiment of Georgia Regulars, commanded by Col. Charles J. Williams, of Columbus. Their first active service was in Eastern Virginia, fighting through the Yorktown campaign and afterwards through the Seven Days' Battle with Toombs' Brigade. Transferred to G. T. Anderson's Brigade, Longstreet's Corps, their soldierly con duct in every engagement aided in making the fame of that fighting corps historic. August 28, 1862, Anderson's Brigade as the advance column of the corps, reached Thoroughfare Gap. The Eighth Georgia was sent through the Gap but were at tacked by a Federal brigade and were being slowly pressed back when they were reinforced by the 7th and nth Georgia, and the ist Georgia Regulars, Major John David Walker com manding. The Union troops were immediately driven back to their entrenchments on the crest of the mountain, the Confed erates climbing its precipitous slope on their hands and knees. Of the conduct of Major Walker's regiment in this engagement Gen. Anderson says, "The Regulars, both officers and men, fought with distinguished gallantry, as they have on every occasion, and I only regret that the army is not composed of just such men." Two days later at Second Manassas, Anderson's Brigade fought on the right of Toombs' and after bravely sustaining a galling fire they advanced, driving the brigade in their frout entirely from the field, but sustaining the heaviest loss of any command on the Confederate side, 612 in killed and wounded. Among them were seven or eight field officers and fifty com pany officers. Major John David Walker was severely wound ed and was taken to the home of a Presbyterian minister. The surgeon said to him : "It will require amputation to save your life." "No," said the Major, "I have had a hard time getting through the world with two legs and I don't think I could manage it with one." Gangrene set in and his gallant life went out near the historic battle field through whose minnie-laden air he had led his regiment so bravely. Buried 75 for a time near the minister's home, his remains, some months later, were brought to Georgia and laid away in the family burying ground near the Arsenal. In addition to the heroic record left by Freeman Walker's soldier sons, the military spirit of the family is further repre sented in the service of a grandson. Dr. Freeman Valentine Walker, as U. S. Army Surgeon, and two great grandsons, Hugh McLean Walker, now naval officer on the battleship Maine, and Fred Walker, now on duty with the 26th U. S. Artillery in the Philippines. FREEMAN WALKER, GENEALOGICALLY. Major Walker and his brothers, George, Valentine, and Robert were the sons of Freeman Walker, Sr., of Charles City County, Va., by his marriage with Sarah, daughter of George Minge. Mary Garlington wife of Freeman was the daughter of Col. David Creswell by his marriage with Phoebe daughter of John Talbot. Freeman and Mary were married at Bellevue then the residence of George Walker, April 29,, 1803, by Hon. George Walton. Of their children who lived to adult age there were three sons, George Augustus Beverly born April 7, 1805, married Arabella Pearson. William Henry Talbot born Nov. 26, 1816, married Mary Townsend, John David born Jan. 9, 1825, was never married. There were also two daughters, Ann Eliza Amanda born March i, 1809, married to Adam Johnston and Sarah Wyatt born Oct. 18, 1822, and married to Dr, AA^alter Ewing Johnston. In addition to these the fol lowing children died in childhood or youth, Robert, Freeman Valentine, Zemula Tabitha and Elliot Floyd. To Beverly and wife were born John P. King, who mar ried Anice L, Mitchell, Mary Elizabeth married to Lawrence A. Milligan, Zemula married to William A. Pendelton, Lucy P. married to Clarence V Walker, Lena married to Lewis F. Goodrich, Agnes Ewing married to Armistead F. Pendleton, George, Cornelia and Sarah Wyatt died in later youth and four others in childhood. To William Henry Talbot and his wife were born two sons and two daughters who reached maturity, William H. T. 7^ Jr., now living in this county. Dr. Freeman Valentine at Bluffton, S. C. Mary Cresswell (Schley) Savannah, Ga., and Hannah who died some years ago in New York. There were several others who died in childhood. Anna Eliza (Johnston) had no children and Sarah Wyatt (Johnston) only one, Rev. W. E. Johnston Augusta, Ga. t" "t* 'K V In my closing sketch of Freeman Walker, there were two features of his story that were inadvertently omitted. Walker street, in Augusta, and Walker county, in North Georgia were both named in his honor. The late Col. Charles C. Jones has left upon record the statement that this distinguished citizen of Richmond county was "believed to 'be the original of Free man Lazenby in one of Judge Longstreet's laughable sketches in 'Georgia Scenes.' " Jupiter sometimes nods and yet it is difficult to believe that so learned and accurate a scholar as Col. Jones should have written "Freeman," when the character who played the role of "The Sleeping Beauty" in the Wai Works show is named by the witty author as "Freedom Laz enby." The types were probably at fault. If Major Walker really played the part, he was selected. Judge Longstreet states, for the reason that he was the only member of the party endowed, as Mrs. Peeler would have expressed it, with the necessary measure of "personal pulcritude" to fit the place. 17 CHARLES AND EDWARD BURCH. Just beyond the limits of our town, near the waters of Little Spirit Creek, and only a little way removed from the old Malone place, now occupied by Judge Matt Kelly, there has stood for a hundred years or more, a cluster of ancient oaks that mark the site of the old-time home of Charles and Edward Burch. They were sons of an early immigrant, who came to Georgia about 1740. Charles and Edward received from King George a grant of a tract of land, bounded by the waters of Big Spirit Creek and by the Savannah and Louisville roads. But this evidence of royal favor did not prevent them from joining the Revolutionary forces that had rebelled against the English King. Both their names appear on the pay roll of the "Burke Co. Rangers," commanded by Capt. Patrick Carr, of Jefferson county in 1782. A descendant of Charles has given me the following incident of Edward's military service : At the close of a skirmish between the Whigs and Tories or British, Edward, who was a very muscular and fearless man, went out unarmed over the ground that had 'been the scene of the conflict, probably to ascertain what loss the enemy had sustained. A mounted British or Tory officer, who had been concealed by the heavy undergrowth, saw the Whig soldier's defenceless condition and determined to capture or kill him. Drawing his sword and putting spurs to his horse he ran down unarmed Edward and attempted to brain him with his gleaning steel, but the doughty Whig parried the blow, and, grasping the blade, he wrenched it from the officer's hand, and would have paid him in his own coin, but for the fleetness of his steed. Of Edward's descendants, I have no information. Charles left four sons, Joseph E., long time commissioner for the poor of Richmond county; Charles, Blanton and Kelt Burch ; the last, if I am correctly informed, lost a limb while serving in the Mexican war. Many descendants of Charles are now living in Augusta and Richmond county, among them James W. Burch, Sr., and James W Jr., Lloyd W. Burch, Dr. Joseph E. Green, Mrs. G. B. Duke and many others. 78 THOMAS HILL. During my boyhood days the waters of Little Spirit Creek that finds its source in our town and borders the lands of my father's old homestead, formed the scene of my early piscato rial experiences. On many a Saturday, when school duties were suspended, I endeavored with alluring bait and with varying success to entice mudcat and red-breasted perch from the depths of its eddying pools. At one point on its shaded banks there were the remnants of what was known as the "Old Tom Hill Mill." There was an old dam by the mill site, but there was no mill by — a long sight. It had vanished with the vanishing years. There was a tradition that in one of the earlier years of the last century a cyclone had passed over this immediate section and in its unmeasured wrath this demon of the air had swept this old mill, or the old McManus mill, half a mile below, or both of them, from the face of the earth. The only personal information that I have of Thomas Hill's milling operations is a story that came to me fifty years ago and more, and whose authenticity I have no reason to doubt. A patron of the mill became impressed with the idea that Thomas was tolling his corn more heavily than the law or established custom warranted and to prevent this excessive levy he accompanied the corn on the next mill day. Thomas suspected the purpose of his visit, and after emptying the sack into the hopper and taking out only legitimate toll he entertained his patron by giving him an exhibition of the diving proficiency of the fat porkers that roamed around the mill. Taking corn from the hopper and not from the toll barrel he threw it into the mill race and the hogs would dive into the limpid water to secure the glistening grain. His evident pur pose was to convince his patron that any little shortage in his meal sack was due to his indulgence in this innocent enter tainment. Thomas Hill lived at the home afterwards owned by Eli sha Anderson, jr., and later by Col. Edmund B. Gresham. The old house was standing in my boyhood and was replaced by 79 Col. Gresham with the residence now owned and occupied by Edward E. Cadle. The old mill was rebuilt and utilized for many years by S. B. Cadle. If Thomas left any descendants, I am not aware of it. This community has numbered among its assets many hills, long hills and short hills, steep hills and hills of moderate grade, but no human Hill, save Thomas. During my boyhood his name was only a memory, and Thomas Hill had probably gone the way of all the earth, but whether his last long journey was made up hill or down hill, I do not know. 8cj EARLY RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENT LIBERTY CHURCH. The early settlement of this section, as of probably every other section in the State, was followed by the erection of a rude log church to supply its moral and religious needs. At what date and on what site was the first house of worship built in this community? Just a hundred and seventeen years ago Francis Asbury, a primitive Bishop of the Methodist Church made an entry in his diary that will probably lead us to a correct solution of this question. This record states that after crossing the Savannah at Augusta in 1790 the Bishop rode in a South Westerly direction to the S. C. Church in Richmond County. Rev. Geo. G. Smith referring to this incident in his History of Georgia Methodism says that this church must have been located near Brothersville. In further reference to the title of the church, he says that in later years a church was built not far away from this community and named for old father Samuel Clark and that the S. C. Church was probably named for an older Samuel Clark. All this I do not steadfastly believe. My friend George like other historians falls some times into error and in this particular case his mental ma chinery has evidently slipped a cog. Clark's Chapel, to which he refers was built in 1847 largely through the efforts of my grandfather, Charles Clark, and was named for him. My father Samuel B. Clark was born in 1812, twenty-two years after Asbury preached at the S. C. Church. If there was an "older Samuel Clark" in this community my researches among colonial and other records have failed to unearth him. What then and where then was this S. C. Church? In one of the early years following the Revolutionary War a tribe of Collins brothers and probably sisters made their advent in this section. There were Moses, the great grandfather of my friend Moses Collins Murphey of Augusta, Lewis the ancester of the late Lewis R. Collins, Samuel, Stephen and possibly others. One of these brothers Samuel or Stephen cut the first log that went into the original church building that stood on the site of what is now Liberty Church and is buried not far away from 81 that sacred spot. The church bore for a time the name of its original projector either Samuel or Stephen Collins and this fact explains, I feel assured, the initials used by Bishop As bury in its early title. It was the first Methodist church erected in Richmond County and possibly the second in the State. Grant's Meeting House in Wilkes County being the first. In further evidence of its antiquity my friend Josiah M. Seago has informed me that his grandfather Rev. James Neatherland preached in this church in 1818 and that the building in which he ministered was the third house of worship that had sanctified the site. During its more than a hundred years of sacred service as a religious center its pulpit has been blessed by the labors of many honored and useful men. In this connection it is an interesting fact that the late Rev. Alfred T. Mann, one of the ablest and most eloquent ministers known to Georgia Methodism, preached his maiden sermon in old Liberty Church and after fifty years or more of distin guished and successful service in his Master's cause the same hallowed walls echoed the last public utterance that came from his gifted lips and consecrated heart. 82 HOPEFUL CHURCH. Prior to the establishment of the Hephzibah Baptist Church in 1862 there was no organized body of that denomi nation in this community, and those who professed that creed united themselves with the Hopeful Church seven or eight miles away. This old church began its religious life in April or May 181 5. Its organization was largely due to the earnest religious work of Rev. Edmund Byne, a native of Virginia, who began preaching in Burke County as early as 1785. Dying in 1814 he failed to see the full fruition of his labors in the establishment of this church. During its more than ninety years existence many able and godly men have ministered at its altars. Among its pastors, who were directly connected with this community, may be named Rev. J. H. T. Kilpatrick, Rev. W. L. Kilpatrick, Rev. Wm. H. Davis, Rev. E. R. Cars- well, Sr., and Rev. J. Hamilton Carswell. The first church building was made of rough pine poles and while its early pastors probably talked to their hearers when occasion de manded, "with the bark off" as it were, their earnest words were echoed by pine walls with the bark on. From this primitive chrysalis it developed as the years went by into a hewn log building then, into a neat framed edifice and finally in 185 1 into the present structure, one of the handsomest strictly rural churches in the State. Through the courtesy of my friend Samuel G. Story I have had the privilege of examining the early records of Hope ful Church running back to November 1815. They show a stringency in church discipline unknown to modern religious methods and a quaintness in expression unknown to modern ears. In 1830 a member of this church confessed at the monthly conference that he had been present when a bee tree was cut on the Sabbath and after the expression of proper contrition for the direliction he was forgiven. A year or two earlier a sister was excommunicated after acknowledgment that she had allowed a negro to put a bag of corn in her house, and another met the same fate for marrying her son-in-law. The 83 corn was probably stolen but the records do not show that fact. On another occasion in those early days a brother rose in his place and after confessing sorrow and repentance for "coming in contact" with a neighbor he was forgiven and restored to fellowship. In 1828 a committee was appointed "to visit a beloved sister and stir ber up." The doctrine of apostacy was not a tenet of the Hopeful creed and yet the records for the year 1828 show that while they did not believe in "falling from grace" they did believe in the falling of 'Grace, a member bearing that name having been excommunicated for some alleged moral obliquity. Rev. Elisha Ferryman, a noted Baptist minister of the old days, while never a pastor of Hopeful held his membership there for a time and aided the church in many ways in its religious work. He was a plain blunt man of limited education, very plain speech and some eccentricities. My father was his physician and at one time was instrumental in curing him of a very serious malady, making, in view oi his ministerial call ing no charge for the service. Meeting my father after his recovery he said : "Dr. I am going to spread your fame from Dan to Beersheba." Some months later an itinerant corps of musicians opened up in the community a kindergarten school of music and my father allowed my brother and myself to matriculate in the violin class. This fact came to the preacher's knowledge and my father's fame, so far as it rested upon Mr. Ferryman's effort for its extension, failed to reach either Dan or Beersheba. In Mr. P.'s eyes a man who would allow his boys to play on the fiddle was anathema maranatha, fit material for the worm that dieth not and the fire that is not quenched. Many stories were told during my boyhood of Mr. Ferryman's peculiarities and some of them may be worthy of a place in these records. Col. A. C. Walker once gave me the following incident. Mr. P. had preached on the sin of Sabbath breaking and in the course of his discourse had given many instances of what he conceived to be temporal judgments visited upon of fenders for violating the sanctity of the Lord's Day. One of his ministerial brethren sat in the pulpit to close the service and when the sermon was ended he rose to make a few ad- 84 ditional remarks, "Yes brethren" he said "if you break the Sabbath your sin will shorely find you out, why old Brother and Sister started out to church not long ago on Sunday and just as they crossed Sandy Run Creek there came a streak of lightening and killed 'em both." As the illustration ended, Mr. Ferryman leaned forward and giving his brother's coat tail a rather strenuous twitch he said : "Sit down you goose, you don't know what you are talking about," and the brother's fervid exhortation ended without an encore. My genial friend. Brad Merry, whose retentive memory is as full of stories as the proverbial egg is of meat, has recently given me the following: Mr. Ferryman on one of his preach ing tours spent a night at the home of Judge Edmund Palmer, who has already been named in these memories. The Judge was not a pronounced believer in race suicide having been blessed, as Bill Arp once said of himself, with "a numerous and interesting offspring." In the opening prayer preceding the sermon on the following day Mr. Ferryman told the Lord how kindly he had been entertained by his hospitable friend Judge Palmer and then added : "And now Lord let thy bless ings rest upon the Judge and his wife and their long train of children." Mrs. Palmer was an auditor that day and however impressive the sermon may have been she was hardly edified by the personal allusion in the prayer. My good friend W. J. Steed, whose constant kindness and unselfish friends'hip have blessed my life so many years has been to me always a veritable Samaritan, never passing by on the other side when a story from his prolific mental store house would fill my needs. He stands sponsor for the fol lowing incident. Mr. Ferryman had closed a successful pro tracted srvice in Lincoln County and was burying in a liquid grave the fruits of his labors. Baptisteries were not in vogue in that section at that day and the waters of a nearby stream were utilized for baptismal purposes. The previous record of one of the "candidates" had not been such as to commend him as a shining exemplar for the rising generation and one of his friends stood by the water-side determined to see that nothing should occur in the administration of the rite to mar its effec- 85 tiveness. As Mr. P. drew him from the water this friend said : "Try him again, I don't think you got him well under that time." The preacher was preparing to comply when the young man said : "Please don't, I think I saw a mink when I was under there just now." Whether the protest was effec tual the records do not show. The later years of Mr. Ferryman's life were spent in this community. He died during my boyhood and the funeral ser vices were conducted by Rev. Jonathan Huff under an agree ment of long standing between them, that whichever survived should render this loving service for his dead friend and co- laborer. Mr. Huff lived in Warren County, but served Hopeful church as its pastor from 1828 to 1836. The following incident in his ministerial life has no connection with this church, but may be worthy of record in these homely annals. A church under his care numbered among its members Mr. Joshua Whittaker noted for his skill as a marksman. According to his own claim he had killed deer, wild turkeys and other game with his rifle at such long range as not only to astonish the natives, biit tax the credulity of strangers as well. And these feats usually occurred when no other eye but his own wit nessed the performance. The matter finally reached a stage where Mr. Huff felt that Brother Whittaker's propensity to exaggerate was bringing reproach upon the church and a con ference was therefore called and a committee appointed to "labor with the brother" and win him back from the sin that seemed so easily to beset him. On the appointed day the pastor and his deacons met at Mr. Whittaker's home and feel ing reluctant to tackle him in his 'own house, they asked him to accompany them to a neighbor's, a mile or so away. Having no clue as to their mission, he readily assented and taking his rifle from the pegs on which it lay he said in explanation ; that a hawk had been foraging on his wife's chicken preserve and he might find opportunity to stop its depredations. They had covered about half the distance when Mr. Whittaker stopped suddenly and said: "There he is now," "Where?" said Mr. Huff. Pointing to a large poplar a long distance away he re- plied : "Look up that tree about fifty feet and then ten feet to the right and you will see the hawk sitting on a nest in the fork of the limb." Mr. Huff and the deacons looked and looked, but neither nest nor hawk could they see. "What" said Mr. Whittaker, "Can't see the hawk? Why I can see his eyes." They shifted their position and strained their eyes, but with no better success. "Well I'll show him to you," and drawing a careful bead he fired. As the smoke cleared away the hawk fell to the ground with a dull thud. An examination of the game showed that the ball had passed through the head going in at one eye and coming out at the other. The journey was resumed in a silence that was a little oppressive both to Mr. Huff and his deacons. They had gone but a little way when the preacher stopped and said, "Brother Whittaker, I have heard so many miraculous stories of your marksmanship with your rifle that I could not believe them and I thought they were injuring the church and I had brought these brethren with me to aid me in the effort to induce you to bring these stories down to the limit of credibility, but since you have killed that hawk by shooting him through the eyes when I couldn't even see the nest I've got enough and I'm going home. Good-bye, Brother Whittaker." The argumentum ad hawkem had done the work. The committee de inquirende adjourned sine die without the bene diction, and "Brother Whittaker's" tongue was left to wag from that day on ad libitum et ad infinitum, I once told the story to a friend, who knew the hero, and he said : "I am not surprised. Why he could see a honey bee a quarter of a mile away." And then in further evidence of the abnormal development of the Whittaker tribe not only in the line of vision but on other lines as well he said that two of them were passing a church steeple when one looking up to its apex for a moment said to the other, "Can you see that fly buzzing around the point of that steeple?" And the other replied, "No but I can hear him buzz." Aside from those already named. Rev. Joseph Polhill, a prominent Baptist minister in his day, is associated with the history of Hopeful Church. Thougb never serving as its pas- 87 tor he began his religious life at its altars and in his earnest and effective ministration for other churches in the Hephzibah Association, he was instrumental in bringing into their com munion nearly a thousand members. The church building at Hopeful erected in 185 1 at the cost of $5,000, and by a membership numbering only sixty five, still stands as a center of rehgious influence and a lasting monument to the Christian liberality and zeal of its old time congregation. NEW HOPE CHURCH. During my boyhood there stood on a blackjack ridge near the present southern limits of Hephzibah a hewn log church by the rather contradictory title of "Old New Hope." At what date it began its mission as a pioneer radiant of moral and religious activity I do not know, but it was probably in the early years of the 19th century. Unearthed from a batch of old records left by my grandfather Charles Clark, who died in 1852, there is now in my possession a roster of New Hope's membership compiled April 9, 1833, and with such additions as were made to October 1844. This roll embraces a large number of those who have already found a place in these records, among them Nicholas Murphey and family, Charles Clark and family, John, Matthew, Moselle and Sarah Cars- well, Robert H. and Betsy Ann Evans, Philip and Martha Evans, William J. and Martha Rhodes, Lavinia and Araminta Rhodes, Anderson, John W., Frederick and Amarintha Rheney, Betsey Walker, Matthew Templeton, and nearly a hundred others. Among these members there is one "Diadem Jewel" who if she fitly illustrated her name must have been a gem of the first water. New Hope church in 1833 formed a component part of what was known in Methodist economy as the Warren circuit of the Georgia Conference. Rev. Lovick Pierce the Nestor of Georgia Methodism was then presiding elder of the Augusta district, while Isaac Boring served New Hope and other churches as pastor with Robert Stripling as Junior Preacher, A baptismal record found in connection with the roll of members furnishes the following approximately correct list of Methodist itinerants who ministered to this community from 1809 to 1849 • 1809 Watson, 181 1 Lewis Myers, 1813 Michael Burge, 1815 Joseph Tarply, 1818 John Mate, 1820 Tilman Snead, 1822 James Turner, 1824 Joseph Travis, 1827 Allen Turner, 1829 P. N. Maddox, 1830 James E. Glenn, 1834 Geo. W. Carter, 1839 P. N, Maddox, 1841 John J. Triggs, 1843 T. D. Peurifoy, 1844 Jno. C. Simrnons, 1847 J"o. P. Duncan, 1849 Josiah Lewis. The names of James O. Andrew and George F. Pierce occur in this record in 1832 and 1837 respectively, but they were both evidently Presiding Elders of the District. The building of Berlin church at some date in the '30s and of Clark's Chapel in 1847 drew so largely upon the membership of New Hope that its use as a house of worship ended prob ably about the last named year. The late William W. Rhodes once told me that it was the rule or custom of this church to construe attendance upon its "love feasts" for three consecu tive occasions as prima facie evidence of a desire to enter its communion, but that having no special trend in that direction in his boyhood he would bar the application of the rule to his own case by always skipping the third service. The Rev. E. R. Carswell, Sr., gave me the following reminiscences of New Hope. During the pastorate of Rev. Josiah Lewis he attended preaching at the church when through the inclemency of the weather or other cause there were present beside himself only Rev. Nicholas Murphey and his wife, and my father. That is to say two preachers and two active members of the church formed the congregation and Brother Lewis preached to these four from the text, "Ye must be born again." He had evidently prepared the discourse for a class of hearers who preferred the cosy comfort of their blazing fire-side to the chilly air of an old log church, whose only heating arrangement was confined to the weakened rays of a winter sun. Matthew Templeton, an old time member of this old church was accustomed to walk to the Sa'bbath service, but on one occasion he varied the rule by riding his mettled steed. Hitching him to a conven ient sapling he entered the church where the fervor of the 89 sermon or the mellowness of the old-time songs banished from his brain cells all memory of his morning ride. The service ended, he tramped his way homeward leaving his faithful horse to wonder in his equine way if the pulpit deliverance would never end. The last vestige of old "New Hope" has long since van ished into airy nothingness and no one now perhaps could mark unerringly the spot where once its hallowed altars stood, and yet just seventy years ago its rough hewn walls were echoing in rhythmic melody the charming eloquence that came unbidden from the gifted lips of saintly George F. Pierce. 90 RICHMOND CAMP GROUND. The religious faith and zeal of the early days found full and fit expression in the freedom and fervor of the old camp- meeting service. Leaving behind them for a time their daily toil and care these old time Methodists went out into the open woods to one of God's first temples and through the mellow sunshine of mild September days and in the shadows of the Autumn nights they made their vows afresh and sought to save their fellow men. Aside from the religious benefit ac cruing from these services there was a social side to these oc casions that brightened and relieved the dull monotony of rural, isolated life and left its gladness and its glamour to linger in the hearts of men for weeks and months to come. Not far from our village limits there lay in the old days two shaded groves dedicated at different times to these an nually recurring open air services. The 'first was near the waters of the Grindstone branch and only a little way from the old time home of Rev. Nicholas Murphey. If my information is correct no "Tents" as they were called were built on the ground. The people came in covered wagons and these were used as sleeping quarters during the progress of the meeting. When conditions in the community had improved, financially and otherwise, the site of the Richmond Camp Ground was changed to an ideal spot not far removed from the present plant of the Albion Kaolin Co., and donated for the purpose by Absalom Rhodes. A spacious tabernacle was erected and bordering it on three sides there stood more than a score of comfortable summer dwellings dispensing a lavish hospitality to all who came. My father's "tent" after its last enlargement, I am sure comfortably housed and slept and fed at least fifty guests outside his own family. With the missing links in my own memory supplied by conference with my old friends J. W. Burch, Sr., and R. H. P. Day, I am able to give the following approximately correct list of these old time "tent holders" as they were called. Taking them alphabetically they were as follows : James Anderson, Augustus H. Anderson, James Brandon, Joseph E. Burch, Charles Burch, Samuel B. Clark, 91 Geo. H. Crump, William Doyle, Robert Evans, Edmund B. Gresham, H. D. Greenwood, Dr. Walter E. Johnston, Jesse Johnson, Jesse Kent, Robert Malone, Holland McTyeire, Rev. Nicholas Murphey, Alexander Murphey, Hiram Oswald, Ab salom Rhodes, Middleton Seago, Mrs. Nancy Seago, Joseph Thomas, Edmund Tabb, David Tinley, Valentine Walker and Asaph Waterman. For twenty-five or thirty years this camp ground flourished like a green bay tree. Its annual services were blessed by the earnest and effective labors of George F. Pierce, James O. Andrew, Jno. W. Glenn, Thomas F. Pierce, Josiah Lewis, Wm. M. Crumley, John W. Knight, Allen Turner and many other worthies of the old days. John W. Knight preached his first sermon at a service on this ground. In his youth and early manhood he had been wild, reckless and dissipated. He "quit his meanness" as the late Sam Jones expressed it, joined St. John church and soon after applied for license to preach. George F. Pierce was Presiding Elder of the Augusta District and Mr. Knight's application embarrassed him. Mr. Knight's previous record, lack of edu cation and general awkwardness would, he thought, militate very strongly against his usefulness as a minister. While the matter was pending the Richmond Campmeeting came on with Dr. Pierce, as he was called, in charge. A dearth in ministerial help furnished opportunity to test the young applicant's fitness for the pulpit and Mr. Knight was assigned to a preaching hour in the service. The result astounded the future Bishop. His fluent, forceful, impassioned appeal silenced all misgivings and secured the license. With limted knowledge of books, his strong native intellect, terrible earnestness and unique method of presenting the truth made him a successful preacher. Rev. Thomas F, Pierce a short time before his death gave me the following reminiscence of Mr. Knight. At the close of one of Mr. Pierce's sermons he asked "Uncle John," as he was familiarly called, to lead in prayer. The old man kneeled down and began, "Lord there are just three things that we want to talk to you, about this morning and we want you to pay special attention." As he enumerated each item he would close the statement with an inquiry of his Master, "Are you 92 listening? Are you listening?" And then said Mr. Pierce "He gave voice to one of the most powerful prayers I ever heard from human lips." After Mr. Knight's maiden sermon at Richmond Camp- meeting George F. Pierce, whether as Presiding Elder or Bishop was one of his strongest friends and advisers. As they talked one day the Bishop said to him, "John, you are a good preacher, but you get off the track sometimes. You start up the creek all right, but you wander off into some shallow branch where there are no fish at all." "I guess you are right 'Bishop, " Mr. Knight replied, "and the next time you are in the pulpit with me and I get into one of those branches, I wish you would give my coat tail a twitch and I'll get back into deep water again." Not many weeks afterward the Bishop chanced to attend one of his friend's appointments and sat in the pulpit to close the service. In the course of the sermon the preacher reached a point where in the estimation of the Bishop he had struck the unfruitful shallowness of branch water and recalling the request made he leaned forward and gave his brother's coat tail a gentle twitch. Mr. Knight recognized the signal and turning his back to the audience he thundered with an imperial sweep of the head, "Bishop you are wrong there. There are fish up that creek and the biggest sort." His hearers were doubtless entertained if not edified by that unexpected and un explained number on the program and his ministerial bark was allowed to glide on without interruption to its destined haven. Dr. James Knight, who died a year or two ago in Eatonton, Ga., was a son of "Uncle John," and in his boyhood developed some characteristics of the Munchausen type. Seated at the breakfast table one morning he taxed the credulity of the family by the statement that he had just seen a million rats down at the pond. It was his father's custom in riding to his appointments to stop at homes by the wayside and hold prayer with the family. On this particular morning after Jim's breakfast deliverance, he mounted his steed and halting at the first house on his route, he said to the lady, who met him at the door, "Sister I have 93 just dropped,in to have a prayer with you," and dropping on his knees he prayed for the family and the church and the world generally, winding up his petition with this invocation, "And now Lord forgive Jim Knight for that lie about them rats this morning, and save us all in Heaven." On another occasion Rev. J. H. Echols was preaching while Mr. Knight sat before him an interested listener. In the elaboration i of his theme the preacher was portraying the characteristics of a gay and festive sinner and his gifted tongue was drawing the picture with the skill of an artist. As he neared the consummation and gave the finishing -touches Mr- Kinght to the amazement of the preacher and the amusement of the audience sang out, "Now aint he a blossom?" The reader will not I trust form his judgment of this saintly man solely or mainly from these peculiarities. He was a diamond in the rough. From the day of his reformation he served his Master humbly, faithfully, effectively often brilliant ly in the pulpit and if there are reserved seats in the Celestial City he is surely filling one, today. Bishop Pierce once said of him, "If his moral and educational environment had been favorable in his early life he would have stood in the front rank as a preacher. His pulpit efforts ranged all the way from cipher to a hundred but in his dryest moods there were al ways scintillations of his originality. His best sermons for range of thoug'ht, power of expression and touching pathos I have never heard excelled." Some minor incidents come back to me to-day over the waste of vanished years of those old campmeeting days, in cidents that bear^no marked religious trend. My first personal acquaintance with that peculiar species of the genus homo known as tramp, occurred at this camp ground. He was known to the general public as Lazy Lawrence and in appearance was a typical member of the tramp tribe. He wore upon his griz zled locks the fading, battered remnant of a once glossy silk tile, upon his rugged face the glow of a perennial smile and on his lips the mellow cadence of an Irish brogue. In his earlier days he had probably been an Irish ditcher, but in his later years his constitutional aversion to physical labor had placed 94 him on the retired list without emoluments or pay. When the lusty voice of Edmund Tabb rang throug the vibrant bugle the maiden call to the opening service on those old grounds the battered tile was there and when its last notes on the closing day faded out on the Aiitumn air its owner "Would fold his tents like the Arab And as silently steal away." I do not recall that he ever attended a religious service, but when the tempting meals were spread, like Bob Toombs story of the Vermont Democracy he was "always on hand with his dish up." What became of him during the twelve months interval between these services I do not know unless with his physical wants entirely filled by a four days feast he went into a state of prolonged hibernation until the bugle blew again- But this peripatetic specimen of the tramp tribe was not the only acquaintance formed at these annual services. On one of these occasions I came into personal but not pleasant contact with what the modern medical fraternity term acute indigestion but what was then known to the unprofessional mind at least, by the less aesthetic title of cholera morbus. While convalescing from this attack an old negro woman, who was rendering culinary or other service at a neighboring tent came in and noticing that I was a little under the weather she kindly asked, "What's the matter with you?" As I gave her the old time name of my physical ailment she drew back with a look of apprehension on her honest old face and said in a tone of some alarm, "Is it ketching?" I hastened to assure her that to the best of my medical knowledge and belief the trouble was hardly "ketching" and her fears were relieved. Rev. Milton A. Clark, who for twenty years and more has been laboring as a missionary among the Indians attended when a boy these campmeeting services. Awaking one morn ing in my father's tent he was unable to locate the bifurcated outer garment that he had laid aside on retiring to rest. My mother learning of his trouble sent Henry, a negro boy owned 95 by my father, into the room to aid him in the search. On his reappearance my mother asked if he had found them and he replied, "No Mistiss, Mars Milton wouldn't help me. He just sot dar a snuffin." Milton's long and strenuous service as a Confederate soldier culminating in the loss of a leg as he bravely faced the bursting shells to rescue a wounded comrade at Spottsylvania and his twenty years or more of arduous self- denying labor among the untamed Indians of the West have brought him many weightier trials than that recited above, but he has met them with a quiet fortitude and patience that failed him in his boyish trouble on that campmeeting morning in the long ago. The annual service on these old grounds was continued until the strain and stress of war caused its suspension and it was never resumed. The old tabernacle was moved in 1869 to its present site at Gracewood and campmeetings have been held there for all these years but never with their former charm or prestige. 96 RICHMOND BATH AND THE OLD BATH CHURCH. On New Year's Day in 1862, the First and the 23rd Vir ginia regiments with Ashby's cavalry and other Confederate troops started out from Winchester, Va., on a winter tramp under Stonewall Jackson with the benevolent purpose of in ducing by moral suasion or otherwise, a certain Federal force then trespassing on Virginia soil to return to their homes and thenceforth and thereafter to "play in their own back yards." Col. William B. Taliaferro, who in the years that followed won his spurs as a major general, was then commanding the 23rd Virginia. Riding by our regiment in one of the early days of this January outing, he was saluted by one of its members with the query: "Where are the Yankees, colonel?" "Up at a little place called Bath," he replied, giving the name the modern and up^to-date pronunciation of "Barth." So, nestled away on the borders of old "Pinetucky" and only a little way from our rustic town, there has lain for a hundred years or more "a little place called Bath," or if the "culchar" of the reader so prefers it, "Barth." In its early days it was known as the Richmond Baths, but whether from any alleged medicinal virtue in the limpid water that gushed and gurgled from one of its shaded vales, this scribe is not prepared to say. Bordering the ancient Indian trail that lay between Au gusta and Galphin's trading post at Old Town, it was probably in ante-railroad days a station on the old stage route that led to Louisville. When plans were being formulated to construct the Geor gia Railroad to Atlanta, some of its promoters suggested a route that ran by Bath, but the old time residents made strenu ous objection. They did not want their rural quietude dis turbed by the smoke and snort of iron horses and another line was chosen. Through all its ante-bellum history, this little village was the resort of wealthy planters from the adjoining county of Burke. Cultivated and refined, with ample means and ample 97 leisure these old time Southern gentlemen builded here their old colonial mansions and made of Bath a social center noted far and wide for its charming elegance and old-time Southern grace. Prominent among its earliest settlers and filling large space in all its ante-bellum history, there was a race that came of Scotch Presbyterian stock. Driven from their native heath by religious persecution they found a refuge in Northern Ire land in the early years of the 17th century. A hundred years later William Whitehead, one of the tribe decided to try his fortune in the New World and settled on the soil of the Old Dominion. In 1764, or possibly earlier, three of his grandsons, John, Amos and Caleb, migrated to Burke County, Ga., taking a section of land that stretched for fifteen miles along the western bank of Brier creek. The lands were fresh and fertile, their slaves multiplied and they and their sons and grandsons took rank among the wealthiest planters of this wealthy old county. Noted in all the fair and broad domain that formed their landed estate was the Spread Oak Place, settled, improved and beautified by the original John Whitehead and the birth place of three generations or more of 'his descendants. But on these virgin lands where the pendant moss in grey festoons drapes the forest trees and the snowy cotton bloomed and boiled and whitened in almost tropical luxuriance under the Southern sky the malarial germ in earth or air or stagnant streams found its abiding place and "third-day chill and fever" hung like a pall over the summer and autumn days. In such environment the old familiar salutation "give us a shake" must hardly have found its birth for shakes, that bore no warm relationship to milkshakes, came without the courtesy of any invitation. To find some surcease from this annoying yet rarely seri ous affliction, many of the old time Whiteheads made their homes in the balmy, resinous, and germless air of Richmond Bath. Among them were John and James, Amos G. and John P. C, Troup and William, John Berrien and John Randolph. With them came other wealthy planters from old-time Burke, of whom the following are recalled, Adam McNatt and Wm. 98 S. C. Morris, Rev. Joshua Key and Major Poythress, Samuel and Gideon Dowse, Samuel and William Byne, Amos W. Wig gins and Thomas Nesbit, Commodore Nelson and last but not least Quintillian Skrine, who as Senor Quinzimaniskrani and with 'his conferes Senor Cartara, Senor Benneti, Senor Antonini and Senor Portosi representing Dr, Carter, Major iBennett, Dr. Anthony and Major Poythress formed the dramatis personae in "The Conspirators," a political drama written by Col. A. C. Walker in the "forty-four, forty or fight" period of Southern history. All of these old homes kept open house, dispensing a princely old time Southern hospitality to all who came. In these latter days a girl of the period invites three or four friends to her home for three or four days and the local reporter em blazons it in the press as a "large and brilliant house-party," but I am assured by one whose memory goes back to the old Bath days that it was not unusual for her father to entertain thirty guests, continuously for weeks and weeks at his old Bath home. 99 LOVE AND WAR, OR A BATH ROMANCE. In the summer of '6i the Confederate iGovernment was endeavoring with wholly inadequate force to hold the un friendly territory of West Virginia true to its allegiance to the Southern cause. In the army of occupation was the 21st Virginia regiment holding as a component part of its organization a splendid company of Baltimore boys commanded by Capt. Lyle Clark. Within its ranks there was a fairhaired lad within whose loyal veins there flowed the blood of a Revolutionary sire, who had not only signed Tom Jefferson's historic paper, but had affixed his signature in such a way as to leave no possible doubt as to his identity if the effort of the colonies had come to grief. In the mountain campaign that followed this boy soldier grew sick and helpless and was forced to ask the kindly care of a friendly mountaineer. A few days later there came to the home two Augusta boys, members of the Oglethorpe Infantry, ist Ga. regiment, asking for a night's shelter, and were assigned to the invalid's room. He had grown weak and despondent and thought that his time had come. They cheered him as best they could and one of them to divert his mind from his illness showed him a picture of his Georgia sweetheart. It was the face of a typical Southern girl with laughing eyes and mobile lips and a wealth of soft brown hair. The night passed and the Augusta boys hurried on to overtake their command. The sick boy was nursed back to health and rejoined his comrades later. In a life of more than sixty years I can recall few days in which palmetto fans were as absolutely useless as January 4th, in '62. If not the coldest I have ever known, as the rustic witness said, it was certainly "tharabouts." Our winter tramp with Stonewall Jackson had brought us within a mile of Col. Taliaferro's little place called "Bath." Our regiment had been halted awaiting Gen. Jackson's final dis position of his forces for the expected battle. Standing by the roadside in the frozen snow I heard the tramp of an approach- 100 ing column and Capt. Clark's crack company from "Maryland, My Maryland," marched 'by with faultless step and ringing, rhythmic tread on their way to the front to open the engage ment on the skirmish line. During my service as a soldier I came in contact with many military organizations from many states, but with none that impressed me more by their soldierly bearing and handsome looks than those grey clad boys from Baltimore. With them tramped and fought that bitter winter day the quondam invalid from the Western Virginia home, but to my personal mental consciousness he was then an abso lutely unknown quantity in the algebra of life. A year later he was sent to Port Gibson, Louisiana, on some military mission that involved a stop over in Augusta for a day or two ehroute. There he chanced to meet a Virginia army friend. Col. McLeod, of Emanuel county, and as they chatted pleasantly, two blooming maidens passed them on the street. "Colonel, those are mighty pretty girls," said the young soldier. "Yes, they are friends of mine. Would you like to meet them?" "Sure," was the prompt response, and when the presenta tion was made, the face of one of the girls seemed strangely familiar to him. "Were you ever in Maryland or Virginia?" he asked. "Never," she replied. "Well, I have certainly met you somewhere." "No, I guess not," she answered. "You have simply met some girl that resembled me a little." "No, it was your face and no other," and then there came back to him the memory of a sick bed among the Virginia mountains in '6i, of a chance meeting with two Augusta boys, of a pictured face drawn from an army knapsack to cheer him in his illness and the mystery was solved. He told her the story, but she laughingly denied the soft impeachment and asked him to accompany them on their visit to the old Doughty home. He went and his stay in Augusta was possibly pro longed beyond the limit that military necessity ab&olutely re quired, but before it had ended he had secured from her a promise that his letters would not go unanswered. lOI And then the weary, bloodstained years went by, but be fore "grim visaged war had smoothed his wrinkled front," the soft pine air of old time Bath was laden with the breath of orange blossoms and in the spacious halls of one of its old time mansions the bidden guests had gathered from far and near to witness the plighted troth of Alaryland's grey-clad sol dier and his bonnie Georgia bride. And now as I write these lines on this January day in 1908, the genial face and manly form of my long-time friend, Phil Carroll, lies at his Greene street home smitten again by illness while she whose love has blessed his life for all these years sits by his bedside to cheer him with her real and not her pictured face. 102 JACOB WALKER, OR A SLAVE'S LOYALTY. Some weeks ago I was able to secure some data in the early history of the old Bath church from my friend Mrs. C. A. Rowland, who in her girldhood worshipped at its altars and whose kindly hands and gentle, generous heart have for so many years in the role of a Good Samaritan brought sunshine to many shadowed lives and homes. In addition to this in formation she gave me also the following story, which while it has no distinctive Bath setting occurred at "Ivanhoe," the plantation home of her father, Amos G. Whitehead, one of the old Bath residents and is therefore in some measure germane to these records. This home lay on the Quaker road not many miles from Waynesboro and in the track of Sherman's famous and infamous "March to the Sea." Some days before the advent of the vanguard of the Federal army, Mrs. White head in order to minimize in some degree their expected depre dations, placed the family silver in charge of Jacob Walker, one of her trusted slaves, with instructions to conceal it in some safe hiding place. In faithful execution of his trust he hid it away in the cavernous depths of an unused well on the premises, covering the surface opening and concealing it all with a layer of forest leaves. Kilpatrick's cavalry coj-ps oc cupied the place for a day, the home itself being utilized as headquart-ers for the general and his staff. During their stay Kilpatrick having possibly in his baggage wagon, still space for a few more sets of family treasures took occasion in a private interview with Jacob to inquire where the family silver could be found. And the faithful slave believing that even the law of absolute truthfulness had its limitations in war times, said with an innocent look in his honest eyes, "Boss, dere ain't no silver here at all. Marster done took it all to Augusta. No, sir, dere ain't none here." And the general's table at his next stopping place was not adorned by the White head silver. Jacob's wife was the family cook and under orders from one of the aides prepared the midday meal for the uninvited guests. Mrs. Whitehead had reserved a set of spoons for the family use and these were placed on the table. 103 As the meal progressed one of the officers tilting one of them on his finger commented very favorably on its weight, and evidently sterling quality. The cook heard the comment and quietly making the circuit of the table she gathered them in and hid them away. Jacob's young master, Willie Whitehead, joined the Burke Sharp Shooters at the first call to arms in '6i, and became the ensign of the Second Georgia Regiment. On the bloody slope of Malvern Hill he went down to death gallantly bearing the regimental colors. IBefore leaving home he gave to Jaco'b as a special mark of his affectionate regard a handsome set of gold shirt studs carved or moulded in the form of a wolf's head. This cherished gift adorned Jacob's homespun shirt front on the occasion of Kilpatrick's visit and while the raid ers were earnest advocates of "Free Silver," silver that was free to their pillaging hands, they were in no way averse to the "double standard" when the occasion offered. The gleam and glitter that shone from the negro's brawny breast attracted the attention of one of the officers, and fingering the studs with an itching palm, he said : "These are mighty pretty. I want them." And Jacob with the same innocent look in his homely face, said, "Boss, dere ain't no gold 'bout dese buttons. I rubs 'em up every mornin' to make 'em shine, but dey ain't nuffin' but brass," and the officer having no desire to add to his outfit, physical or mental on that particular line, left the negro in undisturbed possession of his treasure. I am glad to know that when in after years this trusted slave was called to his last long home and his lowly form was laid to rest beneath the shadow of the trees in the city of the dead, every business house in Waynesboro closed its doors in loving token of respect for his humble, but faithful life. It was General Kilpatrick's purpose to prolong; his stay at "Ivanhoe," until the following day, but General Wheeler came up in the afternoon and began to show him social courtesies of a carbine character and the Federal officer decided to "move on," and "step lively." "Little Joe's" attentions were kept up unremittingly until they arrived at Buckhead creek when Kilpatrick in order to bar a continuance of these courtesies 104 whose constancy had grown a little monotonous, burned or partially burned the bridge. Wheeler's type of hospitality did not allow him to wait for a lumber order to be filled by a local mill and the pews in Buckhead church were utilized to replace the burned flooring. Some days later Little Joe to supplement his knowledge »f Burke topography accepted the volunteered service as pilot of my old friend and school mate, Jno. W. Reynolds, whose active military duties had been ended by a wound received at Malvern Hill. In their meanderings they reached the vi cinity of "Ivanhoe" again and Mrs. Whitehead invited the Gen eral to dine at her home. Little Joe requested my friend John to accompany him and they went, but Eliza found no occasion to remove the spoons that day. 105 A SLAVE WEDDING AT BATH. The outside world has never had in the years gone by and will never have in the years to come any true conception of the peculiar relation that existed between "Marster and Mistiss" and those, who called them such in the old slave days. They found their birth in conditions that had no precedent and a system that will have no successor. The tender kindliness that lay in the hearts of each of these classes, Marster and slave, mistress and maid, "mammy'' and "chile" is a "Lost Chord," whose rhytmic melody will never echo again in earth or sea or sky. To those of my readers, whose conscious life goes back to those old days the following incident given me by my friend, Mrs. M. P. Carroll, may awaken a fading memory of the feeling I have tried to picture. In the old Bath home of her father, Adam McNatt, many Augusta guests were entertained and none more frequently, perhaps, than William Henry Warren. In his periodical trips to the little village, he was attended by Henry, one of his slaves, as a valet. In the home of his host, there was a servant girl, Maria, with whose maiden charms Henry became en amoured and a marriage engagement followed. Maria confided the fact to her mistress and when the appointed day ap proached Mrs. McNatt prepared a costly wedding supper, purchased many bridal gifts and invited all the family servants in the neighboring homes, as Maria's marriage guests. The use of the summer dining room was allowed for the wedding feast, and the services of Rev. Rufus K. Porter, then pastor of the Presbyterian church at Bath, was engaged to bind the nuptial tie. Maria was supplied by her mistress with an ap propriate bridal trousseau, the ceremony was honored by the presence of Mrs. McNatt's family and the occasion passed off with much eclat. If my memory serves me correctly, this in cident and the many similar ones that occurred in the Old South have not been given any very special prominence in Uncle Tom's Cabin, and yet they may, perhaps, he appropriate ly added to the long list of "Southern outrages." 1 06 "RUTHER COLD." My old friend and comrade, Jim Wilson, was wont to characterize an abnormal drop in the mercury as being "cold enough to freeze off the ears of a brass monkey." The allusion made in a former sketch to the frigid temperature that pre vailed in Northern Virginia in January '62, recalls a story that came to me long years afterward and yet that was suggested by the Virginia "spell," and that would seem to meet in some measure, at least, the conditions of Jim's mental thermometer. During one of the Confederate reunions in Louisville, Ky., my old friend Jordan Bottom and myself, made a visit to Cave Hill cemetery, where rest many of Kentucky's honored dead. On one of its graveled and winding ways we chanced to meet two veterans from Parkersburg, W. Va., and in the conversa tion that followed, the severity of the winter already named, became the subject of discussion. My friend Jordan recalled the fact that the temperature fell below the zero point. I was unable to either affirm or deny the statement, as my camp outfit did not include in its equipment any thermometer, save my ears and toes, and they were both ungraded. I did remember, however, that on the unbridged streams over which we passed, ice lay thick enough and strong enough to bear up the weight, not only of heavy baggage wagons, but of artillery as well, and this hardly indicated the fervent heat of a summer solstice. Growing out of this discussion there came from the lips of one of our new made friends the following story, corroborated and confirmed that evening in its essential features by a Confed erate captain from Norfolk, Va., who had personally inspected the documentary evidence. Some years after the war the contract for carrying the mail over a star route line that ran over Cheat Mountain, on whose wooded slopes there came to the writer on a fall day in '61 his initial baptism of fire, was awarded to two Virginia brothers, one of whom was a pious sort of fellow while the moral character of the other would hardly have fitted him for specially efficient service in the line of Sunday school work. The contract was carried out according to specifications until 107 a winter blizzard came that mantled the earth with ice and snow and possibly beat the record by its unparalleled bitterness and bleakness. Outdoor life under these conditions was hardly a luxury and the two postmen sat by the cosy fires in their mountain homes while the mail piled higher in the pig^eon holes undisturbed and undelivered. The patrons along the line were possibly singing Edison's modern phonograph song: "I wonder what's the matter with the mail. It never was so before," But they did not sing long before they began to pour complaints into the department at Washington and back by every mail came letters of inquiry as to "the reason why." The pious brother answered them for a time but with no eminent degree of satisfaction to the officials. He then turned over the correspondence to his wicked partner and a letter was written that failed to find its home in the waste basket, or amid the musty archives of the department records. Neatly framed it hung for years and years on the office walls as a national curio and probably hangs there still. As a sample of its Addisonion style our informant gave us the following ex tract : "If the gable end of the infernal regions was bursted in and its lurid fires turned loose on Cheat Mountain it wouldn't thaw that ice in six months." Whether this virile answer was effective in nol prossing the case we did not learn. 1 08 "JIM." As the following has no earthly connection with old time Bath, nor with "Hephzibah and its Antecedents," nor with their heirs and assigns, the reader can charge, it up to the law of association, but not to the Hephzibah Association. It is simp ly a companion picture to the framed epistle named above and may possibly hang beside it. Some years ago there came to the New York postoffice from over the sea a letter with the following unique superscription : "To My Son Jim He lives two miles from the Rail road And drives red oxen." The postal service makes diligent effort to secure proper disposition of all mail matter that falls into its hands but the prompt delivery of this epistle was fraught with difficulties. If there had been in all the broad domain over which the Fed eral flag folds its protecting aegis but one railroad, but one "Jim" and only a single pair of carmine tinted steers and they had lived and moved and had their patient being just two miles from the railroad for Jim's sole use, behoof and benefit, the identification might have been complete. But un fortunately, in the progress of modern civilization, railroads had multiplied and red oxen had multiplied, so that amid the cattle on a thousand hills Jim's plodding yoke of steers though blessed with auburn locks could cut but little ice. And so under postal statutes, made and provided, the letter went its reluQtant way into the gaping jaws of the dead letter office, not to be burned as were its mates that held nothing of value, but treasured and preserved as a national curio, while "Jim" if he still survives is making the woodland echo with his sono- ous "haws and gees" two miles away from the railroad line in utter and pathetic ignorance of this maternal missive. 109 THE OLD BATH CHURCH. Rev. George C. Smith, in his Story of Georgia, states that in 1760 Presbyterian churches had been established at Brier Creek, Walnut Branch and Old Church in Burke county. Waynesboro was born in 1783, or at least, in the language of an authority lying before me, it was "laid out" in that year. Like some of its modern sisters it may have been laid out before it was born, but if its early reputation has been truth fully portrayed, it is probable that a good many of its citizens in those old days were "laid out" after they were born. In 1810 the churches at Brier Creek and Walnut Branch were abandoned and their members combined in a united church organization at Waynesboro. John Whitehead and Gideon Dowse, who had aided in the establishment of Midway church in Liberty county in 1754 and who had removed to Burke county in 1799, were probably leading spirits in this movement. After Bath had become a summer residence for the families of these and other prominent planters in Burke, the Whiteheads true to the ancestral faith, for which their forbears had suf fered, builded another house of worship at Bath and the or ganization became known as the "Church of Waynesboro and 'Bath." If this dual arrangement began as early as 1820, Rev. S. K. Talmage, at one time president of Oglehtorpe University, near Milledgeville, was probably the first pastor of the Bath church. He was the uncle of Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage, and a sentence from one of his sermons given to me fifty years j.go by my friend Joe Lewis, seems to furnish evidence that he was in no way inferior to his distinguished nephew as a pulpit orator. This pretty thought prettily expressed is as follows : "The first feeble pulsation in the infants sinews is but the maiden drumbeat of an eternal march." In 1824 Rev. Calvin Mclver, 'began his pastorate and was followed in 1830 by Rev. Lawson Clinton, grandfather of President Linwood Hayne, of the National Bank, and later by Rev. Timothy Dwight, whose long pulpit service at Bath and Waynesboro ended in 1843. It was never my privilege to sit under Mr. Clinton's ministration, but if he was as charming no in the pulpit as his daughters were out of it, he must have kept his Bath congregation awake even on the hottest summer days. I do not recall having met, more than once, Miss Julia, the eldest daughter, who was married first to James Anderson, Jr., and after his death to Gen. Hayne, but she impressed me as being not only a pretty, but a very beautiful woman. Miss Kate, the younger, was my schoolmate at the old Brothersville Academy, and was as charming as a rose in June. During the winter of 1859 and i860, my elder brother, William H., was a student at the Medical College in Augusta and among his friends there was a John Wesley Brown, who had met Miss Kate and had become so enamored that his attack might have been diagnosed as a virulent type of functional rather than sympathetic heart trouble. During one of the sessions named. Miss Kate was married to James Heidt, brother of my old friend and college classmate. Rev. John W. Heidt, the genial and gifted presiding elder of the Augusta District. Tidings of the marriage reached Augusta and as my brother stood on the street on the following morning, he saw his friend John Wes ley approaching with a graveyard look on his gloomy face. He failed to give the usual salutation, but as he passed there came in sepulchral tones from his trembling lips these sor row freighted words. "Clark, she's gone," and then went his lonely way. If the rumors of that day were not misleading there were others from whom this disappointed swain could justly have claimed special consideration if the poet said with truthfulness. "A fellow feeling makes us wondrous kind." Ill REV. FRANK R. GOULDING. The ample imcome of the old Bath residents enabled them to furnish liberal compensation to their pastors and the church was served in all its early history by able ministers. In 1843 Rev. Frank R. Goulding, one of the most prominent Presby terian divines in the State, located in the village, and for eight years filled its pulpit. During the early years of his pastorate at Bath, he bloomed out as an author publishing in 1844 "Little Josephine," a religious story based upon the early life of Josephine Anderson, of Washington, Ga. A few years later, he wrote "Young Marooners," which while publishers were slow to recognize its merits, became one of the most popular books of its class ever issued. A charming story of adven turous boy life on the coast, it contained a large amount of valuable information, clothed in very attractive form. A new edition has been published in recent years with an appreciative introduction by Joel Chandler Harris. In later life he wrote other books, among them "Marooners Island," "The Woodruff Stories," "Saloquah, or Boy Life Among the Indians," and "Frank Gordon," but Young Marooners seems to have been his master piece as no other product of his pen met with so kindly a reception from the reading public. Dr. Goulding must have been a moderately busy man, for in addition to his ministerial and literary labors he devoted a portion of his time to mechanics. In the early '40's his hand and brain evolved a sewing machine, which is claimed to have been the first invention of its kind operated on American soil. The practically universal use into which such machines have grown and the princely income secured by Howe and Wilson and Singer and others from similar inventions, have led me to investigate the reasons why he failed to profit financially by his mechanical geniys. Theologians have written much on the "Harmony of the Gospels," but it would require even larger mental effort to effect even ap proximate reconciliation among the conflicting stories, that have come to me on this particular line. In this case the har mony doesn't seem to harmonize. In my boyhood days I was told that Mr. Goulding declined to make any effort to secure 112 a patent for his invention for the reason that with its extended use the occupation of the sewing women throughout the land, like Othello's, would be gone. Since I began this story, the following varying accounts have been received : First, that the inventor's trip to Washington, D. C, in the interest of his patent was delayed by flooded streams and a rival claiming the same mechanical principle, in this way reached the patent office in advance of him. Second, that on the aforesaid trip the stage was over turned and in the confusion incident to the trouble the model was stolen and never recovered. Third, that the model dropped from his buggy into a deep stream as he crossed it and was never found. Fourth, that he failed to locate the eye or opening of the needle used, near its point and for this reason the machine was never a success. I have been told also that Howe during a visit to Augusta was allowed b)' his friend to inspect the working of the model, that he saw its defect, remedied it, ap propriated the motive mechanism and secured a patent that bountifully filled his coffers. The needle theory named above was given to me by my old friend, M!r. John H. Jones, whose memory, although he has passed his four-score years, is as retentive as a tar bucket. As it is confirmed by my friend Mrs. C. A. Rowland and as they were both personal friends of Mr. Goulding and received the story from his own lips, it is evidently the correct version of his failure to utilize his invention. After leaving Bath in 1853, Dr. Goulding lived for a time at Darien, Ga., but spent his last years at Roswell, Ga., where he died in 1881. 5(S * * * !!t * Since writing the above I have learned through a lady friend that Mrs. Mary Helmer of Macon, Ga., daughter of Dr. Goulding, has in her possession beautiful samples of the handi work of this machine — samples that show conclusively that there was no defect in its construction and so it must have been at last his kind consideration for the interest of the gentler sex that held his genius in abeyance. "3 REV. RUFUS K. PORTER. Began his pastorate at Bath in the early 50's. He was the only ante-bellum minister of that church of whom I had any personal knowledge. Earnest, cultivated, of handsome physique and pleasing address he enjoyed the confidence, es teem and love of all who knew him. Some years after his ministry began I attended the morning and evening service at this church, but Dr. Porter had exchanged pulpits for that day with Rev. J. E. Ryerson, pastor of the First Baptist Church at Augusta. At the morning service Addison's beautiful hymn begining "The spacious firmaments on high And all the blue ethereal sky The spangled heavens a shining frame Their great original proclaim." was used. Why this fact has lingered in my mind for more than fifty years, whether it is due to Dr. Ryerson's impressive rendition of it I do not know. Some months ago I mentioned the matter to my friend Brad Merry and he said, "Why Mrs. Henry Leitner attended that service and was so impressed by that hymn that she had one of her sons to memorize and re cite it at the first Sunday School Convention held at Berzelia." On the day following this interview I attended the evening service at the Second Presbyterian Church at Augusta and Dr. Guille, its pastor, read the Psalm on which this hymn is based and preached on "The testimony of the Stars," all of which is respectfully submitted. Dr. Porter's pastorate was interrupted for a time by his service as a Confederate Chaplain with Cobb's Legion and af terwards with the Army of Tennessee. ANTE BELLUM. The use of this phrase in the sketch above recalls another story of my friend Steed, which while it has no legitimate place on the family tree of the old Bath Church is nevertheless a good story and a true one, and I give it here for the reason 114 that I may have no opportunity to give it historic setting in bet ter company. On reaching home some months ago, my friend Phunie found his good wife engaged in conversation with an aged colored woman, who had called on some errand not material to the present issue. By way of presentation, his wife said, "This is one of the old time negroes." "Oh, yes," said Phunie, "Ante bellum." "No, no. Boss," said the old woman, "Dis is Aunt Mandy." And my friend with his proverbial urbanity confessed his error and made the necessary amende honorable. "DUM VIVIMUS VIVAMUS." During Mr. Porter's pastorate at Bath, Capt. W. S. C. Morris, whose Confederate outfit of umbrella, silk tile and infantry saddle horse has already been noted in these records, was a resident of the village. The minister was an expert linguist while his parishioner's knowledge of the classics would hardly have fitted him for successful and efficient service as Professor of Ancient Languages in a first class University. According to his own statement, as made in the recital of this story, there was but one Latin phrase with which he was reasonably familiar, and its English meaning would have found no recog nition if he had met it in the road. At their earliest meeting the liquid flow of language from Mr. Porter's ready lips was liberally interlarded with familiar quotations from the Latin tongue. Capt. Morris bore it for a time without rejoinder but finally unwilling that his pastor should bear off all the classic honors he blurted out with emphasis "Dum Vivimus Vivamus." The remark was made without malice aforethought either express or implied, but by happy accident it cbanced to fit the place exactly and the two became fast friends. "GIVE ME ANOTHER PIECE." iMy friend Brad Merry, whose Confederate command Mr. Porter served as Chaplain, has given me the following story of that service. The preacher by his earnest work, his sym pathy and his willingness to aid them in any way he could, had "5 won their confidence and love. And when there came by chance or otherwise to supplement their scant}- fare a tempting dish of any kind, the Chaplain was always an invited guest. One of the messes had one day a dish of crisp fried chicken, a very unusual item in their menu, and the preacher sat at meat to share its juiciness with them. The contents of the savory dish were disappearing rapidly when one of the hungry mess thinking perhaps to throw a damper on the appetite of their guest, said, "Parson, you asked a blessing on this meal, didn't you?" "Whj- yes," he replied, "Well do you know where this chicken came from?" "I do not," was the answer. "It was stolen," the soldier said. "Ah, I didn't know that," Air. Porter answered, "but it's mighty good, mighty good. Please help me to another piece," and he passed his tin plate and ate what was set before him asking no questions for conscience sake. After the close of the war Air. Porter returned to iBath, served the church for a time and in 1867 was called to the pastorate of a church in Atlanta. ^ ^ ^ ^ stc :^ Since the foregoing was written there has come to me through my old friend A. AI. AlacAIurphey, whose memory goes almost back to pre historic days and whose ancient kins man, George Galphin, was trading red calico for corner lots with the Uchee Indians years before the foundations of the first building were laid in Augusta, this further information as to old time Bath. I do not know that my old friend was a sub scriber to the Augusta Herald, published by Hobby and Bunce in 1812, but he has copies of its weekly issues for that year which contain the following "ads." On June 3. 1812, the pub lic is advised that "A convenient four wheel carriage will start from the City Hotel at 3 P. AI., every Friday and Saturday for Richmond Bath, and return every Monday and Friday the fare being $1.25 each way." The "ad" is signed by Joseph Carrie, and his four wheeled vehicle was probably the original "Carrie-all" in this section. The City Hotel referred to, was probably the dwelling now occupied by Dr. Andrew J. Kil patrick, which in the days of its use as a hostelry extended 116 the entire width of the block from Greene to Telfair and en tertained Gen. La Fayette during his visit to Augusta in 1825. A lady friend and relative has recently allowed me the privi lege of examining the original invitation requesting the pres ence of her grandmother Mrs. Launcelot Johnson at the ball given to La Fayette in Milledgeville in March of that year. The stage line suggests the further fact that my friend Capt. N. K. Butler has now in his possession a receipt for stage fare from Augusta to Charleston paid by his father in 1823. The printed bill head shows that the Commercial Coffee House of Charleston was proprietor of the stage line and that the fare was $12.50 for the trip. Another "ad" in the Augusta Herald of Dec. 3, 1812, shows that Bath was at that time a U. S. Military Post, Capt. R. Cun ningham of the 8th. U. S. Infantry offers a reward of $20.00 for the apprehension of one John Tyner, a member of the regiment, who had deserted on their "march from Charleston to Rich mond Baths." As war had been declared against Great Britain June 19, 1812. and hostilities were then in progress, what military or other necessity brought this armed force to this retired spot in time of actual war. No foreign foe was likely to invade the sylvan shades of young Pinetucky nor hostile battle ship to plow the limpid waters of Sandy Run, why then was this thus? My friend, Phil Carroll, says upon the au thority of Col. Quintilian Skrine, an old resident of Bath, that in some early period of the 19th century troops were sent to this place to secure immunity from the ravages of Yellow Fever, but the occupancy noted was in December and this dread scourge is hardly wont to flaunt its yellow peril in the winter air. It may be that they came in the good old summer time and that Prest. James Madison was unable afterwards to find the place so as to order them away. My friend Mrs. Car roll tells me also that there was at one time an army arsenal at Bath and this fact may furnish further reason for its military occupation. The name of Col. Skrine recalls an incident or two in the career of this gifted and yet in some respects peculiar individ- 117 ual with it these memories of old-time Bath will find their end. Born in Wilkes County he entered the legal profession in early manhood and selected Waynesboro as the theater in which to win professional fame. The trial of his first case at the bar was held in a magistrate's rural court. When the ar gument was ended the learned judge turned to him and said, "Mr. Skrine, I'll have to decide this case agin you, but I'll decide the next one in your favor to even up." The result dis gusted the young barrister and he hauled down his shingle and abandoned his chosen field. In the early "fire eating" fifties he took an active part in public affairs and was slated on one occasion for a joint dis cussion with an advocate of contrary political faith. Col. Skrine had the opening speech and when he had ended, his op ponent rose and said, "Fellow citizens, do you know where Mr. Skrine got all that fire-eating stuff he's been giving you? If you don't I'll tell you. He got it out of Tom Paine's 'Age of Reason.' " The crowd was composed largely of Baptists and Methodists, who looked with absolute horror on this infidel authority, and the Col.'s eloquence went where the woodbine twineth. Disgusted again, he left the political arena and so he has come down into history as a lawyer with a single case and a stump speaker with one lone effort on the hustings to his credit. And yet possessed as he was of strong mental gifts, fluent speech and a seemingly exhaustless store of information he might have won distinction on either of these lines of effort and endeavor if he had not been a quitter. Richmond Bath like Daniel Webster "Still Lives," but only one of its old time homes now holds within its classic walls descendants of its pristine owners. Many of them in these later years have passed into possession of Augusta fam ilies, who since the advent of the Augusta Southern R. R. find through the summer months some surcease from the City's dust and din and overheated air. ii8 EARLY COLORED CHURCHES. The early religious development of this community was not confined to provision for the moral needs of the whites. Each of the churches already named had its colored member ship, while accommodations were always furnished at the Richmond Camp Ground for the negroes, who attended the services. In addition to this they had churches of their own. EBENEZER CHURCH. The earliest house of worship erected in this immediate section by the negroes stood near the circular boundary of our town and its present successor still stands on the same site today. It was organized eighty or ninety years ago, and was originally a branch of the Springfield Colored Baptist Church in Augusta, but developing after a time into independent church life. While occupying territory covered by the Heph zibah Association it has never formed a component part of that religious body. Of its early history I have no information. In the '40's of the last century its pulpit was served by Rev. Joseph Walker, a slave owned by William Evans of old Brothersville. During the earlier ministry of Rev, Charles T. Walker he ministered at its altars ably and succesfully. Its pastorate for some time past has been held by Rev. Joseph Carter. FRANKLIN COVENANT CHURCH. In 1848 Col. A. C. Walker, whose residence stood upon a large tract of land adjoining the imaginary limits of old Brothersville, gave to the negroes in this community a lot for religious uses. On this lot and largely through the efforts of "Uncle Frank," one of Col. Walker's most trusted and valued slaves, a church was built, perpetuating in its title the name and virtues of this saintly Christian negro. Rev. Joseph Walker was its first pastor. He was owned by William Evans a resident of Brothersville, but after the organization of the church its members raised the necessary funds to purchase his freedom thus enabling him to devote his entire time to min- 119 isterial work. I once asked my old friend Rev. Peter Walker, a nephew of "Uncle Joe," how so large an amount was secured by the negroes. "Well," he replied, "we raised what we could and our white friends came to our aid with the balance needed." Rev. Joseph Walker's service as Pastor of Covenant Church continued until his accidental death resulting from a fall while attending the funeral of one of his members. He was suc ceeded by his brother. Rev. Nathan Walker, and in later years by his nephew, Rev. Charles T. Walker, while another nephew. Rev. Peter Walker, has often ministered at its altars. As Rev. S. C. Walker, grandson of Joseph, is now its pastor its pulpit for all these years has been practically monopolized by the Walker family, a family noted for sixty years and more for high moral character, strong individuality and earnest Christian service. Aside from those named above there are nearly a dozen other scions from this parent stock, who are now serving their race ably and faithfully in the pulpit in Macon, Savannah and in other sections of the State. During the pastorate to Rev. Charles T. AValker the old building at Covenant was replaced by a larger and more comfortable church structure, which still stands on the old site today. In the early days of the church Uncle Tom, father of Rev. Charles T., was one of its deacons. He did not have the talent nor the learning of his gifted son, nor his ready command of the King's English, but he held in his untrained head a goodly share of what is sometimes known as "horse sense," as the following incident will show. During my boyhood, on Sabbahs when our own church doors were unopened, members of my father's family would frequently attend the service at Covenant, which was only a mile or two away. On one of these occasions Uncle Tom in the absence of the pastor, was making an examination into the fitness of a number of appli cants for membership. One of the candidates with the charac teristic superstition of his race went into a rambling "exper ience" in which "black-dogs," "spirits," and other supernatural apparitions formed the controlling feature. The old man bore it with commendable patience for a time, but finally said to the applicant, IBrother, I don't want to hear all that. I want you 120 to come right down to the pint and tell how you was re- livered." This deliverance of Uncle Tom's would have hardly graded as "strict middling" in a civil service examination but it had a "get there" attribute about it that relieved in some measure its deficiencies on other lines. During my early school days the hebdomadal respite that came to me on the closing day of the week from the daily regime of the three R's was sometimes spent at the home of my uncle. Col. A. C. 'Walker. On one of these Saturday holi days his son Willie and I, rambling through the woods in search of amusement came to a large bathing house built by my uncle and turned over to Covenant Church for use as a Baptistery. In lieu of other entertainment for our boyish brains we hoisted the old time gate that held the water in con finement and let it flow away at its own sweet will in order to catch the tadpoles, who were enjoying their otium cum di- gnitate on the moss lined floor. Our sport ended, we wended our way homeward little dreaming of the mischief we had wrought. On the following day the pastor and the members met at the church for the regular monthly service. A number of candidates were to receive baptism and the congregation forming in files oi' twos marched to the music of their old-time songs down to the baptismal pool. The pastor halting the procession went forward to inspect the condition of the liquid grave and returned with a look of dismay on his homely face He had found in it a marked resemblance to Senator Black burn's mental outfit as portrayed by one of his friends. While the Senator's volatile tongue was shelling the woods before an admiring crowd a friend on its outskirts said, "Joe's brain reminds me of a piney woods pond ; it covers all creation and in only an inch deep." The pastor with the announcement, "Brethren, we are liable to dissapointments in this life. There's no water here and we'll have to appoint another day," pronounced the bene diction, while William and I tho' guiltily conscious of being accessories to the unexpected denouerrient stood by and made no sign. 121 In one of the early years following the war my old com rade and messmate gentle George Leonhardt, was for a time a guest at my father's old home and went with me to a "general meeting" service at Covenant Church. Dinner was served on the grounds, but not on the ground, temporary ta'bles having been prepared for the occasion. One of these was reserved for the sole use, benefit and behoof of the white attendants on the service and was generously laden with a tempting array of viands, but there was one dish in the menu that contributed materially to our mental as well as physical entertainment. It was a savory chicken pie baked in a tin washpan, but in justice to our hospitable hosts it is only proper to say that this was its maiden use. And now I cannot close this sketch of Covenant Church more fittingly perhaps than with the tribute paid to "Uncle Frank," its humble founder, by his master Col. A. C. Walker in "The Night Funeral of a Slave." AA'hile the cool damp earth lay fresh upon the new made grave of his trusted friend and slave the master penned for the Home Journal of Xew York the sketch from which the follow ing clipping is taken. "I have lost the best and truest friend I had in the world — one whom I have been accustomed to honor and respect since my earliest childhood. He was the playmate of my father's youth and the mentor of mine, a faithful servant, an honest man and a sincere Christian. I stood by his bed-side and with bis hands clasped in mine I heard the' last words that he uttered. They were, 'Master, meet me in Heaven.' His loss is a melancholy one to me. If I left my home I said to him. 'Frank see that all things are taken care of.' and I knew that my wife and child, property and all were as safe as if guarded by an hundred soldiers. I never spoke a harsh word to him in all my life for he never deserved it. I have a hundred others, many of them faithful and true, but his loss is irreparable." His life was lowly and his work unheralded beyond the narrow pale that hedged the humble sphere in which he lived and yet the fragrance of his kindly deeds and of his Christian faith and zeal still lingers in this modern air and will abide to 122 bless his race for all the years to come. And when within the glow and radiance of the Resurrection Day the blessed Angel's hands unclasp the Book of Gold, somewhere upon its shining pages his name will stand beside Ben Adhem's as one who loved and labored for his fellow men. SPIRIT CREEK CHURCH. While this church was not located in this immediate com munity it stood not far away and deserves some notice from the fact that it is probably the oldest colored church in Richmond County. Its original site was on the landed estate of the Twiggs family, near the stream whose name it bears, and its organization dates back more than a hundred years. Through the courtesy of my friend "Rev. Daniel McHorton, its present pastor, I have had the privilege of examining the records of this old church from 1839 to i860. They sbow that while its membership was composed entirely of slaves they paid their pastor a salary, defrayed'liis expenses to the meetings of the Association and at one time contributed nearly fifty dollars for repairs to the church building. When collections were taken each individual contribution is recorded and the amounts range all the way from a nickie or the old half dime to a dollar. The aggregate sum received from the membership is noted and the remainder is credited to "well wishars." They show further that church discipline was much more stringent than in these modern days. ^'Excommunications" were in order for offenses ranging from "impudence to her mistress" to viola tion of the seventh commandment. One of these entries cer tainly beats the record. At a regular session of the church held in September, 1839, the preceedings are noted thusly in the minutes, "Conference met and excommunicated Sister Peggy Mims for designedly drowning herself." Back in the seventies of the last century I chanced to be in Atlanta when the relations between Robert Toombs and Joseph E. Brown became so strained that Carey W. Styles bore a message from the Ex-Senator to the Ex-Governor asking if a challenge would be accepted. There was a rumor in the air 123 that Gov. Brown had withdrawn from the Baptist Church in order to meet the demands of the code duello. Discussing the matter my room mate. Col. Enoch Steadman, said to me, "There is nothing in the rumor. There are only two -ways of getting out of the Baptist Church, death or excommunication." As Sister Mims traveled both routes there could be, as a rustic friend of mine would express it, "no defalcation" about her absolute and unequivocal exclusion from all further fellowship and communion with that particular branch of the church militant. Though organized in 1800 this church has been served during its more than a century of existence by only five pas tors, Revs. Sutton, McGahee, Peter Johnson, Frank Beale and the present incumbent Rev. Daniel McHorton, who has filled its pulpit for twenty-two years, and who in addition to his pastoral labors has organized and conducted the Shiloh Or phanage with the laudable purpose of training the homeless waifs of his race into habits of industry and Christian useful ness. Soon after "freedom came out" as some of its beneficiaries are wont to term it, the church was moved from the old site to a location, near Butlers Creek though it still retains its original name. 1 2.-1 EARLY SCHOOLS. After all these years and in the absence of any official records it is difficult to determine the date at which the pioneer school building in this community was erected. The earliest documentary evidence I have been able to secure is a printed "Reward of Merit" given to my aunt Mary Eleanor Clark, by Joseph Oglethorpe in 1838. The building in which he taught stood in the rear of the site on which the Brothers ville Academy was afterward located and about four hundred yards distant. My mother attended this school and as she was married in 1837, and during her tutelage at this institution was young enough to be attended by "Aunt Emily," one of my grand mother's slaves as a chaperone, the establishment of this edu cational center must have dated back to 1830 or possibly earlier. In addition to his profession as a teacher Oglethorpe was an artist of decided merit. Mrs. M. Louise Walker has now in her possession a portrait of Col. A. C. Walker painted in his early manhood. Mrs. Anna Dickinson of Waynesboro has one of her mother and Mrs. Florida Orr of Athens one of "Aunt Betsy" Walker all painted by this old time teacher and painted well. In addition to his devotion to art and pedagogies he was at times if he has not been the victim of false tradition a generous imbiber of spiritus frumenti. A friend meeting him on one occasion said: "I understand you were drunk a few days ago." "No sir," he replied, "I was only gentlemanly befuddled." In addition to the above there was in those old days a school located between Brothersville and Bath near the Sapp ¦place afterwards owned by Robert H. Evans, taught by one Biglow, a Northern man, and including among its pupils W. L., and J. H. Kilpatrick, Henry Sapp, Henry Hines and R. H. P. Day. There was also the Millwood Boarding School near the present site of Hancock's Mill, where the teacher furnished not only scholastic instructions but bed and board as well. My friend L. L. Winter, whose father attended this school, in- 125 forms me that Air. Alillwood suffered from a dyspeptic ailment and that it was his custom to compel his boarding pupils to leave the table as soon as bis own impaired appetite was satisfied, ^^'hether this policy was due to a fatherly regard for their health or financial concern for his monthly grocery bill, this scribe it not prepared to say. MOUNT ENO'N ACADEMY. In the earl}' dawn of the 19th century a number of wealthy rice planters on the Georgia coast selected an elevated site in this county not far away from Richmond Bath and made of it a Summer resort for their families. On account of its altitude it was given the name of Alount Enon. In 1805 the Baptist denomination in Georgia decided to establish a college at this place and application for a charter was made to the Gerijeral Assembly under the title of "Alount Enon College." The State University then known as Franklin College had opened its doors at Athens in 1801 and the Legislature fearing that the new institution would draw from its patronage declined to grant the charter. It was then incorporated as the Alount Enon Academy and began its work in 1807 with Dr. Charles C. Screven as its teacher. Some years later William W. Holt, afterwards Judge of the Augusta circuit, succeeded him or taught with him until he began the study of law in Hon. Free man \A'alker's office. Dr. Henry Holcomb of Savannah, one of the school's most active promoters, removed to Philadelphia some years after the incorporation of the Academy and the loss of his influence and support, combined probably with the establishment of the Bath School brought about its decline and final suspension. Among the later residents of Mount Enon were Dr. Baldwin B. Aliller. William Evans, later of Brothers ville, Geo. W. Evans later of Augusta, William Sturgess and Simeon 'Garlick of AVaynesboro. In 1837 Mrs. Sturgess, mother of William and John R., kept a hotel or boarding house there and J. Aladison Reynolds and family were numbered among her boarders. Some time after the war Dr. Miller moved his Mount Enon residence to Hephzibah. It was probably the 126 "Last of the Mohicans," and today the brick from some of its old chimneys are the only remnants left to mark the site of this ancient educational center while for fifty years or more it has been numbered among the "Dead Towns of Georgia." The writer's connection with the Brothersville Academy was antedated by his attendance upon two smaller schools. In 1848 Miss Amarintha Rheney taught in a building lo cated near my father's home and occupied for a time as a dwelling by the Dowdy family and later by an old man known as Billy Pierce. In 1849 rny father built an Academy on his own land and engaged the services of Thomas Pearce Sims as teacher. He was succeeded in 1850 by Deborah Curtis. These two universities in embryo furnish inspiration for the following tribute to THE OLD FIELD SCHOOL. Sixty years ago in the unceiled, unpainted and largely un furnished room of an old field school, holding a blue backed speller in my boyish hand I sat with a row of barefoot urchins on a plain pine bench and watched with sleepy eyes the mellow sunshine creeping all too slowly towards the 12 o'clock imark cut by the teacher into the schoolroom floor. This primitive time piece that marked the boundary line between school hours and the midday intermission, known in that day as "playtime," was never patented, although it had the happy faculty of never running down and never needing repairs. To the student of today, reveling in the luxuriant appointments of the present public school system, there may come sometimes a touch of pity for the simple methods and the meager equipment of the old field school, whose teachers, in addition to the inconven ience of having to "board around," were forced sometimes to accept partial compensation for their work in home-made "socks." Such of my readers as may be disposed to question the free and unlimited knitting of socks as a circulating medium for the payment of school salaries in those days, are respectfully referred to my old friend, W. J. Steed, now tax receiver at Augusta, Ga., for the historical accuracy of this statement. 127 And yet — and yet, minimize as we may the limited ad vantages of those old days in the '40s, and magnify as we do the wondrous advance in educational method and appliance in every grade from the kindergarten to the university, the fact remains that "there were giants in those days" who seem to have no successors. I do not know that every institution to which the above title was applied had a veritable old field as one of its necessary adjuncts, but I do know that the special school referred to and in which the writer began, with faltering step, to climb the hill of knowledge, had the good or bad fortune to be so endowed. The building, measuring perhaps eighteen by twenty feet, stood by a running brook, and was furnished with a sufficient number of plain pine benches to supply seating capacity for the pupils who worshipped educationally at its altars. There were no desks, no blackboards, no globes, and in the line of proper school furnishing a son of Erin would have said there was no nothing, and very little of that. The writer's own equipment for the tasks assigneed him consisted of a blue- backed speller and an unfortunate tendency to go to sleep in the intervals between recitations. There was a little brown-eyed girl, whose educational ad vancement about equaled my own, and she and I formed one of the grades in the school, if grades there were. We were in the a-b, ab ; e-b, eb, period, and I doubt if our progress during the six months session enabled us to read with any degree of facility, "She fed the old hen," "The old hen was fed by her," and other similar interesting stories written by Mr. Webster for the improvement of the primary pupils of that day. As limited as was our advancement, I recall the fact, how ever, that we found the pictures that adorned the closing pages of the book and with the pigment furnished by the wild flowers growing near the school grounds we took our first lessons in art by painting the boy in the apple tree and the milk-maid as she soliloquized on the prospective purchase of her new silk gown. Our teacher was known to us as "Miss Amarinthy," and like all teachers of that day, she was an orthodox believer in 128 the strenuous life. I remember that in consequence of various misdemeanors, whose specific character I do not now recall, she was accustomed at times to take me on her knee and ad minister an old-fashioned spanking, subjecting me on other oc casions to sundry other experiences of a punitive character which were doubtless effective mental tonics and moral anti septics, but not specially conducive to my physical comfort. If my information is correct, she still lives, and if these lines should meet her aged eyes, it gives me pleasure to assure her even at this late day of my gratitude for her earnest efforts to guide my errant feet aright. Some months ago, while spending a day at the old home stead, I took advantage of the opportunity to revisit the site of this old school. Not a vestige of the old building remained to tell the tale. The same skies bent over it, the same stream let rippled along its sandy bed to its far-away ocean home, the soil my boyish feet had pressed, the giant oaks under whose cooling shadows I had played, the old box spring, whose limpid waters had quenched my childish thirst, were there, 'but the schoolmates of those far-gone days — where were they? Roam ing over those old grounds with a flood of tender memories tugging at my heart, I could recall but a single face among them all, that had not in the passing years paled under the touch of the "old, old fashion death." Amid the bloom and freshness of life's morning hour or in the strength of midday womanhood and manhood, or in the gathering twilight of its eventide, "God's finger touched them and they slept." To those of us for whom a kindly providence has length ened out our span of life, these retrospects will always bring a touch of sadness, for as the friends who bore us company in other years drop by the wayside, our sunset years grow lonelier as we near the end.- But this was not the only old field school that taught my young ideas how to shoot, nor was the passage of the Potomac by McDowell's army the first invasion of the South by our Northern neighbors. In the days of which I write there had 129 been a large influx into this section of a class known as "Yan kee School Marms." This invasion was due, perhaps, less to a lack of competent material in the South than to the fact that Southern ladies, as a rule, did not feel the necessity for sup plementing their incomes in this way. In addition to this, there was possibly a feeling of pride, which made them re luctant to accept positions which would in some measure lower their social rank. This feeling, false though it may have been, was largely the outcome of the special deference paid to wo man in the old South, a deference amounting almost to rever ence, that raised the fairer sex to a pedestal above the plane of toil, and in degree has found no parallel in any other age or race. In this era of commercialism and the new woman the pendulum has swung perhaps too far the other way, and the throne where once she reigned as queen ihas given place to a sphere of ill-required labor. The first of these invaders with whom the writer came in educational contact was a Miss Deborah C, hailing, as I re member, from some point not far below the Canadian line. She was tall and angular, with a face that seemeed to have im bibed some of the hardness and bleakness of the New England clime from which she came. If she had descended from her ancient Jewish namesake, she had certainly inherited more of the martial than the poetic characteristics of that old-time con queror of the Cannanitish Sisera. The building used by Miss Deborah had been erected by my father, had acquired in some way the euphonious title of "Lick Skillet." For the frequency with which seasoned hickories were brought into play for the enforcement of school discipline, "Lick Scholar" would have probably been a more appropriate designation. In lieu of the clock with which acad emies are now supplied, marks were cut into the school room floor and the sun in his daily round marked the hours for morn ing and afternoon, recess and for the midday intermission. In place of the school bell which now summons the pupils to their daily tasks, the teacher stood in the doorway and shouted to the scattered children, "Come into books." Among other educational advantages of those old days, I recall the further 130 fact that no kindergarten enabled the mother to clean up the house while the little tots were cared for by the teacher, there was no football or baseball nine to aid in solving the mysteries of Euclid, no "Ponies" to divide all Gaul into three parts, and last, but not least, there was in all our vocabulary no such word as "Nit." And yet despite the meager equipment of only rustic benches and unrusting hickories, despite the 'handicap of prim itive text-book and primitive methods in its use, the old field schools laid the broad foundation for moral and mental power that ruled the government for more than half a cenutry and made the South, in culture and in courtesy, in honor and in honesty, in virtue and in valor, to bud and blossom as a rose. OLD ACADEMY LIFE. The educational advantages of the Old South were not confined exclusively to the privileges furnished by the old field school. While, fortunately or unfortunately, the present public school system was not then in existence in the South, this section was dotted with academies manned by its best teaching talent. Aside from the Richmond Academy, in Au gusta, whose organization runs back almost into ancient history there was as early as the thirties of the last century a school ol high grade at Bath, in this county, presided over by Rev. Otis Smith. Some estimate of the character of the instruction given at this school may be formed from the record made by its pu pils in after years. Among them was Herschel V. Johnson, who served three terms as Judge of the Superior Court, two terms as Governor of Georgia, an unejipired term as United States Senator, one term as Confederate States Senator, and who was a candidate for vice president of the United States on the Douglas ticket in i860. There was also Gen. W, H, T. Walker, vvho served with distinction in three wars, and fell gallantly leading his division in the battle of Atlanta in 1864. Numbered among the pupils was also Col, Alexander C. Walker, of Richmond County, who was deemed worthy to wear the mantle of Alexander H. Stephens on the retirement 131 of Mr. Stephens from long continuous service as Representa tive of the old Eighth Congressional District, and who de clined the honor. There was also Hon. Isaiah Irvin, a dis tinguished lawyer of Washington, Ga., who received the nom ination after Colonel Walker's failure to accept, and who also declined because he was not the first choice of the convention. In writing of the differences that exist betweeen those old days and the present, it is perhaps hardly necessary to suggest that the precedent set by these able gentlemen, either one of whem would have worn worthily the honor conferred, and the dif ficulty encountered by this convention in securing a nominee, find rare duplicates among congressional timber in the present day. In illustration of the methods of discipline in use in those days I have heard Colonel Walker say that when the exercises of the school grew dull, it was Air. Smith's custom to call up the late Rev. E. R. Carswell, of Hephzibah, Ga., and thrash him simply to vary the monotony of the session. This habit of Mr. Smith recalls a similar custom in vogue at the Richmond Academy in the earlier decades of the last century, when Wil liam T. Brantley held the reins of that institution. On one occasion Air. Brantley was forced to absent himself from the morning session and installed one of the larger pupils as pre ceptor pro tem. "V\^hen the recitations were ended and the hour for noonday intermission arrived the acting teacher said, "School is now dis — No^ hold on ; I forgot ; I. P. Garvin hasn't been whipped yet. Come up, Ignatius, and take your daily thrashing." The Doctor, in embryo, advanced and took his punishmeent and the session ended. For the authenticity of fhis special feature of the Richmond Academy curriculum my late friend Dr. D. B. Plumb is sponsor, the account given having been received by him from the late Dr. I. P. Gar-vin, who occupied the leading role in this educational drama. Besides the institutions named there was the old iBrothers- ^ ille Academy, built by Mr. James Anderson, one of the origi nal brothers for -wbom this rustic village was named, and presided over during my boyhood by such efficient teachers as Rev. W. L. Kilpatrick, Mr. Thomas H. Holleyman, Rev. 133 James T. Lin, Judge Heman H. Perry, and Rev. Josiah Lewis, Jr. To this academy the writer was promoted after three years' instruction in old field schools. The most vivid recol lection I have retained of my first year's tutelage at this school IS the savage pinch my teacher, Miss Parsons, gave one of my boyish ears for my failure to comprehend the mysteries of long division. Her attack upon that particular organ was probably due to its rather abnormal prominence as a feature of my physiogomy. I recall the further fact that under her super vision I began the study of Primary Geography. There were only two in the class, and I found no difficulty, therefore, in standing at least next to "head." I remember further that my classmate and myself were both averse to undergoing any un necessary mental strain, and to prevent the possibility of over taxing our youthful intellects, we prepared ourselves only on the questions that in the natural order of recitation would fall to each of us to answer. We did not deem it necessary to take our teacher into our confidence in making this arrangement, which worked very smoothly so long as correct answers were given, but very unsatisfactorily when a slip in the mental cogs threw the machinery entirely out of gear. School sessions in that day began at 8 a. m., and ended at 5 or 6 p. m., with a morning, midday and afternoon recess. Pupils whose homes were not located very near the academy belonged to the tin bucket brigade, their midday meals being carried in that con venient, but hardly aesthetic, receptacle. These lunches al ways embraced a bottle of molasses, and this saccharine addi tion to our meals was utilized by being poured into the in verted bucket top, or into finger holes punched into the sides of the biscuits, and these doctored products of the old-time oven were eaten with a relish that a swell luncheon at the Bon Air would not bring to me now. The text books used were selected by the teacher for their supposed fitness to meet the wants of the, pupil undisturbed by the competition of rival publishing houses or the com parative hustling ability of their respective agents. Webster's Spelling Book, The New York Reader, Mitchell's Geography, Smith's Grammar, Davies' Arithmetic and Algebra, Com- 133 stock's Natural Philosophy, and Bullion's Latin Grammar and Reader were the standards. The schools were ungraded, and the teacher had to contend with every degree of advancement, from an A. B. C. tot to the student preparing for the Junior Class at college. Despite this disadvantage, and despite the wonderful improvement in text book and school method since that day, I can recall pupils of that old time, who at twelve years of age were studying Greek and reading seventy-five lines in Virgil's "Aeneid" daily, without the aid of the teacher, or the proverbial "pony." And yet despite this apparent pre- cociousness, the students of that day did not know it all, as the following incidents will show. It was in the early 50's, and the class in Natural Philisiphy at the Brothersville Academy had been called to the recitation bench by the teacher. Rev. W. L. Kilpatrick. The hydrostatic paradox was the subject of the lesson for the day. The teacher, turning to the pupil who sat at the head of the class, and who cbanced to be, as I recall it. Miss Moselle Carswell, afterwards Mrs. W. A. Wilkins, of Waynesboro, Ga., said, "What is a paradox?" In reply she began to quote the qpening sentence of the lesson. "No," said he, "I want to know what a paradox is outside its hydrostatic association," and she was silent. The question was passed to the next pupil with similar results. My brother was sitting at the other end of the bench and as the inquiry came down the line he began to move restlessly in his seat, fearing that the question would be answered correctly before he had an op portunity of showing off his superior knowledge. His appre hensions were groundless, however, and the teacher finally said : "Well, Edward, can you give us the definition of a paradox?" "Yes, sir," said my brother very confidently, "it's what you sing after preaching." The teacher's ministerial labors had presumably familiarized him with the usual methods of closing a religious service, but this was probably his first personal contact with a "hydrostatic doxology." Friday afternoons were devoted to declamation and the reading of original compositions by the pupils. During Mr. Thomas H. Holleyman's administration at this academy in 1854, my old schoolmate, Jasper D , had selected Catiline's 134 oration before the Roman Senate as the medium through which to give vent to his embryonic oratorical powers. After its rendition Mr. Holleyman said : "Jasper, do you know who Catiline was?" "Yes, sir," was the prompt reply. Well, who was he?" asked the teacher. "Well, sir, I knew him, but I — I can't say that I was personally acquainted with him." And Mr. Holleyman proceeded to give him a dose of Ro man history. * * * * These reminiscences of' the old Brothersville Academy re call an old schoolmate of those far-away days, whose girlish charms furnished for years the inspiration for my every boy ish endeavor. She is a dignified matron now, and handsome still, but our paths in life have drifted far apart, and I think of her only as the bright-eyed lass, whose winsome grace made always sunshine in a shady place. I was an awkward, timid boy, and the wealth of silent adoration that I laid daily at her unconscious feet would have furnished many a novel with a a supply of the tender passion. From morn till dewy eve I looked forward with beating heart to the large spelling class that closed each day's exercises, for with it came the coveted opportunity of "turning down" every pupil that stood below her in the class, and of standing by her side for the remainder of the recitation. If she missed a word I spelled it and kept my place. The turning down process had ended. There were other occasions when her applications to the teacher for aid in solving some arithmetical problem would meet with the re sponse: "Get Walter Clark to show you, I haven't time now," and she would come daintily and trippingly to take her seat beside me, and I would bend low over the old-fashioned slate, for tablets were unknown then, and she would bend beside me until our cheeks were almost in touch, and I would solve the problem slowly, very slowly, to lengthen out the time, for while it lasted I was in paradise. In those old days I thought she had the brightest, tenderest eyes and the fairest, pinkest cheeks and the softest, kissiest lips that maiden ever owned, and the dainty aprons that gowned her girlish form were, as I thought, so snowy in their whiteness that no fuller on earth 135 could white them. But, alas! my gallantry in the spelling class and my willing contributions to her stock of mathematical knowledge were all, as the reader may have suspected, "Love's Labor Lost." His appreciation of the fact may, however, be emphasized by the recital of an incident which, though occur ring nearly fifty years ago, comes back as freshly to me today as if it were one of yesterday's happenings. Pink teas and such like social functiofis were not much in vogue in that day, but "parties," with less elaborate paraphernalia and possibly more real enjoyment, were very much in- evidence. At one of these entertainments she gave me an old-fashioned kiss verse, saying it was a reply to one received from me. I had neither given nor sent one to her, but hoping that it contained some evidence of her appreciation I made no sign and held my peace. Open ing the precious paper I read as follows : "You must have dined on razors. You seem so very keen. And were you not so big a fool I'd ask you what you mean." While this verse may be lacking in artistic finish and bears no marked internal evidence of the divine afflatus, its effect upon my budding affection may be inferred from the fact that I am able to quote it verbatim et literatim et punctua- tim after all these years. Among the educators whose teaching service gained for them an enviable reputation in this section during the writer's boyhood was Columbus C. Richards, who taught at Wrights- boro in Columbia, Thomson in McDuffie, and Summerville in Emanuel county. During his long and successful record as a teacher he became especially famous for "breaking in" boys who were not amenable to ordinary methods of school discip line. A friend who attended one of these schools once gave me an item in his experience which, while not educational in char acter, nay not be unworthy of record in these memories. Mania a potu, or delirium tremens or "the monkeys," as it was known to the unprofessional mind, was probably a more com- 136 mon ailment in those days than it is now. Whether this fact is due to a difference in the quality of the spiritus frumenti consumed or to a diminition in individual potations, the writer is not prepared to say. The story as told me by my friend was as follows : A gentleman living near Mr. Richards' school had been imbibing too heavily and continuously, and an attack of this disease supervened. As professional nurses were then practically unknown, the neighbors were accustomed to take upon themselves this duty, and my friend volunteered his services in that capacity. During the night the patient placed on exhibition for the benefit of his attendant audience the usual menagerie of monkeys and snakes, visible only to his demented vision, but before the morning dawned his brain gave birth to the following original couplet of verse : "On the wings of love I fly From grocer-ree to grocer-rye" AVhether this poetical effusion was intended to aid the physician in reaching a correct diagnosis, or whether he simply sang in numbers for the numbers came, the records do not show. SCHOOL SPORTS. While the athletic feature on the school ground was not so fully developed in the old days, yet school boys did not lack for games or sports. The morning and afternoon recess and the mid-day intermission were occupied with knucks, ring marbles, base, bull pen, cat, townball and shinny, or shinty, as the old Scotch game was known. The present game of base ball was evidently evoluted from old-time townball and foot ball, though manipulated with the hand instead of the old- fashioned stick with a curved end is a possible development from shinny. These old games had some advantages over their modern successors in the fact that while they furnished health ful exercise for our youthful muscles, there were no fatalities to report at the close of the game, and no umpires to en courage by their decisions a resort to lynch law. Solid rubber 137 balls were used, while a three or four-inch paddle with the handle trimmed to proper shape and size with a pocket knife, took the place of the modern bat. iBishop George F. Pierce once related in the writer's presence, an incident which in dicates that even in his maturer years he had not outgrown his taste for townball. Passing a crowd of school boys engaged In the game, he decided to take a hand at the bat. He was walk ing with a hickory cane that had been used by his grandfather, and had been owned by the family for a hundred years. Using the stick instead of the paddle he knocked the ball so far that it was never found and his family relic was laid up for repairs. During the writer's college course at Oxford, the faculty not according to the athletic fad the honored place it now holds in educational circles, issued a stringent order that no sports should be- indulged in around the college building. Judge Frank L. Little,, of Sparta, then a senior, reaching the college one morning in advance of the recitation hour, and finding that none of the faculty were in sight, decided to utilize the opportunity to beat the record as a jumper. While en gaged in the pastime. Prof. Luther M. Smith came upon the scene unexpectedly arid caught Frank in flagrante delicto. The latter began at once to excuse himself upon the plea that his physical system needed the exercise. "Oh, yes," said the professor, "Even the Bible tells us that 'bodily exercise profit- teth Little.' " WAYNIE, WIDDIE, WICKIE. All progress is not improvement and in noting the changes that have taken place on educational lines in the past half century, there is one which fails to commend itself to the writer's judgment as belonging to the improvement class. While this is true the following protest is made more, possibly, for the satisfaction of having my say in the matter than from any hope of securing a reversal of the verdict through the medium of a new trial. More than fifty years ago the writer began the study of the Latin tongue in the old Brothersville Academy under the tutelage of Mr. Thomas H. Holleyman of precious memory. 138 Through the Commentaries of Caesar, the Aeneid of Virgil, the Odes of Horace, the Satires of Juvenal, etc., my youthful fancy wandered with a glowing reverence for these old time worthies who had opened to my verdant mind the beauties of the ancient classics. Amid the prosy duties of a busy life my memory had retained but little in a literary way of "The grandeur that was Greece And the glory that was Rome." And yet I had not entirely lost my admiration for the pithy terseness of Caesar, the flowing measure of Virgil and the stately periods of Cicero until the dictum of modern scholar ship burst the bubble and left me only the sad conviction that I had been the victim of misplaced confidence. For nearly fifty years I have cherished the fond delusion that as in schoolboy days I tripped with nimble tongue through "Hie, haec, hoc," "bonus, bona, bonum," "Jusjurandum, juris, jurandi," etc. I was strictly up-to-date, but now alas, these latter day literary saints with their "hie, hike, hoke," "bonooce, bonar, bonoom," "yoose, yurandoom, yureese, yurandee," have laid my little hard won knowledge away on the shelf as a back number and I am no longer in it. For all these years I had rested with implicit faith in the conviction that the Commentaries on the Gallic war were written by Julius Caesar, but these modern educational lumi naries inform me that they were penned by Yulioose Kiser, a possible ancestor of the Kiser family in Atlanta. I had since boyhood admired the epigrammatic alliteration of the brave old Roman's "Veni, vidi, vici," but alas ! that famous Caesarean message will now go ringing down the centuries as "Waynie, widdie, wickie." I had been taught that the story of the Wandering Aeneas was sung by Publius Virgilius Maro, "Wielder of the stateliest measure Moulded by the lips of man," but now I am told that the author of this famous epic was christened as Pooblioose Wergilioose Mahro. 139 I had believed for all these years that the Philippics against Catiline arid Verres and Anthony were delivered by Marcus Tullius Cicero, but I am now confronted with the fact that these masterly orations emananted from the brain of Markoose, Toolioose Kickero. Even the old Latin adage, "omnia labor vincit," that has inspired so many weary toilers in the world's broad field of battle, will henceforth stir their flagging zeal as "ome-nia labor win-kit," while the time- honored chair where old "verbum sat," will now be warmed for all the coming years by his successor young "werboom," I had been puzzling my brain to find some plausible ex planation for the fact that time and labor are spent in teaching the student of today the obsolete pronunciation of a language that is not only dead, but buried beyond the hope of a possible resurrection, and had been tempted to ask with becoming modesty "cui bono?" Opening an English lexicon at random today a possible solution of the question was presented. By actual count, nearly 50 per cent, of the words, on the page ex amined, were derived from the Latin tongue. As Sam Jones would say, "One of the most principalest" benefits arising from a study of the classics is the knowledge furnished the student of the derivative signification of the thousands of English words based upon these dead languages. A few illus trations will convince the reader of the happy influence of the present system, in accomplishing this result. Take the word "civil" for instance. No student with a reasonable amount of grey matter in his brain would of course dream that it was derived from the Latin word "civilis," but change the latter to its present reading, as "kee-wee-leese," and the fact would occur to him instanter, if not sooner. Again,, it would be unnatural to derive the word "ceiling" from "coehim," but as under the revised version the latter becomes "koyloom," the derivation would be as plain as the nose on your face even if that item in your physiognomy chanced to be of the Roman type. In like manner the words "cede" and "joke" and "vision" and "circumvent" would probably never be suggested by the simple forms of "cedo" and "jocus" and "visum" and "circum- venio," but transform the latter into their proper shape as 140 "kaydo," "vokoose," "weesoom," and "kurkoomwaneo" and the result would be as easy as falling from a log. But I will not weary the reader with these examples. Those given will suffice to convince him of the beauty and benefit of the revised system. And now in conclusion I have only to add that the frequent stumbles I have made in my efforts to renew my acquaintance with the Latin tongue under its present environment recall the soliloquy of an inebriated individual, who unable to retain a perpendicular position gave vent to his feelings in the following impromptu parody : "Leaves have their time to fall and so have I, But the difference 'twixt the leaves and I, I fall more harder and more frequent-lye." It gives me a touch of sadness to feel that though my life has reached the season of its sere and yellow leaf, yet through all these years I never knew 'twas "Kick-e-ro" Nor ""Werg-ils" liquid song I've learned but little here below And learned that little wrong. From records left by my father I find in addition to the list of teachers already given for the Brothersville Academy, that Daniel Mahoney taught there in 1845, Dr. James Mann in 1846, Samuel Phelps in 1847 and '48, Packard probably in 1849 and Miss Mary Jane Parsons in 1850 and '51. BROTHERSVILLE, A LOST ARCADIA. The rural village, in which the writer was reared, if village it could be called, was a typical old-time Southern community. In one of the earlier decades of the last century, on an ele vated plateau covered with oak and resinous long-leaf pine and located in the central southern section of Richmond 141 county, three brothers, James, Augustus and Elisha Anderson, made their homes. These residences formed the points of a practically equilateral triangle, and near one of its sides lay then and lies today the old homestead where the writer on a spring day in the early forties made his debut into what a colored brother has termed "the toil and trouble and tossifica- tion of life." Or if it be true, as Rev. S. K. Talmage, uncle of the late Rev. T. DeWitt, has said, that "the first feeble pulsation in the infant's sinews is but the drum beat of an eternal march," then the locality I have named witnessed the initial notes made by the writer at the beginning of his personal participation in the aforesaid march. Of those very early days I have no very definite or distinct recollection, but it is prob ably safe to assume that I did not cut any very remarkable figure as I was unable at that time to cut anything but my teeth. The healthfulness of the location, with its pine-laden air and its freedom from malarial influences, attracted a number of Burke county planters, who built comfortable residences near the homes of these three brothers, and in time the com munity had not only a local habitation, but the name of Brothersville, given it in honor of its original settlers. I do not know that it resembled our national capitol in rnany respects, but there was certainly one well defined point of likeness in the fact that our rustic community was a village of "magnificent distances." Streets were a luxury in which it did not indulge, the site of its residences being selected to please the individual taste of the owner and facing every point of the compass, while the intervening spaces were covered with original forest growth, save the carriage-ways that formed a means of communication between its homes. And yet despite this seeming irregularity in physical con struction, iBrothersville had some very pleasant characteristics to its credit. Its citizens were well-to-do planters owning among the fertile lands of the adjoining county well kept plantations from whose fruitful soil under the tillage of hun dreds of dusky laborers, comfortable incomes were derived. Relieved in large measure of the personal care of these landed 14a estates by the services of trained "overseers" these old-time Southern gentlemen had ample leisure for reading, for travel and for the cultivation of the social virtues. Every household had its family carriage and coachman ready for service in the periodical visit to the city, to the weekly or monthly church service and in the constant and pleasant interchange of neigh borly courtesies. Every kitchen was brightened by the shining face of an old-time "mammy," whose skillful hands had been trained from girlhood in all the mysteries of the culinary art and were blissfully ignorant of the modern housewife's con stant bete noir, the "service pan." No cold and rainy morning brought to the mistress of the home the apprehension that on completion of her toilet she would find the kitchen fireless, the breakfast table minus its accustomed menu and the cook off on a colored excursion or taking a perm'anent vacation, without the formality of verbal or written notice. The whole range of domestic service from the dignified coachman with his silk hat and "broadcloth" suit, on through the varying, grades of cook, laundress, seamstress, housemaid, nurse and down to the little black imp who brought to the "Big House" the barnyard keys at nightfall, was as perfect as training could make it and was rarely changed in its personnel save by death or the disabilities of old age. Under the favoring conditions of practical freedom from business and domestic cares the social life of the community was at its best. In a shaded cove within the village limits Mr. Alex. Murphey, grandfather of the present clever and genial post master at Hephzibah, had built for the public benefit what would now be called a natatorium, but was then only a "bathing house." Near it was erected a comfortable pavilion and the site furnished a pleasant and convenient pic nic ground for the community. During the summer months the citizens would alternate at brief intervals in supplying on these grounds picnic dinners with barbecued trimmings, to which the entire village was invited. Artificial ice was then unknown, but for the 24 hours preceding 'these social occasions the cool limpid water from a nearby "spring house" had trickled over the choicest products of Mr. Murphey's melon 143 patch. It may be that the distance of years as well as space lends enchantment to the view, but no melons of the present day seem to have the flavor and the fragrance of the crimson hearted fruit that lay cooling during a summer day and night in that old spring house under the hill. They have sung of "the Old Oaken Bucket" And its waters so clear and chill. But today I sing of the old box spring. That rippled and sang with its cooling flow On the emerald rind and the crimson glow Of the mammoth melons of long ago. In the spring house under the hill. Whatever estimate may be placed on the lines above, the reader is asked to remember that they were written in "the good old summer time" and are in no wise intended as a con tribution to the world's surplus supply of "spring poetry." In the early history of the village Mr. James Anderson had built on his own land at his own expense a neat and commo dious academy to supply the educational needs of the com munity. Under able management it won justly a wide reputa tion as an educational center of high grade dra-wing large pat ronage not only from the immediate section but from the ad jacent counties as well. The interest felt by the citizens of our village in these matters is evidenced by the fact that the boys and girls within its limits had not only the benefits of this excellent school, but a majority of them received higher educa tion at colleges or universities. A mile or two away from the undefined limits of the village there was a little log church built in the early days of Georgia Methodism and known in the writer's boyhood by the rather contradictory title of "Old New Hope." Its altars had been blessed by the labors of George F. Pierce, James Danelly, Wil liam Peurifoy, John P. Duncan, Josiah Lewis, Nicholas ATur- phey and other worthies of those old days, and the grace that permeated its hewn-log walls had provided during the early life of the village for the moral and spiritual wants of its people. 144 BROTHERSVILLE METHODIST CHURCH, Erected 1853- ' '?l!:|f f'lf life i '-JT HT K -' H. -t,* vjb» OLD HOME OF DR. SAMUEL B. CLARK, Built in 1848. In the course of time a handsome church was erected near the Brothersville Academy, was dedicated by Bishop Pierce in '54 and has been served since that day by a long line of faithful and Godly men. Lying midway between the Georgia and Central Railroads and more than half a score of miles from either, our little village was kept in partial touch with the outer world by a semi-weekly mail delivered on Wednesday and Saturday after noons. On these occasions the village post office was the cen ter of attraction and the community turned out en masse to do it honor. Nestled away in rural seclusion, "far from the maddening crowd's ignoble strife" and yet keeping open house to all who came, whether friend or stranger,they lived and loved, married and intermarried, served their generation by the will of God and when the evening s'hadows had fallen were laid unto their fathers. I can not believe that in all this broad land there was a better or a happier people. True to its name Brothersville was a village if not a city of brotherly love. More than thirty years of the writer's life were spent within its limits and yet he can not recall a single personal estrangement among its citizens. Peaceable and social, moral and intelligent, generous and hospitable, with no petty jealousies nor personal bickerings to mar the quiet of its rural life, it seemed to me then, and as I look back over the waste of years, it seems to me now to have been almost an ideal life. An honored minister, who served as pastor in the community, once said that it came nearer to his conception of what heaven will be than any community he had ever known. Dear old Brothersville, as I write of it today the glamour of its charming old-time life comes back to me like the echo of "faint fairy footfalls down blossoming ways." And now who were the residents of this old time Arcadia? There were fifteen homes, that lay within its undefined limits. Taking them alphabetically there come first on the list, 145 THE ANDERSON BROTHERS. James, Elisha, Jr., and Augustus, sons of Elisha Anderson, Sr., and from whom the community took its name, have al ready been given notice in these records genealogically and otherwise. Of EHsha, Jr. I have no personal recollection as he died before my memory began to serve me. James and Augus tus H. I recall as dignified, portly men, the latter suggesting in form at least the hero of Pickwick Papers. The residence now owned by E. E. Cadle was built by Col. E. B. Gresham and stands near the site of the original home of Elisha Jr. The James Anderson home was sold after the wrar to Dr. B. E. Fryer, then to Dr. Henry iGarrett and later to W. G. Weathers- bee, who still owns the site, the dwelling having been burned two years ago. The home of Augustus H., builded eighty years ago or more, still stands and is owned and occupied by W. P. Hudson. The following incident occurred at the Winter home of Col. Anderson in the later 30s of the last century and while not strictly a Brothersville reminiscence may still be worthy of record. Reference has been made to the marriage of Virginia, youngest daughter of Elisha Anderson Sr., to Dr. Edward Hughes and to the latter's early death. During her widowhood she was an inmate in the home of her brother, Augustus H. While there her hand was won again by Col. A. C. Walker. The date for their marriage was fixed, friends from far and near were invited and arrangements were made to give them an elaborate wedding. On the morning of the appointed day Col. Walker rode over to the home of Col. Anderson and called for the bride to be. When sbe appeared he said, "Virginia I don't propose to be married before all that crowd tonight. I understand that the preacher is here, call him in and we'll get through with it now." She protested against such a course, but he was insistent and her consent was finally gained. The minister was summoned, the family gathered in the parlor, the solemn words were spoken and Col. Walker and the handsome widow were made man and wife. When the ceremony was ended, the groom mounted his horse and taking his gun and dogs spent the day in hunting, return- 146 THE JAMES ANDERSON HOME. ing at night fall to witness the discomfiture of the guests, who were forced to enjoy the marriage feast without the fragrance of orange blossoms or the rhythmical jingle of wedding bells. After the death of Col. Anderson his iBrothersville home was occupied by his namesake, nephew and son-in-law, Augus tus H., Jr., and for a time in i860 by Col. Charles E. Nesbit, son of Judge Eugenius A. Nesbit of Macon. In 1859 the late Judge Herman H. Perry was teaching at the Brothersville Academy and was boarding at the Anderson home. James Gardner editor of the Augusta Constitutionalist was publish ing also a literary journal known as the "Field and Fireside." In one of its weekly issues there appeared a poem of marked merit sent to the journal as original stuff by an Alabama con tributor. When Mrs. Susan Anderson, wife of Augustus H., Jr., had read it she turned to Heman Perry and said, "That poem was written by George D. Prentice years ago. I wish you would advise Mr. Gardner of the imposition." This was done and after making apology for the oversight the two poems were published in parallel columns. They differed only in the transposition of a single word in a single line, which failed to mar either the rhythm or the sense. And yet this Alabama genius came back with the claim that it was his own production and their apparent identity was simply evidence of a remarkable literary coincidence. His contention carried with it to the journal's readers only the conviction that his cre dentials justly entitled him to instant and unanimous admis sion as a "free and accepted" member of the leading "Ananias Club" of that old day. 147 WILLIAM E. BARNES. Of this old-time resident of Brothersville I have no per sonal recollection as he left the community during my early boyhood. In the early '40s of the last century he built the residence on what has been known in later years as the Schaff ner Place, occupied it for a time and sold it to Robert A. Reynolds. Later it became the property of Dr. J. F. Schaffner formerly of Charleston and who had married my old school mate Alary Dillard. William E. was the son of John A. and brother of Hon. George T. Barnes of Augusta. He married Eliza, daughter of Seaborn and Margaret Jones and sister of the late Jno. J. Jones of AVaynesboro, where a son by this marriage John A, is now living. A later marriage brought to him three sons, Harry V., Geo. T. and Albert L., who now reside in or near Augusta. William E. served in the Confed erate army and died in a military hospital at Sumter, S. C. After the death of Dr. Sdhaffner his widow and younger son Clarence made their home in Cincinnati while the elder, Fred L., played in some measure at least, the role of a cosmo politan. During their absence the old home was burned, but in the recent past my young and versatile friend, Fred, after years of errant absence has returned to the old homestead — has erected Phoenix like from its ashes a modest castle of artificial stone, which he says with pardonable emphasis will be only in its prime a hundred years from now. And now within the cosy bachelor walls of "Greystone," unawed and unsubdued by the charms of the female face divine he serves as his own chef de cuisine and furnishes gastronomic entertainment to his Augusta guests in the tempting form of barbacued opos- som, roasted and toasted and salted and peppered and vine- gared by his own practiced and expert hands. At least such is the story gi^'en me by my friend Tennent Houston, and Tennent like Brutus is an honorable man. 148 JUDGE JOHN W. CARSWELL. I have written it "Judge" for the reason that his long and honorable association with Joseph A. Shewmake, William W. Hughes, Jerry Inman and others as members of the old Infe rior Court Bench in Burke County conferred upon him the title that he wore gracefully, ably and justly until his death. He was one of my father's nearest neighbors and probably his most intimate friend in the community. They were bound to gether by ties of blood, constant association as official mem bers of the same church and by an abiding friendship that I cannot believe was ended even by death for I feel assured that it has found a happy renewal in the unknown land. His genial temperament, broad information and full equipment of common or possibly uncommon sense made his frequent visits to my father's home always enjoyed. Over the gulf of nearly fifty vanished years I can recall today some of his terse, sen tentious sayings. Talking to my father one day on the mat ter of their accumulating years he said "old age is always ten years ahead of us." Discussing the marriage of a mutual lady acquaintance he expressed the hope that she had done well and when my father, who had paid a recent professional visit to her home, gave him some information as to her new environment he replied, "Well Doctor, that isn't living much." Referring one day to the prospective marriage of one of 'his wards to a minister of some distinction he said, "He is an educated. Christian gentleman," and then turning to my broth er and myself he continued, "Boys that is as high as you can go." During a visit of the writer to his home in the heated term he said, "I don't like to admit that I'm lazy, but I must confess to an indisposition to doing anything this hot weather." Standing six feet three or four inches in height, weighing two hundred and twenty five pounds or more, and of markedly erect bearing he was a fine specimen of physical manhood. He was the son of John, and the grandson of Alexander and Isabella Carswell, who came to America from Ireland about 1765 or 1770. My good friend and relative Mrs. Ella Salter who is a grandaughter of Judge Carswell's sister Nancy, 149 wife of Rev. Nicholas Alurphey, has traced this line back to Lord Ruthven, first Earl of Gonrie and the head of the "House of Cassiles" in the following direct course of descent. Isa bella, wife of Alexander Carswell, was the daughter of Wil liam Browne, who was the son of Lady Jane (Gordon) Browne who was the daughter of Lady Isabella (Ruthven) Gordon, who was the daughter of Lord Ruthven, First Earl of Gonrie, etc. She has informed me further that the Isabella aforesaid was a lineal descendant of Robert Bruce, William Wallace, Sir. James Douglas, hero of Bannockburn, and probably other Scottish Chiefs. The connecting links between Isabella and these old-time worthies have not as yet been "diskivered," but my friend is satisfied that they exist and that if she were in Scotland she could "sholy" trace them out. A year ago while my time was largely occupied in gathering genealogical data for these sketches, my brother Samuel R., on meeting Alma, my youngest born, asked her if I would be in my office on the following day. "No sir, he is going to Wrens, Ga." "What for?" he asked, and she replied, "I think he is going there to find out what kin I am to Adam." And so as I belong to the Carswell line through my grandmother, Eleanor Carswell daughter of Edward and granddaughter of the aforesaid Isa bella, it may be that if life lasts with my friend Ella and her genealogical energies do not suffer an eclipse she may succeed in carrying our mutual line back to Adam, or at least to Noah, or possibly to the traditional Irishman, who seated upon the topmost pinnacle of the tallest mountain in the deluge-girdled world, with the whirling waters only a few feet below him, asked Noah as the floating Ark passed by to take him aboard and when the request was turned down, replied, "Go on with your old boat, I don't think there is going to be much of a flood anyway." My friend has also given me the gratifying information that we are justly entitled through our Carswell, Brown, Mur ray, Cassiles, Ruthven, Gordon connection to a whole lot of "Scotch Plaids" too numerous to be scheduled here. Some years ago there came to my inner consciousness an overween ing desire to look again upon my pictured face and form as 150 it appeared in all its childish beauty when the world with me was j^ung, very young. The only documentary evidence on that line still existent was an old time daguerreotype presented by my father to his near relative Matthias Clark of New York more than fifty years ago. Through the kindly courtesy of James O. Clark, son of Matthias, the picture was returned to me and as my children looked upon it, one of them said, "Papa wasn't pretty even when he was a boy," which of course was very consoling and comforting to me. But in addition to this I found that my good mother had gowned my little form for the occasion in a costume bearing a broad conspicuous figure, which suggested to my friend Judge Eve the convict stripes, with which his service as County Commissioner had made him quite familiar. And I wondered why my youthful symmetry of face and form had been adorned in this peculiar way. But the mystery is solved and the problem no longer vexes my righteous soul. This gorgeous habiliment must have been simply and solely one of the numerous and flaring Scotch plaids to which I was justly, legally and genealogically en titled. My friend tells me further that the name "Carswell" is derived from the old Scotch word "carse" which means alluvial land bordering a stream. Walls built to protect these lands from overflow were known as "carse-walls" and their owners James or John of the "carse-wall" were finally designated as James or John Carswell. Bishop John Carswell was a promi nent and distinguished member of the tribe in the i6th century and made the first translation into the Gaelic language, the work being John Knox's Liturgy, and the Gaelic version being known as "Carswell's Prayer Book." Judge John W. Carswell married Sarah Ann Devine and to them were born two children, a son and a daughter. The latter Anna Eliza Moselle was married to Major Wm. A. Wilkins and their children Inez (Jones), Lily (Neely) and Wm. A. Jr. live in AVaynesboro, Ga., and Nina (Scutter) in Athens, Ga. The son John Devine married Linda Royal who bore him two sons John D. Jr., of Savannah, and Porter who married Arabella Walker and who died some years ago. 151 Judge Carswell's Brothersville home was built in the '40s of the last century, was sold after the war to Cyrus Hudson, was burned a few years later and was never rebuilt. The fol lowing incident of his service on the bench of the Inferior Court was given me years ago by his associate, Judge Joseph A. Shewmake. Major William Bennett, sixty years ago was one of the "characters" of the Waynesboro bar. He and Dr. Edward Carter shared the distinction of being the most bril liant and entertaining talkers of 'Burke and for this reason they probably avoided coming into colloquial contact with each other. When Judge Carswell entered upon his judicial duties he found that Major Bennett had been occupying pro fessionally an office in the Court House for a long, long time and no charge had been made against him for rent. The sug gestion was made that he be requested to ante up for all of the back rations and a bill was accordingly presented. The Alajor had represented the county in a little case involving a small amount and when the court convened for the transac tion of county business he rendered as an offset to the rent account a bill for professional services equaling exactly the charge against him, not a cent more and not a cent less. After reading the bill Judge Carswell said, "Major, this seems to be a rather exorbitant charge for the service rendered," and the Alajor with a twinkle in his bright, brown eyes replied, "Judge, my conscience is always equal to any demand made upon it and to every emergency that confronts it." What the final outcome was I do not recall. Judge Carswell's late years were spent in AVaynesboro where his remains now rest. His son John Devine died in comparatively early manhood and his wife and daughter Airs. AA^ilkins have been dead many vears. 15-3 ^ > JUDGE JOHN W. CARSWELL. DR. SAMUEL B. CLARK. He was my father and as I write his name today tho' four and forty years have passed since on an Autumn day in 1864 I looked into his face for the last time as I bade him good'bye to take my humble place again under the Southern flag, there comes into my heart in undiminished tenderness the infinite reverence and love it bore him through all my boyhood years. * 5j< * SJC In 1803 or '04 Charles Clark, born at Westfield, N. J., in 1780, came down to make his home in Georgia. He was the son of Charles Clark, Sr., who in 1813 was President of the New Jersey Senate. He was also, I feel assured, a descendant of Richard Clark, who in 1620 came over from England as a sbip carpenter. This conviction as to his descent is based upon the perpetuation of family names and the further fact that Abraham Clark, the "signer," with whom my father claimed kinship, was a descendant of Richard. I mentioned this fact once to my friend Mrs. John P. Dill, whose father Ralph P. Clark was a native of Westfield, N. J., and she laughingly replied, "Oh, every Clark in New Jersey claims kinship with Abraham." And yet despite my good friend's pleasantry I still think that the facts make out a prima facie case for our descent from this old time ship carpenter. Charles Clark located for a time in Savannah and married while there Eleanor Carswell daughter of Edward, who was the eldest son of Alexander and Isabella Carswell. And now before bidding my ancient sire Alexander and his good wife Isabella a final but not as my young friend, Roger Winter, would express it "an elaborate adieu," it may not be amiss to say that this couple brought into the world the following seven children in the years named: Edward 1755, Agnes 1^757, John 1760, Alexander 1762, James 1765, Matthew 1768. The late 'Matthew J., and J. Frank Carswell of Hephzibah were sons of Alexander, who was the son of John. The Late Dr. E. R. Carswell was the son of Matthew and the grandson of John. J. Frank Carswell of Augusta is the son of AVm. Alexander, grandson of Alexander and great grandson of John. 153 Charles Clark remained in Savannah only a little while and removed to Burke Co., where he built the home now owned by Mrs. Louisa Clark near Blythe, Ga. Here the remaining years of his life were spent and here he died in 1852 at the age of 72. Eleanor, his wife, brought to him seven sons and daugh ters who grew to maturity, Charles E., Jane (Brown), Samuel B., Sarah (Brown), James W., John W., and Mary Eleanor (Rheney). In 1825 my grandmother, Martha J. Walker bought a small tract of land in the community in which the Anderson homes were then or afterwards located and built the residence in which th'e writer was born. It was almost an exact counterpart of the home described by Thomas E. Watson in "Bethany" as belonging to his grandfather. Nov. i6th, 1837, my father then a young physician, married Martha Rebecca Walker and bought then or later my grandmother's home, adding in later years a larger tract of land bought of John D. Mongin. In 1848 to meet the wants of a growing family he replaced this primitive residence with a larger and more modern home, within whose walls through all his later years he lived and loved and labored until, worn down by the added duties imposed by the absorption of younger members of his profession into Confederate service, on a winter day in Feb ruary '65 the angels "touched his eyelids into sleep." THE OLD HOMESTEAD. This old-time Southern home embowered in oak and elm, its front graced by tall colonial columns, still stands in all its pristine strength and charm. Within the enclosed and shaded yard there stands a walnut tree that found its permanent habi tat by accident rather than design. During my mothers girl hood she was playing in her own backyard one day when her brother, afterwards known as Col. A. C. Walker, attempted to take a walnut from her hand. To foil him in his purpose she ran around the old dwelling and while hidden from his view she buried it hurriedly and went her way. He failed to find its hiding place and she failed to recover it, and the tree towers 154 DR. SAMUEL B. CLARK. in midair today more than fifty feet in height and has borne its toll of fruitage for fifty years and more. This old homestead with its broad domain of nearly a thousand acres, wears the distinction of being the only one of the fifteen original Brothersville homes that is now occupied by descendants of its old-time owners. Eight of them have gone to ashes and all save three have passed to other and alien hands. It bears the further distinction of having preserved within its walls for three score years an itemized account of its original cost, save only the timbers hewn by my father's slaves from his own forest lands. These well preserved records now in my possession reveal to me further the exact day in 1848 when my boyish feet began to climb the hill of knowledge under the guiding aegis of an old field school and the precise date in a later year when I walked the earth mon arch of all I surveyed in my maiden pair of boots. They give me the cost of those boots and of every article of apparel that gowned my form in all my boyhood years. They give me likewise the annual and total expense of my education from that Spring day in 1848 until the Summer day in i860 when my graduation came. They record every dollar of income received by my father for medical service rendered on the Sabbath, all of which was scrupulously given away to church or dharity. They reveal my father's dealings with his slaves, the gifts in money that he made to them,, the advances made upon the crops he allowed them to cultivate for themselves and their total income from these crops ranging in amount from smaller sums to more than fifty dollars. They record many other things besides and among them every item in the cost of this old home save the heavy timbers already named. My father paid for material, for painting, plastering and masonry $1,540.12, and to Josgph Boulineau for building $1,505.51^4. Since reviewing this record I confess to some curiosity as to the special consideration for -w'hich that surplus one and a half cents was paid to the builder. I recall the fact that during the progress of the work Joseph Boulineau would frequently lose his gimlets and other small tools in the mass of shavings that covered the hall floor where his work bench stood and my 155 6 year old eyes and fingers would ferret them out, and time and time again he told me that he was going to give me a white rabbit for my boyish service. The work ended and he went his way. For days and weeks and months I watched and waited with eager, anxious eyes for the advent of Brer Rabbit, but he came not and now that sixty years have passed I have practically given up hope, * * * * And now I close this sketch with an evening scene in the long ago at this old home. Edgar A. Foe once took the public into his confidence as to the construction of poetry in general and of "The Raven" in particular. In this charming essay he makes the statement that the closing verse of that world famous poem was the first to find expression in his weird and rhythmic fancy. Some years ago I began the preparation of a series of sketches on the old slave days and under the shadow of so illustrious a precedent I had penned their closing feature in the following pen picture of AN EVENING SCENE AT THE OLD HOMESTEAD. And now there comes before me a picture whose softened lights and shadows will never fade until the hands that pen these lines are cold and pulseless. It is an evening scene at the old homestead. The twilight shadows have fallen o'er grove and field and wood. The cares and toils of the day are done. The faithful slaves have finished their daily tasks. The farm and driving stock are housed and fed, while from the barnyard the tinkling bells of the resting kine grow faint and fainter on the drowsy air. The evening meal is ended in the "Big House" and the cheery old oak fire is casting fitful shadows on the whitened walls. Beside the hearthstone with book in hand sits one with saintly face and thinning hair while scat tered here and there within the circle of the glowing lamplight the children con their lessons for the morrow's school. The tall old fashioned clock that has ticked away for half a century chimes out the hour of nine and books and lessons are laid aside. Out on the rear veranda a sweet toned bell summons 156 the dusky slaves and led by old "Aunt Hannah" they come with quiet step and reverent air to take their places in the waiting hall. From its accustomed place the sacred book is taken down and lips, that now 'have long been silent, repeat the words of Isreal's poet king: "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures ; he leadeth me beside the still waters. Fie restoreth my soul ; Yea though I walk through the valley and the shadow of death I will fear no evil, for thy rod and thy staff they comfort me," Or the lesson read, it may be, is from the Master's holier lips: "Let not your heart be troubled; ye believe in God, be lieve also in me. In my father's house are many mansions, if it were not so I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you." And now as the reading ends and the book is closed, the keys of the old time organ are touched by girlish fingers and in the chorus of sacred song the voices of "Master and Mistuss" and of the children blend with the stronger, sweeter tones of the old time slaves, rising it may be beyond the narrow, cof fined pale of our material sense, beyond the music of the spheres to chord with softer, holier ministrelsy on the unseen shore. And now as its echoes die away they kneel together, and sometimes the master and sometimes the slave leads in the simple prayer, that in touching faith goes up to the common Lord 'of all. And now the service is ended — no not ended for on all the hearts that kneeled there in childish faith and trust, whether bond or free, the benediction of that fireside hour through all the years has rested and is resting still. A PSYCHIC MISTERY. In connection with the picture drawn above there oc curred a strange coincidence, whose mystery I never yet have solved. Rev. Charles T. Walker, whose gifted tongue and brain have justly given him the name of the "Black Spurgeon" and w'ho is conceded to be the most eloquent minister of his race, is the youngest son of old "Aunt Hannah" named above 157 and in his early life attended with his mother these family services. After I had penned this sketch there came into my mind the thought that possibly his religious life, which in these later years has found such wonderful development, might have had its earliest awakening at this fireside Bethel in the old slave days. For days the thought grew on me and then while weighing the propriety of adding it to the sketch as a prob able fact, there came to me from "Charlie" as I have always known him, a letter which read in part as follows ; "I intended giving you a copy of my book -w'hile in Augusta, but was sud denly called to New York by the death of one of my deacons and I failed to find opportunity to see you. I send you a copy today by mail. You will find in it that I have attributed my earliest religious impressions to the family services in your father's house, when he gathered his negroes into the hall to join in the family devotions. I can remember today the first hymn I ever heard him sing; I can repeat words that he used in his prayers. I have never been able to get away from the in fluence of those old-time family services." The very thought that for two days or more had stirred my own brain cells was finding voice at the point of Charlie's pen in his New York home a thousand miles away. Was this simply and solely a coincidence, or was it the result of some strange psychic force, some weird, ethereal mental agency that takes no note of space and yet some day will find its master and be made to do his bidding by some Marconi of the future? The reader can take his cboice. My father was born Feb. 26, 1812, married Martha R. Walker Nov. 16, 1837, and died Feb. i, 1865. There were born to them four sons and four daughters, viz : C. Edward, born Oct. 31, 1838, married Martha !B. Allen Feb. 27, 1868, died June 29, 1883 ; William H., born May 14, 1840, died unmarried Mch. 29, 1867; Walter A., born Mch. 5, 1842, married Sarah E. Reney Oct. 24, 1880; Samuel R., born Feb. 15, 1844, married Evalina L. Allen Nov. 27, 1873 ; M. Eugenia, born Feb. 9, 1846, married George W. Hughes Feb. 27, 1868; Mary Anna, born January 21, 1846, died Sept. 4, 1864; C. Edwina, born May 7, 158 1850, married Dr. W. H. Baxley Oct. 18, 1893; Ella G., born Sept. 2, 1855. And now I trust the reader will pardon the filial tribute to my father's worth, that comes unbidden from my heart to day. It may be that no human life can claim perfection and yet if his knew aught of fault or blemish in all the years from boyhood to the grave, no human eye could see it. In lofty purpose and in lowly unremitting faithfulness to duty, he lived above the common plane of men, serving his generation by the will of God, doing justly, loving mercy, walking humbly in all the paths his Master's feet had trod and dying in the noontide of his usefulness, he left to those who loved him, a name as pure and stainless as the snows that winter winds have heaped upon his grave. 159 WILLIAM EVANS. The Evans family is of \A''elsh origin and its earliest im migrants came to America in ante Revolutionary days. Daniel Evans served in that war as a member of Capt. Patrick Carr's Burke County Rangers and possibly in other commands. He lived in Burke County not far from the present site of Story's mill and he and his wife "Polly" gave to the world a number of children only three of whom bear personal relation to these records, viz : Robert H. and Alartha J. to whom some atten tion has already been g'ven, and the subject of this sketch. AA illiam Evans married Alahala Wiggins and lived for a time at Alount Enon. About 1840 he located at Brothersville and his home is still owned though not occupied by one of his surviving daughters. Five children were born to him, Leoni das, Floyd, Claudia (Crockett), Sarah Eleanora (AA'alker), and AI. Sophronia. Only the two last named still survive. AA'il- liam Evans died during my boyhood, but I recall his stalwart frame, his fondness for fox and deer hunting and his staunch adherence to the Baptist faith. His son Floyd was my boy hood schoolmate and when our academic days were ended I went to Emory College and he to the Kentucky Alilitarv In stitute at Frankfort. In the summer of '61 an entertainment was given at the old Poythressville Academy near AIcBean for the benefit of the soldiers and Floyd, Bill AA^imberly, my brother and myself were present. AA''e had all arranged to go to the front and were talking in light and jocular vein of the life before us when Floyd said, "Boys you may laugh and joke about it, but we are not all coming home again." In sad ful fillment of his prophecy the war had not grown old before his young and manly form was sleeping in a soldier's grave. Aly classmate, AA'imberly, came back again but maimed for life by a cruel minie at Gettysburg while my brother brought from the field before the end had come a fatal lung affection and his young life faded out in the bloom of early manhood. The writer alone came out unscathed by ball or shell or fell disease and yet despite this fact within these later years an enterprising manufacturer of artificial legs has plied me o'er 160 and o'er again with letters, circulars and other advertising stuff insisting that I allow him to supplement my walking outfit with this added and in his opinion, absolutely needed equipment. Many years ago I was playing with a little child — a child too young to place a seal upon her lips, and as she played she said to me, "Your legs looks like they was all breeches," and I could scarce deny the soft impeachment. And so it may be that my manufacturing friend had based his zeal and misplaced interest in my locomotive welfare upon the fact that nature had failed to give me, bodily at least, any "visible means of support," MOSES P. GREEN. The marriage of Martha Anderson, daughter of Augustus H., to Aloses P. iGreen has already been noted in the Anderson feature of these records. This union and Moses P.'s change of residence from Burke County to Brothersville occurred probably in 1847. After his marriage Moses P. built a hand some residence near the Anderson home and occupied it until the Augusta and Millen branch of the Central R. R. was being constructed, when, he sold his Brothersville holdings to Mrs. Seaborn Augustus Jones and built him another home near Green's Cut, a station which takes its name from a railroad cut that ran through his large plantation. He was the son of Jesse Green and was one of the wealthiest citizens of our com munity. I have been told that he kept at one time eighteen horses simply and solely for the use of himself and family, not one of these animals ever having occasion to cultivate the ac quaintance of either plow or wagon. His children have been already named as descendants of Augustus H. Anderson. COL. EDMUND B. GRESHAM. George Walker, the Irish immigrant who came to Burke County with his brother Thomas about 1745, had among his twelve children a daughter Margaret, who was married to John Jones. There came of this union three children, Mary, Margaret and John. Mary, daughter of John and Margaret i6t Jones was married to Job Gresham, and if she developed the sweetness of the old time Mary of Bethany and her husband ran the patient schdule of his ancient namesake, their married life must have been ideal in its happiness. There came to them two sons, John J., who entered the legal profession and made his home in Macon, and Edmund B., the subject of this sketch. After practicing at the bar for a time John J. abandoned the law and became a successful banker. The marriage of Col. E.' B. Gresham to Sarah Anderson and the building of his residence near the site of the old Elisha Anderson, Jr., home have been already noted in the .\nderson sketches. Though a de facto resident of Brothers ville and an active promoter of its social, educational and material interests, he retained his citizenship in Burke, repre senting that county many times in the General Assembly and as a member of the Secession Convention, that severed for a time Georgia's relation with the Union. He was a successful planter and a man of kindly, genial nature and gentle, generous heart. He confessed to me once that he had never made a horse trade in his life without worsting himself, and this was perhaps to his credit. On one occasion I heard him say, "Do a man a wrong and you'll hate him for it all your days," and I am sure through all his years he never had occasion for such a cause to bear ill will to any human being. After his death in 1872 his family occupied the old home for a time but later sold it and removed to Waynesboro, Ga. Eight children were born to Col. Gresham and his wife Sarah : Mary J., Sarah Adeline, Job A., J. Jones, Hattie G., Rosa V., Oscar and Maggie. Mary J. married first Jesse Green, and after his death Dr. G. B. Powell ; children, Jesse and AA^alter , Green and Lewis Powell. Job A. married Dollie Lassiter ; children, Ida, Emmett, Margaret and Milledge. J. Jones mar ried Ella Lassiter ; children, Mamie, Orrin, Nellie and Arthur. Hattie married Robert Burton, and while "Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy" may possibly adorn the shelves of her clever husband's library I am sure that it has found no place in their happy home life. Rosa, whose Aeolian fingers drew melody from the old-time organ when the writer was playing a soprano 162 role in the Brothersville church choir, married my old friend Dick Milledge, the cleverest man in the State. There were born to them six children, John, Kate, Hattie, Richard, Rosa and Adeline. Oscar married Lola Scales; children, 'AViley and Fannie. Dora married Gilbert Banks but left no issue. Of those who survive, Sara'h Adeline, Job A. and J. Jones are now residents of Waynesboro, and Hattie (Burton) of Mid- ville. And now I trust my old schoolmate. Miss Addie Gresham, who has been my constant friend since the old days when as children we played "Hail Over" and turned each other down in the big spelling class at the 'Brothersville Academy, will par don me for closing this sketch with an incident or two personal to 'herself. Our human life is made up largely of little things and these are only minor chords in the rhythmic cadence of its never ending psalm. Years and years ago, we stood chat ting pleasantly on the porch of the old Brothersville church when a young lady came up the broad steps and she and Miss Addie greeted each other with a cordial handclasp and with a mutual kiss whose fervid warmth would have done credit to a pair of maiden lovers. As her friend's form disappeared within the church door. Miss Addie turned to me and said, '•Walter, who — was — that?" During my recent residence at Hephzibah and soon after the death of Rev. Young J. Allen, she came to the village to secure from his relative, Mrs. V. L. Davis, some information to be used in a memorial exercise in the Waynesboro church. As she stood at the depot awaiting the train that would bear her homeward, we were chatting again when a young girl came forward and extending her hand said, "I expect you have forgotten me Miss Addie." And she replied, "Yes child, I do not recall you." And then I said to her,, "Whenever I fail to identify the girls, I tell them that my failure is due to the fact that they have grown so much prettier than, when I saw them last," and then she turned upon me a sober, reproachful face as she answered, "I have quit telling stories," and the curtain fell. 163 HENRY D. GREENWOOD. Of the Greenwood antecedents, I have no information. Henry D. must have had an ancestry or he would scarcely have been here, but none of his progenitors have volunteered the necessary information and weather conditions just now are not specially favorable to genealogical research. The calendar that hangs before me has "July" printed in flaring capitals on its pages and the summer sun is raining down caloric on the just and on the unjust without regard to race, color or previous condition of servitude. Long years ago in my schoolboy days I was required to translate into limpid English the Satires of old-time Juvenal written eighteen hundred years ago. One day there came into my lesson the phrase "Julius ardet," and not being a mind reader and having no convenient opportunity of conferring with the old Roman Satirist as to what he in tended to say, I rendered it "Julius burns." Aly teacher kindly informed me that the proper translation was, "July is hot." And it has been hot through all these vanishing centuries, too hot indeed to be digging at the roots of old family trees. I know however that Henry D. had a broth,er Edmund, a sister who married Ruddell and probably one who became the wife of a McCall. He married Harriet, daughter of Elisha Ander son, Jr., built a summer home at Brothersville and occupied it as late as i860, and possibly through the years of war. Only one child came to them, a son John, who was for a time my schoolmate. His hearing and his speech were both defective and he was never able to articulate distinctly. He always called me "Water Lye" tho' I do not know that he spelled his version of my surname precisely that way. Henry D. was a man of large, muscular build and a prac tical joker of no mean distinction as the following incident will show. The 4th of July celebration held in Brothersville in i860 had as one of its features an elaborate basket dinner furnished by the hospitable ladies of the community and to which every attendant upon the exercises was an invited guest. While Mrs. Greenwood was preparing her contributory share to this feast, Henry D. gathered a supply of green persimmons and 164 instructed his good wife to convert them into a pie without the aid of a single grain of sugar, or a single drop of flavoring of any kind whatsoever. To such of my readers as may be un familiar with the personal habits of the festive persimmon, that never loses its acrid, astringent flavor until sweetened by the alchemy of the Winter frosts, the following stories may be educational. Gen. Jubal Early riding in rear of his army corps at a stage of the war when the Confederate Commissary department was in a semi state of collapse, spied a straggler from his command partially hidden in the spreading branches of a tree that stood by the roadside. "What are you doing up that tree?" the General sternly asked. "Drawing my stomach up to the size of my rations by eating green persimmons," the soldier answered, and Early went 'his way. A hungry traveler saw beside his pathway a shapely per simmon tree laden with its wealth of emerald fruit and to allay the lonesome feeling in his epigastrium he ate with greedy appetite the pungent pulp, but when his lips began to take on unfamiliar curves he sat him down to meditate with sorrow on the aftermath. Another traveler passing by and noting the puckered mouth said to him, "My friend are you trying to whistle?" And the sufferer replied, "Whithle nothin, I'm pithened." And so amid the tempting dishes that graced the menu on that long gone July day there lay the Greenwood persimmon pie wearing upon its flaky crust no sign to indicate the sorrow that lay beneath. I do not now recall how many of the guests were taken in by its outward and seeming innocence, but I know that Judge John W. Carswell was among them. Frequent allusions to it during the after dinner hours fretted the Judge's nerves a little and when a boy attempted to twit him he said, "I ate the pie but I do not care for every whipper snapper on the ground to joke me about it," and this unsavory triumph of the culinary art became only a chastened memory. After the war the Greenwoods remained on their Burke plantation and their Brothersville home passed into other hands. My friend John, I think, was never married and this special branch of the Greenwood family is probably extinct. 165 SEABORN AUGUSTUS JONES. The blood of the Jones tribe tinged so thoroughly the strain and lineage of our community that Jonesville might properly have been added as an "alias" to its title. Four of its old time homes were presided over by charming matrons, -who had borne before their marriage the name of Jones. One of its clever residents married a widow Jones. My grandwother, Martha Jones Walker, one of its earliest settlers, was the grandchild of AYilHam Jones who married Mary Jones, and in the eariy '50s the family of Seaborn Augustus Jones purchased the home of Moses P. Green and became residents of the village. in 1725 there died in Petersburg, Va., a Peter Jones, who \"\'as the ancient sire of all this goodly tribe. He must have been a man of some note, for Petersburg was named in his honor. He had the further distinction .of being known as "Sweat House Peter," having acquired that title by reason of the fact that he builded and owned the only "sweat house" in his community for the curing of his own and his neighbors' crops of tobacco. He was also somew'hat as to lineage, his father Abram being the son of Richard Jones of AA'ales. who married Lady Jeffries. This Peter of Petersburg and sweat house fame had a son bearing the same name and Peter the Second had three sons, Abram, Henry and AVilliam, who' migrated to Georgia in ante Revolutionary days, located in Burke County and became the progenitors of the numerous Jones contingent in this and other sections of the State. William Jones lived near the present site of Story's Mill and was its original builder and owner. The Jones tribe before or after their advent in Georgia de veloped two rnarked characteristics, first for marrying their kinsfolk and second for giving their male progeny the name of Seaborn. I have been informed that the original owner of the name was born at sea — was literally sea-born, but if he was a scion of this particular Jones tree he must have lived, as the rural preacher said of Moses, "away back in the fu-char," for this section failed to hold a sea among its material assets. 166 k^ EORGIA. By his E.vcellency fARED IRWIN, Governor and Commander in Chief lu ;mj over iIic faid State. re .jyj^/t 'f/l?j/' '^^<' 'f'''^ /•: E TING. / T> Y virtue of the pouxr and authority in inc nilcd by an Act of the €cn«l AiU-mblv of thf S«itc .tfori-fiid,, palbjj the fv.'tnry-fMpn.i i.w oi Frbruary. one thoufand ft-vtn hunjicd and nuatv-li.-i, I W'> HEREBY . MmniMboTiate you ths faid , ,^^/s. j^_ O^-..^^ e*^ -.^ oneoftht [udgcs cf the Inferior Coiu-f 6;r (he county of i'i2/!.'««^i;. ¦^ in tlie faid .State. "Vr-xi arc theretore hereby autltorifed ,intl riquu.-d to do and perform ail and iinrular the dittits incumbent on you as, x Ju I'; of the fiid Court, according to law and tha truft rcpo.l-d in you. G / VI'. AT misr iiy S!,:H.- St.i!r-ii')i