In honor of Lt. Spencer Clack's death July 9, 1832

NOTE: a repost from my other blog...gathering the more recent blog posts into one place for access and organization!

I recently saw a post on one of my more famous (there aren't that many!) ancestors, Spencer Clack of Sevierville, TN.  The Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) chapter is named after him there.  So Lieutenant Clack must have been pretty important in that area.  Anyway, the new post had a document about a "Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty-Land Warrant Application Files Page 10 - Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty-Land Warrant."

 Original marker standing (broken) and Revolutionary soldier honorary marker for Spencer Clack

Carved likeness of Spencer Clack on his grave marker. before it was broken.

Recently added document

But it was completely illegible.  I copied the photo, cropped it, enlarged it, enhanced the contrast and brightness, but it was all gibberish. So I was glad that the original source, Page 10, was cited, and when I went back there, I could read about John Alvey's pension request by his widow, Francis, or maybe her survivors as to whether she could have received pensions for the last days of her life, written in 1857.  Who is he? Who is she?

The Ancestry tree I have doesn't have any John Alvey, or even Francis Alvey on it, especially related to Spencer Clack.  I wonder who they were? And how they are related to Lt. Spencer Clack.  When I asked, the person who's tree it was added to said he/she hadn't been working on that part of her/his tree lately, and didn't know who it referred to either.

Here's the best I was able to do with my limited photo skills.  More will be coming I'm sure.

I located a pretty good summary of Spencer Clack's life, HERE. 
I'm copying it below, in case you want to know more about him.

Spencer Clack (1746-1832) 

by Miss Tommie Clack, Abilene, Texas; and J. A. Sharp, Sevierville, Tenn.

Spencer Clack, Revolutionary soldier, settled in Sevier County, Tennessee, in 1788 or 1789. Little is known of his military service except that he was a lieutenant of a Virginia (Henry County) militia company in 1782-83; Captain Tully Choice was company commander. He was born, March 28,1746. His obituary gave his birthplace as Loudoun County, Virginia, but this could not be accurate for Loudoun County was not partitioned from Fairfax County until 1757, and no Clack records, as early as Spencer's birth, were found in either of these counties. 

Spencer Clack did, however, live in Loudoun County, and witnessed there, in 1770, the will of Thomas Beavers; also, Loudoun County was probably where he married Mary Beavers about 1766. He sold his lands in Loudoun County in 1777 and moved southward to Henry County, Virginia about 1778, when he purchased land in the latter county. In 1786, when Franklin County, Virginia, was formed from parts of Henry and Bedford Counties, he became one of the first justices of the new county, and in 1787 he sold his Franklin County lands, just before his westward trek to Sevier County, Tennessee. 

No conclusive proof of the parentage of Spencer Clack has been offered, although various attempts to do so have been made by descendents and genealogists. It does seem certain, however, that he descended from Rev. James Clack, English-born rector of Ware Parish, Gloucester County, Virginia, from 1679 to 1723. 

The Spencer Clack home in Sevier County was located on the right bank of Little Pigeon River, immediately below the junction of the East Fork and West Fork of that river. Here, in 1808, Spencer obtained an occupant grant from Tennessee for 442 acres; most of this land was on the north bank of East Fork directly opposite to the town of Sevierville, or the Forks-of-Little Pigeon, as this frontier settlement was known. The Chandlers and Walkers, Clack descendents, later owned the same place and the old Clack home was located on the same site as the later Chandler-Walker home. Near his home Spencer operated one of Sevierville's first mills, also a cotton gin and wool-carding machine. 

Spencer Clack was prominent in the affairs of the Forks-of-Little Pigeon (Sevierville) Baptist Church from the time of its formation in 1789 until his death. For many years he served as church clerk. In addition to his church activities he was interested in education and politics. He was an early trustee of Nancy Academy, Sevier County's first school and gave money for its support. He was one of the five Sevier County delegates to the Knoxville convention of 1796, which drafted and adopted Tennessee's first constitution and he was a signer of that document. He also represented Sevier County in the lower house of the first three Tennessee legislatures, 1796-1802, and in 1801 he served on the legislative committee "to prepare a device and motto" for the Great Seal of Tennessee. 

Neither the Spence Clack Bible record nor the Spence Clack will have been found; therefore, the writers will list only those who were unquestionably children of Spencer and Mary Beavers Clack. Perhaps, in this way, the confusion and error of other Clack descendents and genealogists may be avoided. Good proof exists for the following Clack children: Martha, Rawleigh (Rolly) (b. 1772), Rhoda (b. 1776), Catherine (b. 1778), Frances (b. c1783), Mary (b. 1785) and Malvina. 

Martha Clack's marriage to Josiah Rogers occurred in Franklin County, Virginia, in 1786; they apparently came to Sevier County with the Clacks. Rawleigh Clack was married (1) to Mary Randles in 1791, and after her death he was married (2) to Martha Kerr in 1816; this marriage took place in Sevier County. Sixteen children resulted and about 1820 Rawleigh and family moved down the Tennessee River to Rhea County, Tennessee, where he died in 1842. Rhoda Clack married James Randles in 1791; they raised a family of twelve on Boyd's Creek in Sevier County. Randles died in 1816, while on a trip to Virginia for salt, and was buried somewhere in Washington County, Virginia. Catherine Clack was married, in 1794, to Rev. Elijah Rogers, early and well known Baptist minister in East Tennessee; they raised five sons and five daughters at their Sevier County home near the mouth of the Little Pigeon, on the French Broad River. Mary Clack married William Miller; they left Sevier County at an early date and settled in Meigs County, Tennessee, where she died in 1860. Frances Clack was married (1) to Mordecai Gist; after his death she married (2) John Mynatt of Knox County, Tennessee. Malvina Clack married Major Beavers; they left Sevier County for Talladega County, Alabama, soon after the War of 1812. 

There were doubtless other Clack children, but the writers do not believe that Spencer Clack, Jr. John Clack and Nancy Clack were children of Spencer and Mary Beavers Clack, as some published accounts claim. However, there is a well established tradition that there was a son, Micajah Clack, who was "killed by lighting." And there may have been a daughter named Rebecca Clack, but again we must rely only upon tradition for proof. Also, in 1789, one Sarah Clack (b. c1773) married William Henderson in the "Forks of Little Pigeon," as shown by bounty land papers in the National Archives; they migrated to St. Louis County, Missouri, about 1840. We believe that this Sarah Clack, heretofore unknown to present generations of Clack descendents, was another daughter of Spencer and Mary. 

Spencer Clack's death occurred, July 9, 1832 and he was buried in the old Baptist Cemetery at Sevierville; the original flat limestone rock with the unique carving of Spencer's face and the initials, "S.C.", still marks his grave. Mary Beavers Clack died, August 14, 1840, and was buried by the side of her husband. At the time of his death a contemporary described Spencer Clack as a "pious… worthy Christian, kind and affectionate. . .an excellent neighbor, remarkably even and unruffled in temper."

I highlighted Catherine Clack and Rev. Elijah Rogers, my great times 4 grandparents.

If you know who the Alvey's were, please leave a comment below! Thanks. 

Zulieka Granger Phillips Swasey, July 30, 1858

Great Grandmother birthday

(Saturday, July 27, 2013 blog edited and reposted!)

On July 30, 1858, Zulieka Granger Phillips Swasey was born.  Her mother Mary Phillips, had been a Granger before marriage.  Her father was raised by a stepfather, Samuel Gainer in Georgia.  Her mother went from Texas back to Georgia to give birth, and I'm not clear whether she was with her own mother or her mother-in-law.  Baby Zulie was given a slave girl at her birth, with the papers written by hand by her paternal grandmother, Mary Phillips Gainer.  I wonder if any of them knew that the Civil War would be starting in just a few years.

She returned with her parents to Sabine Pass,Texas or Beaumont, Texas, at a time when there were cotton plantations where now oil wells drill, and cities stand.

Front and back of Zulie G. Swasey portrait, mother of Ada Phillips Swasey Rogers

Zulie's mother, Mary, had another child two years later, and Mary died within a year of that birth.  Julie's father William Phillips may have been sick, may have been grieving, or some other reason had him leaving the homestead, and sending his daughters to relatives in Galveston.  Within 6 months of his wife's death, he joined the Confederate forces, fighting early in the war with other Texans in a company from Alabama, and dying.

Zulieka and her younger sister, Ada Phillips, were raised by Granger and Gainer relatives. They were  the sisters of either their father or their mother...

When Zulieka married at age 24 to Alexander John Swasey, also of Galveston, she then had her own two girls, naming her first Ada Phillips Swasey, and her second Stella Zulieka Swasey.  Ada Phillips Swasey became my grandmother on my father's side.

Zulieka Swasey (Dear Nan) and daughter Ada's daughter, Ada Mary Rogers. (Ada Mary Rogers died as a child)

And how do I know more than is available by census and city directory documents?  My relatives somehow kept copies of letters written by Zulieka's mother, her father, her grandmother Gainer, her grandfather Granger, and her uncle Marion Granger.  I've transcribed them into records for these people on Ancestry.com, which kind of makes these people more real.

The letters just before and during the Civil War are the most precious, because of the lack of true information that was available to people, and the privations they endured.  Letters were written on both sides of folded paper, then across the original writing at a 90 degree angle, as well as in the margins.  See HERE for some of the letters.

Did they have important things to say?  Sometimes.  Many times a whole paragraph seemed to be speaking of unimportant things by my current standards of communication.

But they shared their lives, their language, and the actual writing of their pens down through the years

How Sudbury got help (1676) from Mr. Edward Cowell

NOTE: a repost from my other blog...gathering the more recent blog posts into one place for access and organization!

More about the Sudbury MA battle between Colonials and Indians...HERE .

But my question that I posed back then, was which Edward Cowell led the forces that tried to come to the aid of Sudbury, a town being attacked by Indians in King Phillips War in 1676.  Edward Cowell Sr.(1617-1677) would have been in his 50s or 60s, (since his birth date is unknown.)  His son, Edward Jr.(1644-1691) was the right age to be involved in a battle, and I would imagine he was among the company as well.  But it would have been more likely that the elder would be considered a leader.

Youngest Cowell, Edward III was born in 1672. so was obviously too young.

But geography is also in question.

Edward Cowell is described as coming to the aid of Sudbury FROM Brookfield MA by way of Marlborough.

"Mr. Edward Cowell, with a body of eighteen mounted men, coming from {Brookfield}* by way of Marlborough, and by a different way from that taken by Capt. Wadsworth, (of Connecticut) became sharply engaged with an outlying party of the enemy, and lost four men killed, one wounded, and had five of his horses disabled.

I contested at the time I posted that quote back in May that Brookfield had been destroyed in the preceding August 1675, when my ancestor Captain John Ayers was killed by Indians of King Phillips War (which now extended to Sudbury).

But he could have been Mr. Cowell Sr. OF BROOKFIELD if he'd lived there.  But he didn't actually.  He lived in Portsmouth New Hampshire, where he was a sailor by trade.  Had he tried to relocate with other colonists in the shift to western frontier of Quaboag in the 1650s?  I think not.

He had arrived in Boston, in 1640, and in 1645, where he married in 1655. He had his first son, Edward in Boston in 1644.  From there he took the family to Portsmouth NH, and had 3 more children.  Since he was a sailor, he is also recorded as arriving in Boston in 1655.  But his probate following his death was in Portsmouth NH in 1677.

So a descendant made a memorial for him for fighting in King Phillips War in 1676, the year before he died.  I still wonder how he arrived at the scene of the battle in Sudbury MA coming from Brookfield MA, when his home had been all the way in Portsmouth NH.   The clue is that he was coming from the much closer town of Marlborough, just to the west of Sudbury.  It's much more likely that any call for help had gone out to that area, and whoever had any military experience (which was very rare among the early colonists according to what I've read)...would have been pressed into assistance.

Since there were also other colonists who came to aid Sudbury from Connecticut, apparently there was a general call for assistance.  And perhaps Edward Jr. had some interest in Marlborough.

Geographically I don't know more than that Sudbury MA is 22 miles outside of Boston MA and a good 70 miles from Portsmouth, NH.  Sudbury is even 50 miles east of Brookfield MA but only 20 miles from Marlborough.  I don't know where the soldiers (i.e. colonists, with maybe a bit of military training) from Connecticut began, but that's pretty far away as well.  So when the Indians of King Phillips war attacked Sudbury, and the colonists received help, it was probably several days before it arrived from that far away...especially since someone had to ride (or sail) for the help in the first place.

It was the wild frontier then.  And the war with the Indians only lasted a couple of years, at that time.

Here's one description of the wars the European colonists had with Native Americans.  It's pretty amazing to me, since these conflicts are downplayed so much in the American History books.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_Wars

Further information: European colonization of the Americas

The colonization of North America by the English, French, Spanish, Dutch, and Swedish was resisted by some Indian tribes and assisted by other tribes. Wars and other armed conflicts in the 17th and 18th centuries included:

• Beaver Wars (1609–1701) between the Iroquois and the French, who allied with the Algonquians (What states?)
• Anglo-Powhatan Wars (1610–14, 1622–32, 1644–46), including the 1622 Jamestown Massacre, between English colonists and the Powhatan Confederacy in the Colony of Virginia
• Pequot War of 1636–38 between the Pequot tribe and English colonists in Massachusetts and Connecticut
• Kieft's War (1643–45) in the Dutch territory of New Netherland (New Jersey and New York) between Dutch colonists and the Lenape people
• Peach Tree War (1655), the large-scale attack by the Susquehannocks and allied tribes on several New Netherland settlements along the Hudson River
• Esopus Wars (1659–1663), conflicts between the Esopus tribe of Lenape Indians and colonial New Netherlanders in Ulster County, New York
• King Philip's War (1675–78) in New England between colonists and the Narragansett people
• Tuscarora War (1711–15) in the English Province of North Carolina
• Yamasee War (1715–17) in the English Province of South Carolina
• Dummer's War (1722–25) in northern New England and French Acadia (New Brunswick and Nova Scotia)
• Pontiac's War (1763–66) in the Great Lakes region
• Lord Dunmore's War (1774) in western Virginia (Kentucky and West Virginia)

In several instances, warfare in North America was a reflection of European rivalries, with American Indian tribes splitting their alliances among the powers, siding with their trading partners. Various tribes fought on each side in King William's War, Queen Anne's War, Dummer's War, King George's War, and the French and Indian War, allying with British or French colonists according to their own self interests.

Similarly, in the American Revolution and the War of 1812, Indian tribes in the territories of conflict differed in their alliances. The Cherokees supported the British in the Revolution and raided frontier American settlements in the hope of driving out the settlers. Other tribes fought for the American Patriots, such as the Oneida people and Tuscarora people of the Iroquois Confederacy in New York.^[1]

Spencer Clack memorials by the Little Pigeon River - Sevierville Part 2

I drove west from Asheville NC to Tennessee, which is the other side of some old Appalachian Mountains...to Sevierville, and Knoxville.  Part of the trip was to meet my son and his family as they traveled perpendicular to my journey (Ohio to Florida) for their vacation on the beach.

So I had some time while they were held up in traffic in Kentucky and I stopped in Sevierville and drove around a bit.

There's I-40 at the top of the map, going south to north at this point, but I mainly traveled east to west.

I stopped at the Sevierville Visitor Center.  What a smart gal I am, and got some good maps showing where maybe Spencer Clack's grave was.  The clerk didn't know anything about the little park where the original log church had been and the grave marker for Spencer Clack still was.  But she knew there was a small park that was located by the river and a highway by-pass.  That sounded right to me, because I'd been zooming along that bypass and saw a sign about a cemetery when I went through the town about 25 years ago. It was on the left however!

Newer sign designating the Cemetery park on the by-pass.

And on Ancestry, Spencer Clack has 2 memorial sites with pictures.  So I hoped to see for myself!

Though there was a LOT of traffic, it kept moving and each stop light was given a number.  So I was going to light Number 15.6, turn up Main St. and pass the by-pass...and the pink area was the probably place of the park.  But it was still on the left side of a 5 lane highway.  So I played around with several more right and left turns in circles, and eventually was coming back down Main St. to turn right onto a little no-name street, and there it was!

 Bridge over the Little Pigeon River on other side of manicured park.

 I see the 4 markers at first...

And then notice more markers, this is a real cemetery!

Spencer Clack's marker, as it is in 2018.

The cemetery has been kept up, and someone has used Round Up around each marker to kill all the grass...but it's probably safer than using a weed-eater.  We just won't think of the run off into the river just yards away!

This shot is posted on Ancestry, supposedly a carving of Spencer Clack's face on the tombstone.  When I looked at the shards of the stone behind the broken vertical piece, they seemed to have various layers, as if it had been repaired with concrete and then broke apart.  But the face is definitely gone now.

The marker at the base was added by Joe Sharp, who requested it from the US Government to honor a Revolutionary War Hero.  (Joe Sharp was an active genealogist in Sevierville.) And  now I understand that Spencer Clack was in the Virginia Militia, rather than the Continental Army.

I don't know any dates he served in the military, and perhaps nobody does.  But he came across the mountains without benefit of the highway I just traveled, from Virginia into this area when it was wilderness. It is known that he was part of the group trying to form the State of Franklin out of the western wilds of North Carolina, but it didn't succeed, and eventually the western part of NC became Tennessee.  Spencer took part in that also.

This little pocket park tries to give a bit of memorial, though I couldn't read any of the other old stone's inscriptions, except 2 newer ones flat on the ground.  But there were good markers around the park to let me know what was there and why.

Spencer Clack was my 5 times great grandfather.  His daughter Catharine married Rev. Elijah Rogers, and their son Micajah moved his family to Texas in the early 1800s.

But back to the park...according to Ancestry, Mary Beavers Clack, Spencer's wife, is also buried in this cemetery.  But I didn't find a stone marker that was near him with her name, but it could have been any of them since names were illegible.

 Broken marker in foreground is Spencer Clack's.  The other marker doesn't say whose it is.

 Upon the park's rededication in 2009 more amenities and signs were added (by the Spencer Clack Chapter of Daughters of the American Revolution, and others)

A central flag pole with a circle of benches was added with dedication and appreciation of those who contributed to it.  Among the names, at the bottom is Joseph Sharp, who had worked to get Spencer Clack's newer marker installed.

I'll finish describing this little park in another post...it wasn't mobbed with people coming to see it...and with Pigeon Forge, Dollywood, and Gatlinburg right up the road, I wasn't surprised!

Side-wheelers, The Ella Warley, The Kate Ward and The Kirkland

My own connection to side-wheelers was my great times 4 grandfather, Captain Alexander G. Swasey Jr. of the Ella Warley, (formerly the Isabel) which became in 1861 a Confederate blockade runner. They were captured in by the Union blockaders early in the Civil War and Captain Swasey spent the war in a Union prison.

Here are some  links about some of his life. (HERE)

and Here, especially about his side-wheeler.

I enjoy reading about different historical events in Texas, my home state. I receive a newsletter Today in Texas History as an email, and on June 21, the post was about the following boat The Kate Ward being launched in 1845 on the Colorado River.

The Handbook of Texas On Line gives this information: 

The Colorado River, measured in length and drainage area, is the largest river wholly in Texas.  

Above Austin the lands along the Colorado are generally rough, but below Austin the river traverses the flat, alluvial bottoms of the Coastal Plain, an important agricultural area.

Early in the nineteenth century its slow current caused the formation of a raft, or log jam, which gradually grew upstream so that the river was navigable in 1839 for only ten miles above its mouth. By 1858 the situation in Matagorda and Wharton counties had become so bad that the state appropriated funds for the construction of a new channel around the raft. The United States Army Corps of Engineers opened the channel in the mid-1800s, but since it was not maintained the raft filled it up. Teamsters unloaded vessels above the raft and carried the cargo to other teams that loaded it on other boats for shipment to Galveston and other Gulf ports. Shallow-draught vessels were at times able to ascend the Colorado to Austin.

So to get the geography straight...this Texas Colorado River does not go through the Grand Canyon...but into the Gulf of Mexico at Matagorda, TX.

The KATE WARD 

Mary M. Standifer 

KATE WARD. The Kate Ward was the first steamboat to operate on the Colorado River. In June 1844 the La Grange Intelligencer announced that a local merchant, Samuel Ward, was to build a steamboat for use on the Colorado. The engine and other equipment had already been bought in Pittsburg and were to be shipped to Matagorda by July 15. The boat would be assembled at the head of the raft, which obstructed navigation on the lower part of the river, and was to be in operation by November 1. The article praised Ward for his part in selling the stock of the Colorado Navigation Company, which had been rechartered in January 1844 for the purpose of clearing the raft. Plans for construction of the steamer evidently changed, however, for the next relevant notice of a steamboat concerns the launching of the Kate Ward at Matagorda, near the mouth of the Colorado, on June 21, 1845. The vessel was said be owned by "Messrs. [George W.] Ward and Robinson" or by "Mr. Ward and Co. of Matagorda and a Mr. Robertson of Columbus." The Kate Ward, named for Ward's sister, was described as 110 feet long, twenty-four feet across at the beam, and capable of carrying 600 bales of cotton. It was reckoned that with such a cargo she would draw three feet of water, but at her launching she was said to draw only five inches. The reporter expressed the hope of going along "before many months . . . on her first trip up to Columbus and La Grange." Further work on the vessel, therefore, may have been necessary. Several months later, an identical announcement in two Houston newspapers reported that the Kate Ward, which was "intended to ply between the head of the raft and the landings above," was "nearly completed." She was expected to make her first trip in eight to ten days. Before she tried to reach Columbus, however, it was felt that many snags downriver from that town would need to be cleared out. Somehow the Kate Ward managed to get past the raft; she arrived in Austin on March 8, 1846, her first and only visit to the capital. On March 11 she took a party of excursionists, including citizens, legislators, and United States Army personnel, several miles upriver to visit Mormon Falls. At this time the boat was described as being a side-wheel steamer, 115 feet long and twenty-four feet wide at the beam, with two engines rated at seventy horsepower each and a draft, "with wood, water, etc.," of eighteen inches. The steamer stayed above the raft from 1846 to 1848. At the head of the raft, cargoes were loaded on wagons for the ten to twenty mile trip to Matagorda, where they were reloaded on ocean-going vessels for shipment. High water on the Colorado in the summer of 1848 cut a temporary channel around the raft, and the Kate Ward descended to Matagorda Bay.

From 1848 or 1849 to 1850, at least, the Kate Ward was in use on the Guadalupe River, where another steamer, the Victoria, seems to have preceded her. The town of Victoria contracted with two brothers, Iso and William J. Ward, to clear drift from the Guadalupe and to provide transportation from Victoria to the bay. The Wards were offered $40,000 for the work of clearance and for making twenty-five trips between Victoria and the bay before June 1850. They employed the Kate Ward, which apparently reached Victoria in early 1849. By June 1850 she had made thirty trips and at that time was completing the round trip from Victoria to Cavallo Pass in forty-eight hours. In 1852 W. T. Ward used the Kate Ward as a snag boat on the Colorado, where he succeeded in clearing a twenty-mile stretch from the mouth upstream. The owner of the boat at this time seems to have been the Colorado Navigation Company. A company stockholders' meeting in October 1852 noted that the Kate Ward was then in Matagorda Bay and in need of repairs after Ward's work on the river. The United States government bought the Kate Ward in July 1853 and had her repaired that fall. In November she was back on the Colorado, where United States Army engineers used her to help dig a channel around the raft. What later became of the steamer is unknown.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: 

Comer Clay, "The Colorado River Raft," Southwestern Historical Quarterly 52 (April 1949). Houston Morning Star, October 30, 1845. La Grange Intelligencer, June 13, 1844, July 7, 1845. Brownson Malsch, Indianola-The Mother of Western Texas (Austin: Shoal Creek, 1977). Telegraph and Texas Register, November 5, 1845. Texas Democrat, March 11, 14, 1846. Texas National Register, July 10, 1845. Texas State Gazette, October 9, 1852, January 22, 1853. Vertical Files, Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, University of Texas at Austin (Steamboats). 

The Kirkland 1888

Wikipedia offered this about The Kirkland -

The Kirkland was built in 1888 by T.W. Lake for the Jackson Street Cable Railway Company.^[1] Once complete, Kirkland was placed on the Juanita– Kirkland–Houghton–Leschi Park route.^[1] Kirkland was considered the prestige vessel on Lake Washington at the time it was built.^[1][2] In 1889 Kirkland carried the U.S. Naval Commission on a tour of the lake when they were considering whether a shipping canal was possible. 1891 Kirkland conveyed President Benjamin Harrison around the lake when he came to Seattle.<sup>[3][4]

In 1898 Kirkland was dismantled, converted to a barge and sent north to Alaska.[1]
 ------------</sup>

Newell, ed., McCurdy Marine History, at 43. Wright, E. W. (1895). Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest. Portland, Oregon: Lewis & Dryden Printing Co. p. 353.

Newell and Williamson, Pacific Steamboats, at 132.

Kline and Bayless, Ferryboats – A Legend on Puget Sound, at 144-145.

Drop by Sepia Saturday this week to see what others have to share on the topic...

Sevierville, TN, Rogers family roots Part 1

I found the place where I think the Rogers family originally settled in Sevier County, Tennessee, before it even became a state.  Of course anyone who lives in Sevierville that's also a descendant of the Rev. Elijah Rogers family, may know much better than what I'm piecing together today.

The original Rogers land was at the junction of the French Broad River and the Little Pigeon River, in what is now Sevierville TN.

The Litte Pigeon River has several forks, so I used a Google map to find the island which had a cousin's name, McCroskey.  In the 1950s Joe Sharp (genealogist) let my grandfather, George Rogers, know that the original property was currently where a cousin McCroskey lived.

Google maps showed me McCroskey Island, and McCroskey Island Rd, but didn't say what was on the island.  A small mobile home park is on a loop of homes, but as I crossed the bridge to the island (above) I found bunch of industrial buildings.  There was a wide open gate, and no signs about not to enter, so I did.

 I drove past some guys standing in garage doorways, and I probably wasn't welcome here, but I just pretended to be a lost tourist, got to the French Broad River, took it's picture, and left.

And as I left McCroskey Island, I noticed two things, the pipe going across the bridge, and the smell. This was probably a sewage treatment plant!  What a laugh I had, at thinking this was the ancestral home.

I looked up on a hill and saw a large plantation style home, and will hope that this is where the McCroskeys and the Rogers lived...rather than the flood-prone island.  Of course with the dams that the TVA built, there are probably few floods these days.

Then I went searching for the graves...I'll continue this story soon.

I'll be back...soon