A Photo Has Suprisingly Emerged…..Sadly Not What Has Been Hoped For
By occasionally examining genealogy web-pages for current postings I find more and more individuals interested in the Jones side of the family adding their family lines. Many are tracking back to the Tates and even parallel branches in the 16 to 1700 time period. Not quite as many individual contributors are concentrating on our Jones line of that period, which by the way is becoming a bit more clouded over time. There seems to be a second wife and more children attached to one Willis M. Jones, my generations Great-Great Grandfather, that not all contributors are validating in their data, as well as the place of his death, be it North Carolina or Tennessee. But that’s a story for another time and it is something that helps to occupy my time in attempting to sort out the differences.But this posting involves a later generation, that of our Grandfather Alfred Hines Jones and specifically his Mother’s line, Martha Elizabeth Moulder, and her parents, Samuel Tennessee Moulder (1801-1888) and his wife Nancy Luster (1811-1899).
Denver Cemetery
Carroll County, Arkansas
The Resting Place of Many of the Moulder Family
Twenty miles to the northwest of HarrisonWhere our great grandparents, Samuel Tennessee Moulder and his wife Nancy Luster Are buried along with many succeeding generations of the Moulder family. County and family records record the name of the burial cemetery, but the grave markers have since been lost.
Don and I as well as Juanita and of course Chuck and Bernie share a distant and almost unknown grandmother. Martha Elizabeth Moulder. She is at rest in a remote Boone County Cemetery, some three or four miles to the west of Harrison, Arkansas. Of course she is not totally unknown, but we know so little of her in actuality. But she definitely is from a past that we may have trouble relating to for our real family lines were never really shared in depth with us as we grew up. A picture of her grave marker is shown here. I hope to someday have an additional marker placed before the current one rusts away in place.
Grave of
Martha Elizabeth Moulder
1850 - 1894
Denning Cemetery
Boone County, Arkansas
As mentioned the purpose of this post is to share some related information regarding our Grandmother, Martha, wife of Alfred Hines Jones, and the mother of our father Charles F. Jones Sr.
While browsing thru internet resources I have recently come across a real surprise to me personally. A picture, sadly not of our Grandmother Martha Elizabeth Moulder, but that of her older sister of two years, born in 1848, Amanda Melvina Moulder. Both these sisters were born in Tennessee prior to the family moving to the Harrison, Arkansas area. All the family of fifteen children were born in Tennessee prior to moving to Arkansas sometime in the 1860’s, perhaps early 1870 simply based on census data. Some had left home prior to the family’s migration west to Arkansas but at least half of the family were still with their parents in the 1870 census in Harrison. Our Grandmother Martha Elizabeth Moulder was one that came to Boone County and then on to neighboring Carroll County with her parents where she and her remaining siblings were raised.
The Jones families migrated to Arkansas from Georgia, one branch to the Conway area, the other two branches to the north of Conway to Harrison assumedly after the death of their Father Samuel Jones, and at about the same time the Moulder family arrived. Our Great-Grandfather died in 1870 in Gordon County Georgia, near Ellijay, the birthplace of our Grandfather A.H. Jones.
Shown here is a photo of what is our Grand Aunt, an older sister of our Grandmother Martha Elizabeth Moulder, Amanda Melvina Moulder. She was married to one Samuel Thomas Roark, in Arkansas in December of 1870 according to internet sources and they finished their lives in New Mexico and were buried in Tucumcari. I judge the photo to be taken in the 1880-1895 time period when Amanda was about 32 to 47 years old. No it certainly is not a picture of our Grandmother, but it might suffice for the moment as a hint of what our Grandmother may have looked like.
Amanda Melvina Moulder Roark
1848 – 1924
Probably taken about 1880 -1895
32-47 years of age
Sister of Martha Elizabeth Moulder
A correspondence with a great-granddaughter of Amanda Moulder that resides somewhere in California that posted the photo to the Internet has been started. She suggests that there are many more family photos that were passed on to her that very well might contain a view of our Grandmother Martha. I have no great expectations here but I do have hope and perhaps someday she just might be able to come forth with such a photo. After all, we do have a photo of our Grandfather A.H. Jones and it certainly would be fitting if by some chance we might also some day acquire a photo of our Grandmother. Wishful thinking actually but it remains to be seen.
If you remain a bit confused about your family lines at the moment a family tree still exists at
http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0BxPVuWItV_l5MzAzOWMyZWYtNGNlZS00ZWU3LTg1ZDQtZGZkNzQyYWMwMDJl&hl=en
It has to be accessed via a permission list of e-mail addresses of family members. If you are unable to access the Family Tree let me know and I will add you to the list. It probably needs updating but for any immediate purposes it should provide you with an idea of just where you are positioned regarding this current discovery.
A small discovery but yet important for it does fit the overall puzzle of who, where and when we came from.