Where in Sam Hill is Snow Hill ?

In the middle of it all............... ?

   

 

At The Center Of The Map Is Catoosa County, Georgia. Immediately To The Right Of The Highway 27 Indicator Is Where I Speculate Our Great-Grandfather, Samuel Jones, Was Farming At The Time The Civil War Came To North Georgia

 

It has always been my desire to be able to traipse across the land that our ancestors lived on as far back as possible but that is not a simple task.  The Irish side would really be a daunting undertaking even if one steps foot on Irish soil.  The basic question arises in that case,  just where did the families live?  We really have no idea today other than records that at least provide us with two counties in Ireland and nothing more.  I seem to have found where our grandfather raised his family in Arkansas, within a reasonable guess at least, but the search for our Great-Grandfather Samuel Jones's  property is proving to be a bit more difficult.   We certainly know where our own mother was born and raised and where the Canadian roots of the family are to be located, but the actual land records for the property holdings of Samuel Jones, in the antebellum south have not been uncovered in current times.  The records I am sure still exist, it is but a matter of searching out the sources of the records.

In attempting to locate Captain Samuel Jones in his late years by concentrating on finding any record of the man in the 1860 census contains one vital clue to aid finding his property just prior to the Civil War. The census district he is residing in is labeled "Snow Hill" and is about 50 miles to the west of his former home in Gilmer County where most of his children were born and raised. In viewing old maps found online Snow Hill lies but a few short miles to the south of the current Chickamauga National Battlefield Park.

 

Catoosa County, 1864

Snow Hill (Post Office) Is Just To Left Of Center Along The Road South To Lafayette. In This Map The Jones Property Would Lie Along The Road And Almost On The Dotted County Boundary Line Below The Snow Hill Label.

 

 This location in all probability is his final land holdings of any great value.  To find his actual county land records in old historical county records may be problematic but I do hope to accomplish that someday.  If not, then perhaps this article will provide enough hints to allow some other future Jones descendant with an interest in history to track down the records. Just what year Samuel left Gilmer County and landed in Catoosa County will help to narrow down the years of County records to search.  One might assume that the death of his wife Narcissa in 1852 may have influenced his decision to settle elsewhere, perhaps in 1853 when according to some family historians his final term of office as Justice of the Peace in Gilmer County expired.  

 

Another clue in helping to place some credibility on what speculations I make later in this writing also comes from some early family historians, namely Nancy Hicks in collaboration with Kristin Ingram. It concerns some difficulties Samuel and one of his offspring, his daughter Elizabeth, encountered during the Civil War.  It is anecdotal evidence uncovered by these two latter day family descendants regarding some of the experiences Samuel's daughter Elizabeth Jones Steele.  This of course is a sister of our Grandfather, Alfred Hines Jones. Elizabeth married Robert Jefferson Steele in Gilmer County in 1851 a year before the death of her mother.  Kristin Ingram, recently of Oregon, and Nancy Hicks of the Atlanta area are the first and only family historians I have come across on the internet. Just who or what was the actual source of the tale of Elizabeth I suspect is anecdotal information passed down through other family branches and Nancy compiled a summary of what had been shared with her.  Again I only suspect this is the source. Nancy Hicks in her own right is a very methodical and determined researcher and she very well may have discovered most of what we are now learning of the North Georgia Jones clans.  The narrative regarding Samuel and his daughter tends to lend credence to the possible location of the Jones property at the time of the war. The real source for the details of the story is unknown and can only be accredited to Nancy Hicks most likely. It states that she fled to Georgia to her father's home which certainly was located in the midst of much of the Chickamauga battle activity if the location defined here proves out to be the correct property. The veracity of the entire story may be questionable for it seems to incorporate some of the worst circumstances that did happen during the entire war but all this to one person? That to me is questionable but it very well may be very true .  

 

The narrative regarding Samuel and his daughter Elizabeth is copied as follows:  

 

From Nancy Hicks, Elizabeth Jones born October 20, 1835 in Gilmer County, Georgia. She married a Robert Steele who was born in Marengo County [Alabama ?] in 1835. He was a plantation owner in Alabama; the family owned many acres of cotton and more than a hundred slaves. In about 1852 he married Elizabeth Jones.

 

Robert and Elizabeth had two daughters and a son: Alice, born in 1853; Blanche, born in 1858, who married Dr. Thomas Moss in Arkansas; and Jefferson who married Minerva and reared Alice's orphaned children.  Robert was a Captain in the Confederate army. He was stricken with red measles in 1863 and died in Confederate camp. Elizabeth stayed on the plantation with her father-in-law, Samuel Steele, until Union Army troops came through Alabama, burned down the house and took the male slaves with them, driving off the African women. They also killed father in law Samuel Steele with a sword because he wouldn't reveal where he had buried the family jewelry and silver.

 

Elizabeth and her children moved to slave cabins and labored in the fields to try to bring in the cotton crop, but new troops came by and set fire to the cotton plants. Elizabeth then took her children and escaped to her father's home in Georgia as a refugee. But their new safe haven lay in the path of Sherman's March, and the Georgia home was burned to the ground.

 

Elizabeth's last refuge was property her family owned in Arkansas. She went there with her children and settled near Conway [sometime after 1870], where she created a small cotton empire. Elizabeth's and Robert's daughter Alice, born in Alabama in 1853, married Brownlow Fletcher Stephens in Harrison, Arkansas in July 1875. Alice and Brownlow had six children. Elizabeth Blanche who married Robert Leonard Metcalfe and had children Daisy, Elizabeth and Thomas. They moved to Alabama eventually; Alexander; Sidney; Samuel; Eugene and Daisy Alice. Brownlow owned a large cotton plantation in Arkansas. He and Alice died in a yellow fever epidemic in Conway Arkansas about 1889, leaving their young children in the care of Alice’s brother, Dr. Jefferson Steele and his wife Minerva.  

 

Some of the details in the story may be embellished. I wonder of the veracity of the death of her father-in-law by a soldiers sword. Of course it very well may have happened that way but it all needs further proof.  The sentence regarding fleeing to her father’s home does make sense and is the clue that I focus on here for it reveals events that fit the location found.

 

In 1870, Elizabeth and her children were still living with her father and her brother, Alfred Hines, in the Calhoun area of Gordon County to the southeast of the Chickamauga location by some 30 miles.  This also seems to be the area that one of Samuel’s brothers, Rev. John Calvin Jones, settled in after the close of the war.  The Reverend was a staunch Unionist and stayed out of the South during the war.   

 

Samuel’s census entry for 1870 regarding his wealth, reveals a very meager amount, and is in sharp contrast to what the 1860 pre-war census reflected.  I seriously doubt that he owned any property at all in 1870 although his census data states he has real estate valued at $100 and his daughter Elizabeth is noted as owning $225 in real estate property.  

 

This story led me to delve into the history of the battle of Chickamauga.  In reading the official military correspondence of September 1863 leading up to and during the battle, between various units, Federal and Confederate, it certainly drives home the dangers of what our Great-Grandfather may have faced during the time of the conflicts around and to the South of Chattanooga. Most of the operations of that famous battle primarily occurred in the adjacent counties of Catoosa and Walker in North Georgia, in the very location our Great-Grandfather had relocated to sometime between 1853 and 1860. The area of Snow Hill named on maps of the time for it was a location of an area Post Office and probably not an organized community of much size.  

 

What follows is conjecture but I do find it somewhat credible but not entirely factual for the moment but I do think that what I present here may help others in the future really pinpoint the location of Samuel Jones at the time the Union Forces began their moves into Georgia in order to put down the rebellion that had erupted in the Southern States.  The Battle of Chickamauga resulted in a Confederate victory bringing about a replacement of the Union Commander by General U.S. Grant and he in turn chose General Sherman to lead the attack on Atlanta and eventually begin the famous March to the Sea.  

 

Samuel may have evacuated to other places, probably to Gordon County, to the southeast of his property by some 30 miles, shortly before all the action began to occur around his property.  Or maybe he was stubborn and remained in place and did endure some physical hardship as units of both armies marched across his property or along the Lafayette road in front of his home for several days as they were maneuvering and reconnoitering north and south but two or three miles south of the final battle location.  That road and the Snow Hill site are mentioned several times in the Official Report of the Civil War produced in the late 1800's by the U.S. Government as a compilation of all the dispatches, orders and maps of both sides during the entire war.  This extremely lengthy record now available currently in CD format has provided a surprise finding, not proven, but certainly a very possible connection to the Jones family history. 

 

Chickamauga, Snow Hill, Lafayette and numerous other places in the neighborhood of what might be considered an educated guess as to the location of the farm of Samuel Jones are mentioned time and again in the messages of various military commanders during the time leading up to the battle and during the battle itself.  Even later in 1864 when Sherman began his final and crushing advance out of Chattanooga to the south, the area of Snow Hill and the Lafayette road are again along the route of march of portions of the Union Forces on the move towards Atlanta. 

 

More than likely Samuel in 1864 was long before situated to the south in Gordon County, in the area of Calhoun where he lived out his final years until his death in 1870.  But even the area around Calhoun witnessed Sherman's invasion.  Sam Jones truly was in the path of the war from the very beginning of action in North Georgia in 1863.  Snow Hill no longer exists on today's maps and I have been unable to find any historical references to it in any other available internet sources. But it does appear on at least one Military map found within the Official Record of The Civil War concerning the Battle of Chickamauga. The map reveals what I feel might very well be the location of Samuel Jones's property, the property he settled on sometime in the 1850's.

 

The following map, but a portion of a larger map, is clipped from the Official Record and contains an obscure notation on the location of a lone farmhouse just to the south of what would be the location of Snow Hill at the beginning of the Civil War. The map gives references to the known owners of various enterprises and homes. What apparently is a farmhouse that caught my attention on the map is noted as belonging to "W. Jones". The initial "W" could stand for William or Wendell or any other number of given names, but I contend it could also stand for "Widow" or "Widower". The term "Widow" can be found on several other similar maps within the Official Record but usually it is spelled out in full and not just an initial. Towards the left-bottom of the map another Jones name is noted which in all likelihood provided the need for the map maker to draw some distinction between the two locations. Thus the addition of the initial "W" to one location.

 

The question comes down to what was the initial meant to signify. Since census data states Samuel Jones living in Catoosa County, and the other Jones location to the south being in Walker County it is easy to focus on the location labeled "W Jones". So I need to point out here that what I speculate on is nothing more that just that, speculation and at best an educated guess. Thus the need to seek out the Real Estate Records of the period.

 

   

 

 

W. Jones Or Is It Samuel Jones. This Map Made Almost A Year After The Battle Of Chickamauga Showing Some of the Route That Sherman And His Troops Followed On The Way To Attack Atlanta

 

A brief phone call to the Catoosa County Courthouse made a few years back leads me to believe that the records most certainly do exist but of course they are probably not easily accessed nor indexed since they are deposited in remote storage areas used by the county for old records. It might require a diligent effort to locate the actual property description for the land of Samuel Jones, the land he owned when the war came to Georgia, and that he lost ownership to as the war ended.  How he lost it all his property is again speculation as presented here but most certainly he suffered the loss in the same manner so many Southern land owners did, most likely through an inability to pay taxes or possible penalties placed on land owners after the War. The period of Reconstruction in the South was not really meant to be a time of forgiveness for those that believed in the Confederate cause and in so many cases it was really a period of plunder. In the case of our Great-Grandfather we can only apply the lessons of the history of the period for now and from that viewpoint it isn't difficult to assume the very worst.

Bond of Office, Sheriff Samuel Jones, Gilmer County, Georgia, 1844-1845

Nancy Hicks, a Jones family researcher, forwarded this to me in January of 2011.  It is a copy of the bond that Samuel Jones signed to ensure he faithfully carried out the duties of the office of Sheriff of Gilmer County, Georgia for his elected term in office of 1844-1845.
 

A transcription of the document follows as best as can be deciphered follows below.

 

Copy of original bond as provided by Nancy Hicks

 

Samuel Jones Sheriff Bond For 1844-1845

Georgia, Know all men by these presents that we Samuel Jones, John P. Alexander, Joseph Garren and John P. Fouts, are held and firmly bound unto his Excellency George W. Crawford Governor and Commander in Chief of the army and navy of this State and of the Militia thereof, in the full sum of Twenty Thousand Dollars to be paid to said George W. Crawford or his successor in office, Governor of the said State for the time being, for which payment well and truly to be made and ?, We bind ourselves and our heirs Executors ADVISERS and each and everyone of THEIR saintly and SEVERELY FIRMLY by these presents,

Sealed with our seal and dated the third day of February 1844.  Where as the above bound Samuel Jones on the first day of January 1844 elected Sheriff of the County of Gilmer in the said State. Now the conditions of the above obligation is such that if the said Samuel Jones shall well and truly do and perform all and SINGULAR the duties required of him in virtue of his said office of Sheriff of the County of Gilmer as aforesaid according to law and the trust reposed in him then the above obligation to be void otherwise to remain in full force and virtue.

Sealed and delivered in presence of  

H.K. Osborn J.J.C. L-----? Stephens J.J.C. Samuel Jones John P. Alexander Joseph Garren John P. Fouts

Registered the 26^th February 1844, R.B. Perry clerk

Georgia Connections

One might think that I tend to dwell on the "seedy or unseemly" side of our family history, but it is not intentional I can assure you and I certainly look at what I present here as far from seedy, it is just how people had to survive during difficult times. What is detailed here and an affair of another Willis Jones relative in Texas do tend to paint an unfair picture of what our ancestral family has experienced over time but I just find the stories interesting and worthy of sharing.  I tend to look at any story coming out of the past regarding all branches of the family as just contributing to the overall story fabric of the family regardless of any remote attachment one might feel. Life is what it is and we certainly have no control of what has happened in the past. Some might find this meaningless but some time in the future others might feel very much otherwise. The goal from my perspective is to find and record as much as I possibly can, and the attached story is something that needs to be saved and explained.

The real objective of this posting is to attempt to relate that the Jones family still has roots remaining in Georgia and that not all happened, began and ended with our family line originating in Arkansas with nothing else known of even earlier beginnings.  Over time we very well may be able to someday make direct connections with other remote lines in North Carolina.  Surely they are there, but to find the actual proof will take time.

The individual Jones distant relative mentioned in the attached newspaper article from the Atlanta Constitution newspaper of February of 1921 happens to be a second cousin to Charles F. Jones Sr., and through that connection certainly a shirt tail relative to all his descendants. The man is Wills A. Jones from the line of Jones's that remained in North Georgia after the Civil War, in the Northeast part of the State near the South Carolina border where first substantial documentation of our ancestors migrations can be found. Much of that portion of the State was carved out of the former lands of the Cherokee Indians after their unjust removal from their ancestral territory to Oklahoma in the first half of the nineteenth century. Our Jones family members of the time witnessed and some even participated to some degree in that tragic story now labeled as the "Trail of Tears" that occurred at the insistence of President Andrew Jackson and his administration.









Just what the level of contact between relatives residing in Georgia, Texas and Arkansas was at the time is not really known but some contact was obviously maintained.  One or two family photos taken of our Arkansas Jones family that survived within the belongings of our line were also found in the belongings of some of the Georgia Jones’s and were shared with me proving that they did correspond and were exchanging family photos during the latter part of the 1800’s.

The following photo was found in the old family suitcase filled with pictures from both sides of the family.  The photo is of Alfred Hines Jones and his brother Samuel Tate Jones, both living in the Harrison, Arkansas area when the photo was taken probably in the 1870 –1880 time period.  This very same photo was forwarded to me by one Nancy Hicks of Atlanta and was passed on down thru her family or other North Georgia Jones descendants. 







Adding to our obvious connections to other North Georgia Jones family descendants the following photo of the Alfred Hines Jones family of Harrison, Arkansas was also passed on down thru some vague but obviously family members and also shared with me by Nancy Hicks.  This photo did not survive within our cache of photos.  Based on the youngest child Ruth having been born in 1894 the year is probably 1895 – 1896.  The oldest daughter Mary Lou in the back row was probably the surrogate mother to the young children since her step-mother, Martha Elizabeth Moulder, second wife of A.H. Jones had died shortly after the birth of Ruth in 1894.  The other stepdaughter, Esther Almira Jones had married and left Harrison in early 1895.  She died quite young in Renton, Washington in 1901, apparently the very first member of the family to step foot in Puget Sound country.







The given name Willis in the Jones line extends into lines of three Jones brothers that migrated into Georgia in the early 1800’s from the Northwestern part of South Carolina in present day Anderson County, very near the Georgia border.  There was a total of five brothers known of and only the three, Samuel, William and John Calvin Jones have left any trace of their existence that can be followed up to current times.  The migrations of the times seemed to be of rather short distances as men and families would establish in new areas and raise their families.  Our particular ancestor, one of the three brothers, Samuel Jones, moved farther west in Georgia two more times in his life to the far western side of the State.  One brother, William and his descendants remained in place, in what is now Lumpkin County, Georgia and brother John Calvin is a difficult migration story to follow but for the most part after some confusing movements prior to and during the Civil War (he was of Northern sympathies) he and his descendants ended up in Gordon County, Georgia to the Northwest of Atlanta.  Gordon County is where our Great Grandfather Samuel died in 1870 where he had settled after the Civil War following the loss of his land further North in Georgia near the Chattanooga Battlefield. 

But the Willis Jones focused on in the attached newspaper article is from the area of original family settling, the Northeast part of the state where it seems there are still distant relatives well established there even today.  At this point I cannot be certain if the Jones surname has survived to current generations however, but through marriages the area is probably well represented with various descendants.  As the article suggests the area was a popular area for the making of moonshine liquor over the years and to some degree it may be so even today.  But this Willis Jones died protecting his source of income which many families in the area did as well in order to support their families when the times demanded such activity.

I made a brief internet contact two years ago with a descendant in the Atlanta area that had studied and researched the Jones line quite extensively and she is the one that discovered the connection of the current descendants back to the original three brothers.  She diligently followed up on many sources in Georgia and South Carolina and eventually was able to tie her ancestor John Calvin’s line in Gordon County to William and his descendants in Lumpkin County.  This connection then easily led to the connection to our Samuel Jones and what can now be found online primarily at Ancestry.com presents some fairly well documented family lines that we most certainly are connected to.  This researcher hinted at the involvement in the  moonshine business of some Jones descendants over time and just recently another descendant found and posted the attached article to Ancestry.com and what is attached here is copied from that posting.  This tends to definitely prove out what the lady had hinted at in some of our correspondence.

But the story is probably not the only such story to come out of that part of Georgia but it is definitely part of the fabric of what I try to pursue.

Samuel Jones, Incorporation Commissioner

 

This is the last of a few references found for Samuel Jones in the Georgia online Archives.  It really reveals little about the man other than maybe how he was held in some esteem in the Ellijay and Gilmer County area.  I may have the interpretation of all this somewhat skewed but what follows is my brief take on what this is all about.

Ellijay at the center of the Map

It appears that this is an act of the Georgia Legislature during the 1853 and 1854 session enabling the incorporation of a Railroad Company and permitting it to sell stock in the State in order to finance construction.  Ellijay apparently may have been a terminal point on the new railroad or at least it was an area of some sort of importance to the endeavor.  As I understand the document Samuel Jones is among several men appointed as some sort of trustees or commissioners and assigned the task of overseeing the incorporation of the company and monitoring the proper handling of investors money.  Admittedly it is rather a dry document to read through but this is how I summarize the legislation and the role our Great-Grandfather played.

The act is dated February of 1854 and helps to establish a more accurate date that Samuel Jones sold off his Gilmer County property and moved more to the west in North Georgia, to what was known then as the Snow Hill community in Catoosa County.  Right smack-dab in the middle of some of the worst fighting of the Civil War in the Western Theatre of operations.  Actually in the middle of what became General Sherman’s eventual Military playground so to speak.  Samuel’s wife Narcissa Tate Jones had died in 1852 and this document establishes that he waited at least two years or more before making his move out of Ellijay.

I have tried to highlight the mention of Samuel’s name but online blog editing can sometimes be rather hit and miss.  I hope I succeeded.

A GALILEO Digital Initiative Database

Georgia Legislative Documents

Content of Act/Resolution

---

ACTS OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF GEORGIA, PASSED IN MILLEDGEVILLE, AT A BIENNIAL SESSION, IN NOVEMBER, DECEMBER, JANUARY, AND FEBRUARY. 1853-4. COMPILED, AND NOTES ADDED, By JOHN RUTHERFORD.

PART II.--PRIVATE AND LOCAL LAWS.
INTERNAL TRANSPORTATION. RAIL AND PLANK ROADS AND RIVERS*

* See No. 500, Broad River, Commissioners for; and Ohoopie River, Commissioners for.

†

† See No. 348, for Habersham and Union Telegraph Company incorporated.

UGUSTA AND [Illegible Text] RAIL ROAD COMPANY.
[Illegible Text] [Illegible Text] AND ZEBULON RAIL ROAD CHANGED TO [Illegible Text] FRANKLIN AND OXFORD RAIL ROAD.
CHARLESTON AND SAVANNAH RAIL ROAD.
CHATTAHOOCHEE RIDGE RAIL ROAD.
COLUMBUS AND HAMILTON RAIL ROAD.
COLUMBUS AND WEST POINT RAIL ROAD.
COOSA AND CHATTOOGA RAIL ROAD.
DALTON AND COPPER MINE TURNPIKE, PLANK AND RAIL ROAD COMPANY.
DALTON AND ALABAMA LINE RAIL ROAD.
EATONTON AND COVINGTON RAIL ROAD COMPANY.
EATONTON AND MONTICELLO RAIL ROAD COMPANY.
ELIJAY RAIL ROAD COMPANY AND THOMASTON RAIL ROAD.

1853 Vol. 1 -- Page: 425

Sequential Number: 453
Law Number: (No. 363.)

Full Title: An Act to open and construct a Rail Road, commencing at some point between Marietta and Calhoun, to be determined by a majority of the Stockholders herein incorporated, and thence the most practicable route, by Elijay, in Gilmer County, to the, or near the, Mouth of Fightingtown Creek, at the Copper Mines, in the County of Gilmer; also, to incorporate the Thomaston and West Point, and Thomaston and Milledgeville Rail Road Company.

 

WHEREAS, There are large developments of Copper Ore now raised and raising at or near the mouth of Fighting town Creek, on both sides of the State line, between Georgia and Tennessee, which cannot be shipped to places of manufacture without the aid of a Rail Road through that section of the country:

 

SECTION I. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Georgia in General Assembly met, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That for the purpose of opening and constructing a Rail Road communication, from the Western and Atlantic Rail Road, beginning at some point on said Road, at or between Marietta and Calhoun, to be determined by a majority of the Stockholders herein after incorporated, and thence the most practicable route by the way of Elijay, in Gilmer County, to or near the mouth of Fighting town Creek, in Gilmer County, at or near the Copper Mines; the subscribers for the

---

Page: 426

capital stock, herein after mentioned, and their assigns, shall be a body politic and corporate, by the name and style of the Elijay Rail Road Company, and by said corporate name shall be capable in law to purchase, accept, hold and convey real and personal estate; make contracts, sue and be sued, and to make by-laws, and to do all lawful acts properly incident to a corporation and necessary and proper for the construction of the works and transaction of the business for which said Company are incorporated; and to have and use a common seal, and the same to alter and destroy at pleasure.
[Sidenote: Elijay Rail Road Company.]
[Sidenote: Powers, rights, &c.]

 

SEC. II. And be it further enacted, That the capital stock of said Company shall be five hundred thousand dollars, but shall be liable to be increased from time to time, and by such sum or sums as may be deemed expedient, by the majority of the Board of Directors of said Company for the time being: Provided, That said capital stock shall not be so increased as to exceed in the whole the sum of one million and one half of dollars; And it is also enacted, That the Board of Directors for the time being, shall be authorized to prescribe the terms of subscription, for such additional capital stock as may from time to time be required.
[Sidenote: Capital.]
[Sidenote: [Illegible Text]]
[Sidenote: [Illegible Text] [Illegible Text]]

 

SEC. III. And be it enacted, That for the original capital stock of five hundred thousand dollars, books of subscription shall be opened at Elijay, in Gilmer County, by the following Commissioners, who are hereby authorized and made competent to do all acts incident to the said office, to wit: Benjamin Johnston, Peter Patterson, Joseph Patterson, Beverly A. Freeman, Lorenzo Gudger, Robert [Illegible Text] Jasper Johnson, Williamson Forrester and   Samuel Jones;   and if any of said Commissioners should refuse to act, others in their places shall be appointed by the remaining Commissioners; and there shall be no more than seven Commissioners at the above named place; at any time after giving twenty days notice of the day and place in two or more public places in said County, shall open said books of subscription. And Andrew J. Hansell, David Irvin and William P. Young, Commissioners at Marietta, Georgia; and John Burk, Hawkins F. Price and William T. Wofford, Commissioners at Cassville, Georgia; David Knot, William M. Peoples and William H. Dabney, Commissioners at Calhoun, Georgia; and Basil H. Overby, James M. Calhoun and L. C. Simpson, Commissioners at Atlanta, Georgia; and Robert J. Cowart, Andrew H. Shuford and William P. Hammond, Commissioners at Canton, Georgia, shall open books of subscription at said several places, under the same rules and regulations as are provided in this Act for the Commissioners at Elijay, in Gilmer County, Georgia; and receive, from individuals, companies or corporations, subscriptions for any number of shares, not exceeding two hundred shares to any one individual, company or corporation, Banking Companies excepted; and no subscription shall be received and allowed unless there shall be paid the Commissioners at the time of subscribing the sum of five dollars on each share subscribed; for which the Commissioners shall give the subscriber a certificate, setting forth the number of shares taken by such subscriber, and amount per share paid thereon; and if after ten days the shares are not taken they may be subscribed

---

Page: 427

for without limiting the number of shares; and said books of subscription shall remain open for sixty days, or longer if necessary, at the discretion of the Commissioners, and when closed on the last day said Commissioners shall certify and sign to its being a correct list of said subscription, and thereupon make out a general list, setting forth the name of the subscribers, the number of shares taken by each subscriber, and the sum paid thereon, and if on summing up all the subscriptions the same shall appear to amount to the sum of two hundred thousand dollars, the said Company may be organized and go into operation; thereon and after the organization of the Company all future subscriptions for stock shall be by the Board of Directors of the Company; and the said Company shall at once proceed to the measures as hereinafter subscribed [prescribed] for the organization of the Company.
[Sidenote: Subscriptions.]
[Sidenote: Commissioners, [Illegible Text] [Illegible Text] &c.]
[Sidenote: Shares taken, &c.]
[Sidenote: Books to remain open.]
[Sidenote: Other regulations.]

 

For the entire document follow this link:

 http://neptune3.galib.uga.edu/ssp/cgi-bin/legis-idx.pl?sessionid=7f000001&type=law&byte=28478547

Samuel Jones- Slave Owner, Farmer, Planter

It cannot be denied that our Great-Grandfather was a slave owner prior to the Civil War.  The following census Slave Schedules have been found online.  Even after the war he is quoted in one obscure document as stating that he believed in the Southern Cause and since he had a considerable amount of his assets invested in slaves, it is understandable that he had such sentiments, for reasons of wealth if for nothing else.

I do not believe a separate Slave Schedule for 1840 was created, at least I have no access to such online.  If it does exist surely it would be available.  Thus it is not known if Samuel Jones possessed any such property in 1840 but a few short years after arriving from Lumpkin County to the east of Ellijay.  Sadly, property was one of the terms of the time to describe slave ownership.  However by 1850 he had acquired five slaves as revealed in the 1850 census. 

Slaves were enumerated separately and listed under their owners name.  The schedule under Samuel’s name lists a mulatto couple, middle aged, and three younger males ranging in ages from 12 to 18.  The younger boys, being black, obviously were not children of the mulatto couple.  This was in the Ellijay area in Gilmer County, Georgia.  After his wife Narcissa died in 1852 the man for some reason had decided to leave Gilmer County and relocated to the northwest of Ellijay some 50 miles, closer to Chattanooga, in Catoosa County, Georgia,  very close to the southern Tennessee border.  This of course placed him in the direct path of the Civil War fighting as the Federal Armies chose his region of Georgia as the route to invade south towards Atlanta.  That has been documented in my previous effort explaining what is known of the comings and goings of the Jones family during the time leading up to, during, and after the Civil War.

1850 Census, Samuel Jones, Slave Schedule

Gilmer County, Georgia

The total number of slaves for Samuel Jones in the 1860 census reveals he is listed as owning six slaves ranging in age from 48 to 12, and but one female.  It appears that Samuel had been buying and selling in the preceding ten years for the ages alone do not match the ages of the five listed in 1850.  Apparently he had replaced all his 1850 slaves.  By no means was Samuel a major slave owner for maybe 25-100 slaves or more was considered a major holding at the time.  Most common farmers or plantation owners probably did not have any slaves.  To be an owner required capital and that was not really the norm in the day in my understanding.   Many farmers, like Samuel,  the ones that probably worked the fields day in and day out along side their slaves really looked at slaves as a necessity in order to bring any profit at all to the land.  Sadly, they were looked on probably as a modern farmer would look at a piece of mechanical farm equipment today.  It is only assumed however that Samuel also worked the fields but he assumedly had an amount of acreage that probably required him to work to some extent.

1860 Census, Samuel Jones, Slave Schedule

Catoosa County, Georgia

 

The average value of a slave in 1860 was about $500 and that depended on health, age, sex, and abilities of the individual slave.  Samuel does give some hint to their value in his actual family census entry in the listing of his assets.  That census reveals also that all his family had left home for it appears the other two members of his household were probably a caretaker and his wife employed by him.  This gives hint that the caretaker possibly was the one directing the slaves or perhaps he was just considered a field hand as well.  Samuel very well may not have been working alongside his slaves at the time but it is a mute point that can never be determined.  His daughter Elizabeth was married and living with her husband and his extended family in Alabama, assumedly someplace in North Central Alabama, up until the war but sometime during the war, between 1862 and 1865, she was forced to flee Alabama with her children and sought refuge with her father in Georgia.  That is another story in itself for she once again found herself in danger as the war commenced fighting in the very vicinity of her father’s home near the famous battle field of Chickamauga.

 

1860 Census, Samuel Jones Household,

Catoosa County, Georgia,

Near Chickamauga

1860 Census, Willis Jones Family,

Smith County, Texas,

Near Tyler

A.H. Jones in the Household, Attending School

In 1860 his son Alfred Hines was living with a brother, Willis and his family, in Smith County, Texas, very near Tyler in the eastern part of the state, and is listed in the 1860 census as a '”Student”.  After war broke out he obviously returned to his Father’s home in Catoosa County, Georgia, and enlisted in the Confederate Cavalry in the small town of Dalton in the nearby county of Whitfield.  Dalton would be an important area of battle later in the war when Sherman began his march south towards Atlanta.  Just when our Grandfather departed for Texas and why he chose to continue his education in Texas in the first place is not really known but I do find it rather curious to consider.  Regardless he headed back home to Georgia when the Confederate draft was about to begin in earnest.

Based on somewhat subjective formulas found on the web today, the total value of the Samuel’s holdings in today’s currency, is hard to determine.  I don’t consider him to have ever been extremely wealthy, but probably comfortably well off.  Perhaps his pre- Civil War holdings would amount to about $300, 000 today.  The eventual loss of most everything, if not all he held when war broke out, as revealed in his 1870 census entry must have been devastating to the man, and to all those around him. 

When looking at his story and that of his daughter Elizabeth during the war, and without knowing all the day to day happenings, it is easy to say that the surviving Jones family suffered greatly during and after the war.  He died in Gordon County, Georgia in 1870, in or near the small town of Calhoun.  Calhoun was some 30 direct miles to the southeast of the family home near Chickamauga.  It is easy to imagine the ordeal that Samuel must have endured during the period for with his slaves obviously gone and his daughter and what appears to be her four young children in tow, one of which must have been near infancy, he attempted to keep himself and his wards out of harms way.  Not knowing how and where they traveled in order to avoid the battles one can only speculate it had to have been a stressful situation for the community of Calhoun, where the man and his remaining family around him ended up was also directly along the path of the fighting.  From day to day, it is quite possible, based on typical family accounts of the time, that as they moved away from the scenes of battle, they simply placed themselves in the path of the next ensuing battle.  It must have been a terrible thing to have endured.

 

Do keep in mind that much of this is but speculation on my part.  However, based on a several years of reading of Civil War history, the theory of what happened is well within the realm of possibility.

Georgia Legislature 1836- Appointment of Samuel Jones- Gilmer County Road Commissioner

As mentioned in a previous posting, a biography of sorts was created by some family historian sometime in the mid to late 1900s.  Probably written by the unidentified shirt-tail relative that did much of the research that has survived on the internet.  A brief excerpt from that biography mentions the appointment of Samuel Jones to a Road Commission to build a connecting road to the Federal Highway to enable other North Georgia Counties to access the Federal North-South route from Atlanta to Tennessee. 

The paragraph reads:
“The legislation authorized  the construction of a road from Dahlonega, by way of Elijay, to the Federal Road in Murray County near the Summer house.  The act provided for three commissioners to lay the road out and complete its construction.  Samuel Jones, Isaiah Clayton, both of Gilmer County and Richard Bearden of Lumpkin served on the Commission to build it.” 

Recent access to the Georgia Archives online database has provided a copy of the very act of the legislature making the authorization for the road building.  This was in 1836 some two years before Samuel was elected to the State Legislature for the Gilmer County area in 1838 and 1839.  A downloaded copy of the act from the Archives follows.  His name is mentioned in section 2.

http://neptune3.galib.uga.edu/ssp/cgi-bin/legis-idx.pl?sessionid=7f000001&type=law&byte=16342387&lawcnt=143&filt=doc

---

Georgia Legislative Documents
Content of Act/Resolution

Act/Resolution 143 of 175

ACTS OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF GEORGIA, PASSED IN MILLEDGEVILLE AT AN ANNUAL SESSION IN NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER, 1836.

ACTS of the General Assembly of the STATE OF GEORGIA, PASSED IN NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER, 1836.

ROADS.

1836 Vol. 1 -- Page: 243
Sequential Number: 143

Type: AN ACT,

Full Title: To appropriate a sum of money, and to lay out and put in good order, a road from Dahlonega, in Lumpkin county, by way of Elijay, in Gilmer county, and on from thence to the Federal Road in Murray county, where the Commissioners may deem most expedient, and to appoint Commissioners to carry the same into effect.

Sec. 1st. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Georgia in General Assembly met, and it is hereby enacted by the authority of the same, That from and immediately after the passing of this act, the sum of ten thousand dollars, be appropriated out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, for the purpose of laying out and putting in good order, a road from Dahlonega in Lumpkin county, by way of Elijay, in Gilmer county, and on from thence to the Federal Road in Murray county, where the commissioners may deem expedient: Provided, the same is between Sumach creek and Coosawattee river.

Sec. 2d. And be it further enacted, That Michael Smith, and Richard Bearden, of the county of Lumpkin, and Samuel Jones and Joseph Clayton, of the county of Gilmer, and James McGee, of the county of Murray, be, and they are appointed Commissioners for said road, and they are hereby vested with full power and authority to contract for, and superintend the laying out and putting in good order, said road; and before they enter on the discharge of said duty, they and each of them shall severally enter into a bond with good and sufficient security, payable to the Governor for the time being, and his successors in office, in the sum of four thousand dollars each, for their, and each of their faithful performance, and discharge of their duty in contracting for said work, and for their, and each of their superintendence as aforesaid, in the application of the sum appropriated, or of such parts of the same as may severally come into their, or each of their possession, which said several bonds shall be taken and approved by the Justices of the Inferior Court, or majority of them, in the county in which the said Commissioners severally reside, to be by them transmitted to the Governor as aforesaid, and field in the Executive office: Provided, that no one Commissioner shall draw more than a proportionable part of the appropriation aforesaid, to the number of Commissioners aforesaid.

Sec. 3d. And be it further enacted, That upon the receipt of such bonds in conformity to the above and foregoing sections it shall be the duty of the Governor, to issue his warrants in favor of the Commissioners aforesaid, for the aforesaid sum of ten thousand dollars.

Sec. 4th. And be it further enacted, That if any of the aforesaid Commissioners shall refuse to serve, or execute such bond as provided for in this act, that the Justices of the Inferior Court, or a majority of them, in the county where such refusing Commissioner may reside, shall fill such vacancy by appointment, who shall give their bond and security as aforesaid.

Sec. 5th. And be it further enacted, That each Commissioner appointed and superintending as aforesaid, shall be entitled to compensation, at the rate of two dollars per day, for each and every day he shall be engaged in laying out and superintending the work in completion of the same: Provided, that no Commissioner shall receive pay for more than fifty days.

Sec. 6th. And be it further enacted, That it shall be the duty of said Commissioners or a majority of them, to report from time to time, to his Excellency the Governor, the state, condition, and progress of said work, and that said Road shall be completed within eighteen months from the passage of this act.

JOSEPH DAY,
Speaker of the House of Representatives,

ROBERT M. ECHOLS,
President of the Senate,

WILLIAM SCHLEY, Governor.
Approval Date: Assented to, Dec. 24, 1836.

Samuel Jones- Summary of Georgia Archives References

The State of Georgia along with several other States are committing many old archived documents to a digital format and uploading them to the Internet for public access.  These efforts have opened many new avenues of research for some families attempting to document their past.  The Jones family is no exception for a few references of the patriarch, Samuel Jones, 1796-1870, have been found rather easily online.

Due to some local prominence, especially in Gilmer County, Georgia, and Ellijay specifically, his name has found it’s way into some obscure references and recorded in the annals of the State.  For what it’s worth, but primarily to partially fulfill some of my continuing interest in recording anything of interest regarding family, I have copied what has been found to date for my Great-Grandfather, Samuel Jones.

The first reference here is from what the Georgia Archives calls their Master Card Index file, with but brief mentions of names and topics.  Just when and how this was compiled I have no idea but assumedly the indexes were extracted from some other data sources and of course do not elaborate very much at all.  If time and energy allow perhaps another visit to the Archives in Atlanta might reveal more detailed information.  But for now, this is what is available online.  The following image is a copy of one of two card indexes found for the man.

There is little room for doubt that this is our ancestor.   What I consider to be reliable family trees that have been found on the Internet refer to Samuel’s time spent as a judge of the inferior court of Gilmer County.  Inferior Court assumedly meaning the lowest court,  perhaps similar to a Justice of the Peace or even some municipal courts.  An inferior court as I understand it requires no official recording of the proceedings and primarily only records the charges and the judgments, if that. 

So in interpreting what is written here the significance of the roman numeral VII following the name escapes me for now.  The data is obviously a compilation of of the periods that he was assigned the duty of judge.   Without the aid of an official explanation perhaps the individual dates were dates of official duties or of a renewal of a swearing in process.  Regardless, the entries cover a period of several years beginning in March of 1836 through perhaps December of 1855, a period of some nine years.  Further research in the Archives will probably clarify these dates to be an uninterrupted span of duty or perhaps individual short periods of assignment.  Someone accessing our Family History many years past obviously did a considerable amount of research for some of the accounting of his activities found in his short biography online are now easily confirmed.  That is always a good thing in my estimation for at times I truly wonder how reliable some of the sources really are.  What I have personally found in the online Archives really adds to my feeling of the accuracy of what I consider my baseline of the family tree found some ten years ago.

The next Master Index file card cannot be easily verified, but based on dates, location and rank, specifically Captain Samuel Jones, reflected in many online family trees, I am rather confident that this is also our ancestor.  Lumpkin county is the county where Samuel was a sheriff and was the location where the family began it’s Georgia history, most likely in or near the town of Dahlonega,  after leaving South Carolina some 50 to 75 miles to the east. 

During this period of our Countries history, and not only in the State of Georgia, Militia Service was compulsory.  Men of good health and of the proper ages were well organized and trained to some level of capacity strictly from the necessity of protection from either Indians or marauders of any sort.  They were the “Minute Men” of their time and the forerunner of our current National Guard units.

Dahlonega was the center of commerce during the period of the Georgia Gold Rush beginning in 1828 on what was Cherokee Indian land, and was described as a wild west area.  Lumpkin County was formed from a portion of Habersham County in 1832 and Samuel Jones was elected the first sheriff of the county and served for two years or less.  That information also passed down in other family trees has also been verified in History of Lumpkin County, For the First Hundred Years by Andrew Cain and published in 1932.  He is listed in the appendix as the first sheriff and sworn in on March 9, 1833.  The author relates that “Sheriff Samuel Jones stepped to the door and sang out “Oh yez, Oh yez, the Superior Court of Lumpkin County is now open”.  This was contained in the authors description of the opening of the first court session in Lumpkin County in August of 1833, some eight months after it was formed in December of 1832. 

The first seven of eleven children that Samuel and his wife Narcissa Tate spawned were born in Habersham and later Lumpkin Counties.  Lumpkin County was carved out of a portion of Habersham County.  This card index reveals that his time served in the Militia ended in 1835 suggesting he was not directly assigned in a military capacity to the expulsion of the Indians during the period of the “Trail of Tears” of 1838-1839.  There is some vague reference that Samuel was appointed to sell assets of some Cherokee families and to forward the funds to Oklahoma to be given to the owners of the personal assets, but I am not sure that this responsibility was of a military capacity.  This apparently occurred after he had moved his family some 30 miles further west in Georgia to Gilmer County, where he and his family first appear in the U.S. Census of 1840.  The seventh child, Willis, was the first born there in 1837.  Our Grandfather A.H. Jones was the last child born, in Ellijay, Gilmer County, in 1843.  All this establishes the time of the move to Gilmer County between 1835 and 1837.  In all likelihood Samuel was also a member of the Gilmer County Militia but that requires further research.

These are but the first of  a small handful of what can be found of Samuel in the Georgia Archives.  More will  be posted as I collect them and ponder any of the questions that arise from them.