What happened to John Powell? Part 1

In genealogy circles, they are referred to as "Brick Walls" -  genealogical puzzles that refuse to be solved, no matter how much research you do.  I have one that has plagued me for several years now - my 2nd great-grandfather on my Powell line.  He married my 2nd great-grandmother, Hattie Gregory, sometime around 1890, fathered my great-grandfather, James Edward Powell, who was born in 1891, and then seemingly dropped off the face of the earth.

The Murder of Jacob Black

The Jacob Riley Black family
Back row (left to right):  Ella Mae, Jacob Riley, Lang G., Roy Kilby, Cecil Banks, James Leland, William Thomas
Middle row (left to right):  Ruth, Eunice Fae, Wade Dewitt, Evelyn Kate
Front row (left to right):  Doris, J.C., Riley Ray

For today's post, I'd like to investigate an incident that took place over 78 years ago, not to a direct ancestor of mine, but to his brother.  That distant uncle's name is Jacob Riley Black.  On February 19, 1940, Jacob Black was murdered.  Or was he?

My 3rd great-grandparents, Riley and Elvina Mauldin Black, were the parents of fifteen children - five girls and ten boys.  One of those children was my second great-grandfather, Andrew Paul Black, whose history I will explore in a later post.  However, great-great-grandpa Andrew Paul ("Paul") had a brother named Jacob.  That makes Jacob my third great-uncle, or the uncle of my great-grandmother, Myrlie Catherine Black Foster.

William Henry and Nancy Jane Knight Davis

"Aunt Marthie" - Martha Jane Davis
(1918-2003)

My 2nd great-aunt (through my maternal line), Martha Jane Davis, was a high school English teacher at Wren High School in Anderson, South Carolina for many years, as well as a family historian.  "Aunt Marthie," as she was called, was the sister of my great-grandmother, Ruth Beatrice Davis Garrett.  Aunt Marthie's research, along with the research of my maternal grandfather's sister, Margaret Foster Limbaugh, has provided the basis for much of what I know about my mother's side of my family tree.

My DNA Story

My Ancestry DNA Ethnicity Estimate.

For Christmas 2017, my parents gave me the gift of an autosomal DNA test kit.  I was THRILLED!  I won't lie, though - it wasn't a huge surprise.  Since my parents aren't quite as well-versed in genealogy and DNA testing as I am (which isn't even very much), my mom had previously contacted me to find out which DNA testing company I would be most interested in testing with.  Being just a little OCD (okay, a lot OCD - stop laughing, mom!), I had jumped right in to researching which kit would work best for the results I was hoping to get from it.

The Mystery that Started It All (part 3)

Note:  This is a continuation from previous posts.  To start back at part 1, click here.

The Old Seaboard Air Line Railway on the corner of Deadwyler Street and North Oliver Street in Elberton, GA.  Directly across North Oliver Street (to the left of the building in this photo) was where the Parham boarding house was once located.

As a preteen or very young teenager, my grandmother was sent by her mother and stepfather to live with her paternal grandmother in Elberton, Georgia.  Grandma Eva’s father, James David Parham, had passed away from a gastric hemorrhage caused by a peptic ulcer in 1937, when my Grandma was only nine years old.  Her mother, my great-grandmother, who I always knew as “Grandma Bobo” (Annie Mae Jones Parham Bobo) had remarried Snow Robert Bobo just shy of a year later on September 19, 1938.

The story that has always been told through the family is that Grandma Eva's older brother (James David Parham, Jr.) joined the military, and that shortly thereafter Grandma Eva was sent to live with her grandmother.  However, I have had some difficulty making that timeline work, as my records show that James joined the Navy in June 1944, which would have been well after Grandma Eva moved to Elberton.  At any rate, at some point between 1940 and 1943, Grandma Eva ended up living with her Grandma Parham in Elberton, Georgia.

The Mystery that Started It All (part 2)

Bonnie Rose Bryant, 9/30/46 - 7/28/47

Note:  This is a continuation from a previous post.  For part 1, click here.

For most of my life, I lived right next door to my paternal grandparents. My parents bought the house I grew up in when my mom was pregnant with my sister and I was barely five years old. When I was in elementary school, I would walk the block and a half home from school straight to my grandparents' house to stay. Even when I started middle school and became older and more trustworthy, I would first check in with Grandma (and get a snack, because, well ... she was my sweet southern Grandma and that's what sweet southern grandmas do!) before going next door to my house to do homework and chores until my parents got home from work.  But I almost always stopped in at Grandma's house first.

The Mystery that Started It All (part 1)

Eva Alma Parham

On August 17, 1996, when I was eighteen years old, I experienced my first significant loss of a family member.  I say "significant," not because any losses before this were inconsequential, but because up to this point in my life, I had never really lost someone close to me.  My great-grandmother, "Grandma Bobo" (Annie Mae Jones Parham Bobo), had passed away in 1990 when I was in middle school, but she had lived in Georgia and my family had never been particularly close with her.  We had visited her a few times, and she had visited us a few times, but she wasn't a significant presence in my life.  There were also a few great-aunts and great-uncles, and one great-grandfather, that had passed away throughout my childhood, but again - no one who had been present in my life on a regular basis.

But this.  This was SIGNIFICANT.