Those Places Thursday: "Just a Boy" at Andersonville

This week, looking towards Memorial Day, I'll give some background on the men in our family tree who served in the United States Civil War. Memorial Day, originally called Decoration Day, was established to honor those who died while serving in either the Union or Confederate armies.

Thomas Hansel Sheperd

REGIMENT: 3rd Georgia Reserves

COMPANY: A
RANK: Corporal

ENLISTMENT DATE: April 23, 1864
AGE AT ENLISTMENT: 18

Family oral history says that Thomas (T.H.) served as a guard at the Camp Sumter Military Prison at Andersonville, Georgia. Prison and regimental histories confirm that the 3rd Georgia, Company A, were indeed at Andersonville, among other locations. Records show that by August 1864 (3 months after Thomas enlisted) the prison held over 32.000 Union prisoners and the death rate was over 100 soldiers a day. Andersonville was a horrific place for any man to have experienced and Thomas was "just a boy" as his widow recounted in an interview in the 1920s long after T.H. had passed away.

According to Thomas' Indigent Solider's Pension Application, he was released from the 3rd Georgia and sent to Augusta, Georgia to "tend the sick" around April 1, 1865. (This date coincides with the closing of Andersonville Prison.)  The 3rd Georgia was captured in Columbus, Georgia, on April 15, 1865 and surrendered to the Union troops. Thomas was still in Augusta at the surrender and family members believe that he walked home, 100 miles, from Augusta...he was 19 years old.

Thomas married Mary Anna Ruth Harvey on December 21, 1865 after arriving home from the War. Thomas became a well respected citizen of the Laurens County area. He was a farmer, a land owner, and he served for many years on the Dexter City Council. He was considered a "pioneer" of the town of Dexter. 

Thomas applied for an Indigent Civil War Veteran's Pension in 1907 and was denied because he was a landowner. He applied again in 1911 and was granted a pension of $60 annually. This pension application shows a substantial reduction in his land holdings and a deterioration in his health.

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Thomas and Mary had celebrated 49 years of marriage at the time of his death in 1913. Thomas is buried in the Sheperd Family Cemetery in Dexter, Georgia which is now located on private property.

Oath of Office: Justice of the Peace, Laurens County, Georgia

BORN: September 15, 1846 in Hawkinsville, Pulaski County, Georgia

DIED: June 16, 1913 in Dexter, Laurens County, Georgia

PARENTS: James Monroe Sheperd and Mary Ann Higdon

SPOUSE: Mary Anna Ruth Harvey

CHILDREN: Ida Pearl Sheperd (died in a fire as an infant)

                       James Thomas Sheperd (1865-

                       Mary Jane Sheperd (1868-1947)

                       Childs Raymond Sheperd (1870-1954)

                       Julian Wesley Sheperd 1873-

                       George Fulton Sheperd (1876-1953)

                       Ovey Sheperd (1879-

                       Nancy Lou Sheperd (1881-1970)

                       Walter Jackson Sheperd (1884-

RELATIONSHIP: Angie Abbate (Mood)
                                 Eucebia Jane Thomas (Abbate)
                                   Daniel Claude Thomas
                                     Mary Jane Sheperd (Thomas)
                                       Thomas Hansel Sheperd

Sentimental Sunday: The Story of the Peach

Sentimental Sunday, a Geneabloggers blog prompt...

This story has been told over and over again to my generation by those of us whose fathers and mothers are descendants of Mary Jane Shepherd Thomas and John Griffin Thomas. Here's my mother's version. Thomas descendants, how does this match up with the version you've been told?

The Story of the Peach, as told by Eucebia Jane Thomas:

"At the home of Big Mother and Pap (John Griffin Thomas), there was a peach tree just beginning to bear fruit and there was one peach that was almost ready but still hanging on the tree. Well.......all of a sudden it was discovered that someone had taken a bite out of the peach while it still clung to the tree.  At that point, Big Mother called all the children out into the yard, lined them up and holding a flat iron in her hand declared that she was going to throw the iron up in the air and the Lord would let it fall on the head of the guilty one.  With that, Lois stepped forward and said she was not going to get her brains knocked out over a peach, so she had to take the punishment.  It was not until years later that Daniel Claude (D.C., my father) confessed to having climbed the tree and taken a bite out of the luscious, ripening peach!"

The players: 

The Mom, Mary Jane Shepherd Thomas

Some of the Thomas boys:
Jim (17), Dessie (15), Fisher (11), Charlie (9), John Roy (4), Daniel  (2)

The Culprit

The Fall Girl

Mary Jane Shepherd Thomas and her children.

Fearless Females: She's Newsworthy

Women's History Month Fearless Females blog prompt: Newsmakers? Did you have a female ancestor who made the news? Why? Was she famous or notorious? Did she appear in the social column?

Mary Anna Ruth Harvey Shepard
January 7, 1847-September 10, 1936

My great great-grandmother, Mary Anna Ruth Harvey Shepard (Granny Shepard) had her "moment in the spotlight" when she was interviewed by a reporter from the Macon Telegraph in the early 1930s. I would think that it would have been pretty unusual that the Macon newspaper would be interested in a story about a woman who lived in the little town of Dexter, Georgia that was some 60 or so miles away. The interesting thing about her, and what sparked the article, was that, at the time, she had 105 descendants. Mary was born in 1847 so she would have been in her mid-80s when this interview took place. She had been a widow for almost 20 years.



Here are a few interesting excerpts about life in the late 1800s:

...."I had a hard time raising my children, too, she said. They're living in paradise and don't know it. I came along just after the war (To Mrs. Shepard there has been but one war, that between the North and the South) and I know about hard times. I raised my family right down here in the 'Piney Woods,' when the nearest store was at Cochran or Dublin. There was no such town as Dexter then. All this country was wild.

"We never knew what it was to buy a pair of stockings. I knitted all my husband and children had. And I spun and wove the cloth to make their clothes, too." "And dyed it, too, ma," interrupted her daughter. I can remember helping to beat up walnut hulls and hunt for gall berries to make their clothes, too."

"We raised sheep and cut the wool off them and wove the cloth, and dyed it and I made all my husband's clothes and my boys', too. We would beat up walnut hulls and boil them and strain them to dye brown with. And we would go down to the branch and break off the gall berry bushes and boil them to make a black dye. The gall berries were gathered in the spring, when they were green."

"There was plenty of wild indigo, growing in the woods in those days. Some folks raised it at home to dye things with, but we got ours from the woods. It dyed blue. And sometimes I would but a little copperas and it dyed a sort of golden brown. Pine bark would make a sort of purple dye.

"Law me alive!" she sighed, "Some of my grandchildren think it is terrible because they have their wages cut. But they don't know anything."

"That they don't!" agreed Mrs. Shepard, "Too much money is not good for anybody. I never had much of it, but I have been blessed to raise such good children and to have so few deaths in the grandchildren, there have only been six deaths.

Not only is the mortality rate low in the Shepard family, the longevity of the family is remarkable. Octogenarians predominate. Mrs. Shepard's mother, Mrs. Jane Harvey, lived to be 86 and most of the members of the past generations lived for more than their allotted three-score and ten years. *

Mary Anna Ruth Harvey Shepard was married to Thomas Hansel Shepard and they were the parents of nine children including my great grandmother, Mary Jane Shepard Thomas. Mary Anna Ruth, too, lived beyond her "allotted three-score and ten years," having passed away on September 10, 1936 at the age of 89.

*The article ran in the Macon Telegraph circa 1931-1933 and was titled, "Dexter Woman had 105 Descendants, All But 12 Living in Same Locality". It was written by Susan Myrick. The excerpts in this post were copied from a reprinting of the the article in the book Dexter, by Amy Holland Alderman.

Fearless Females: Religion and Faith

Women's History Month Fearless Females blog prompt: What role did religion play in your family? How did your female ancestors practice their faith? If they did not, why didn’t they? Did you have any female ancestors who served their churches in some capacity

Each of the Bibles pictured here belonged to a female ancestor and/or were given to me by one. They represent a heritage of faith, generations of women who loved, served, and lived for Jesus. Some have verses marked or underlined and others have messages of inspiration or love on the dedication pages. These ladies passed on a pretty amazing heritage and I, for one, am grateful for a mom, grandmothers, and aunts who were examples of authentic faith. 

Here's a story about some of my ancestors, including two women who helped start a church in Dexter, Georgia:

Summer, 1893...the south was still rebuilding after the Civil War. The economy had been in shambles but the railroad was beginning to bring prosperity to a small town in middle Georgia called Dexter. In July, 1893, just before the official incorporation of their town, a group of residents presented "letters from other churches" as a request for their membership to be transferred to form the new Dexter Baptist Church. They met in the local school building until a permanent building was erected in 1903. Check out this link to the Laurens Baptist Association which lists the founding members of the Dexter Baptist Church. You will have to scroll down a little to find Dexter. The listing contains four family members: J. (Jonathan) S. Thomas, J. (John) G. (Griffin) Thomas, Mary J. (Jane) Shepherd, and Mary E. (Elizabeth) Mullis. Jonathan S. Thomas is my great-great grandfather, John Griffin and Mary Jane Thomas are my great grandparents and Mary Elizabeth Mullis is an aunt (Sister of John Griffin, daughter of Jonathan S.) Almost one hundred and twenty years later, Dexter Baptist Church is still there, a newer building, and a congregation with history.

Fearless Females: Marriage Record

Continuing to honor the women in our family, today's question from The Accidental Genealogist:

Do you have marriage records for your grandparents or great-grandparents? Write a post about where they were married and when. Any family stories about the wedding day? Post a photo too if you have one.

I stumbled on this Marriage License one day while searching the Civil War records for my 2nd great grandfather, Thomas Hansel Shepherd. It always pays to look around when searching records. I would not have found this had I not searched several pages before and beyond the pension application that I was originally looking for. This Marriage License was attached to the Widow's Pension Application that was filed upon Thomas' death by his wife, Mary Anna Ruth Harvey (Shepherd).

Here are a couple of excerpts from an interview with Mary Anna Ruth Harvey Shepherd for the Macon Telegraph in the early 1930s:

"My husband was Thomas Hansel Shepherd and he fought in the (Civil) war in the last year. That was before we were married though, he was just a boy!"

"I was married when I was not quite 18 and my husband was just 18 and we farmed, that's about all a boy could do in those days." 

Thomas and Mary were married in Laurens County, Georgia on December 21, 1865.

Mary Anna Ruth Harvey Shepherd
"Granny Shepherd"

Fearless Females: Names and Naming Patterns

So, that was quick, I am officially "caught up" with the Fearless Females blog prompts!

Today, The Accidental Genealogist asks: Do you share a first name with one of your female ancestors? Perhaps you were named for your great-grandmother, or your name follows a particular naming pattern.  If not then list the most unique or unusual female first name you've come across in your family tree.

Well, I am named for a guy so I am not thinking that I will be the subject here today!  No naming pattern for me either although both of my given names are family names.

BUT! Today's prompt is particularly interesting because last night I realized, for the first time ever, that my mom's name is actually a combination of her grandmothers' middle names.  I NEVER noticed that before, probably because she had such an unusual first name and I have always focused on how in the world they came up with that name. (Not just for her but for the two other female ancestors with the same name as well.)  Her name was Eucebia Jane.  Her grandmothers were Minnie Eucebia Alligood (Silas) and Mary Jane Shepherd (Thomas). Mom always used the name "Jane" and was often called "Janie" by family and close friends. She lived in a predominantly Hispanic neighborhood later in life and she loved telling her Hispanic friends that her name was actually Eucebia, she had the "Spanish" pronunciation down just right. She always made them laugh!

My beautiful mom Eucebia Jane Thomas (Abbate) at age 19.
The photograph on the television is her mom,
Mildred Arlene Silas Thomas.