The name “Sedgwick” has been used as a middle name for several generations in the Brown and Bryan families in my husband’s line. Here are those with that name and their connections. Continue reading “Sedgwick”
Death Date for Thomas Willis Farley
Thomas Willis Farley was born 26 January 1841 in Buckingham County, Virginia. His father was James Henry Farley. His mother was Catherine F. Roberts, who fell over dead of a heart attack across Thomas’s crib when he was six months old.
Thomas grew up in Buckingham, and attended Hampden-Sydney College, and served with the Confederate Army during the Civil War. He married Nancy “Nannie” Montgomery Rigg and they had 10 children.
One of the first records I found for Nannie (and Thomas) is the 1900 U. S. Federal Census for Kanawha County, WV, on which Thomas does not appear at all, and shows his wife Nannie as widowed. I had his date of death noted as “bef 1900” for many years. Then over the last few years I stumbled across several sources which jointly establish his date of death as 26 July 1903. Continue reading “Death Date for Thomas Willis Farley”
Keeney Cabin
Catherine Lewis (1759-?) and Michael Keeney (1761-1790) were married on 11 January 1781 in Greenbrier County, Virginia (now WV). They are my 5th great-grandparents. This article about their cabin appeared in the Beckley Post-Herald on 09 October 1956. It tells a great story not only about the cabin but also about the lives of Michael (who died at a young age) and Catherine and their four children.
I just discovered some great information by Central Appalachian Timbers on this cabin; a brief blurb and photo and then much more detailed info, photos and update on 25 August 2015. There is some question about whether this is actually the Keeney cabin, or one belonging to the Lewis family; the study of the wood cores will help determine the answer.
*Note – the newspaper article had to be scanned at a very high resolution for readability, so this page may load slowly. There’s not an online version that I can find. I intend to to transcribe the article and post here.
Wedding Book of Grace Campbell
Grace Lavenia Campbell married Carl DeWitt Hopkins on 25 July 1904 in Galipolis, Ohio. Grace and Carl were my great-grandparents, and my mother remembers them well.
Grace was born in 1883, the daughter of Samuel Henry (S. H.) Campbell and Nancy Jane Meadows. She was 21 at the time of her marriage to Carl. They had two sons (Keith Campbell Hopkins, my grandfather, and Henry Frederick Hopkins), and a daughter who did not live past infancy. Continue reading “Wedding Book of Grace Campbell”
Campbell Rocking Chair
Grace Lavenia Campbell was born on 18 July 1883 in Winefrede, a small coal mining and railroad community not far from Chesapeake and Chelyan in Kanawha County, West Virginia. She was my maternal great-grandmother.
Grace’s granddaughter Carol Lavenia Hopkins is my mother, and recalls this small rocking chair in Grace and Henry’s home in St. Albans, and being told by Grace that she (Grace) was rocked as a baby in that chair. The chair passed to my mother, and then on to me some years ago.
It is a fairly small rocker, with a very nice detailed upper rail. The Campbell family lived in a fairly rural community in that time period, so my guess would be that it was hand carved. Not sure what wood it is made form. The upholstery has been changed several times; there’s a layer underneath the current that predates anything I recall, and may be fairly old. I remember this rocker well from my childhood and am glad it’s among the family treasures I’ve been entrusted to care for.