Spears Side Update 2

Bio-Dad got more info from his cousins. Apparently my Great Grandfather John Walter was full blooded Cherokee and my Great Grandmother Lula Goines was full blooded Chickasaw. BOTH of them lived on reservations (or whatever they were called at the time) and were moved from North Tennessee sometime in the late 1800's. I can't wait until the photographs they are sending him finally get there, I so want to see what they look like. Do any of us resemble them? I can't wait!

Update 03/09/2012
Bio Dad gave me bad info. Spoke with his cousin who has the family history and it is Iriquois and Chickasaw Indian. Either way, it is going to be a long road in trying to find any records of my Great Great Grandparents on my paternal Grandfathers side.

Spears Side Update

Woke up to an email from my bio-dad that he contacted some cousins (I didn't know he kept in touch with ANYONE aside from his brothers) who were going to be sending him photographs of his Father, Aunts and Uncles. I am completely blown away, I can't believe I am going to see a picture of my Grandfather for the first time. I am excited and a tad bit trepedatious, yet hopefully, these images will help unlock the secrets I have been trying to find out.

I'm So Frustrated

That's it! It's time to call in a professional. I am at a loss, I can't find ANYONE on my Grandfather's side or my biological father's side or my Grandmother's side.. I keep hitting that damned wall again and I am at the point where I cry when I think about genealogy. Now if I can only find someone down for the challenge and who is affordable. I live in Utah, the mecca for genealogy, you'd think folks would be affordable, um, nope. :/

McVey, McFarland and Goins (Update)

Well I am back to square one :(. Thanks to the help of a very nice man on Ancestry.com, he helped point out that the information my Mother-in-law had dug up was WRONG. Everything she had found was not related my direct family line. So I am back to the beginning with no new information on the horizon. I think it is time to hire a professional :/.

McVey, McFarland, Goins and more

I finally got a break in tracing my Spears line, thanks to my mother-in-law. I still haven't broken the Spears line itself but I was able to get the names I needed for my Great-Grandmother Lula Belle Goins. Through her line I was able to discover that we are German (a lot of it), English (royal as in Sirs and Ladies) and Scottish (Och, to the Moors Lads and Lassies). At least one branch has been broken, now to just try and figure out the rest of the branches.

Cheers!
Sammee

Family Pictures

Now that I have tracked down ancestors, I have also tracked down photographs and stories. I am going to relay one such story now, this is about my son's Great-Great-Great-Great Grandparent's William Prince and Louisa Evaline Lee Prince (she was the daughter of John Doyle Lee and his first wife Agatha Ann Woolsey Lee).

Story written by another descendant of Louisa and William

When Louisa was six years old, she moved with her parents from Big Cottonwood to Cedar City, Utah where they lived for only a few months before moving south. They eventually settled at Old Fort Harmony. Thick walls enclosed the fort which were made of adobes molded without straw and dried in the sun. The fort was destroyed a few years later by an unceasing storm which continued for many days. The adobes disintegrated and fell apart.

Several miles away a new townsite was chosen. While it was being erected, Louisa, her mother and brothers lived in a dugout for two years without even the simplest of comforts and only the barest of necessities. Her mother became ill due to the hardships and meager rations. Louisa then assumed the care of the family and herself for seven years before her mother's death. 

Of necessity, Louisa learned to do all kinds of work very early in life. She carted wool for yarn which she also dyed. She learned to spin while yet so young that her father had to make a ramp in order for her to reach the spinning wheel. This was fashioned from a plank with two holes bored in one end near the edges into which wooden legs were inserted of the required height, while the other end of the plank lay on the floor. Forward and back she went, up and down the ramp, turning the wheel with a swift motion of her right hand and as she stepped backward drew out the wool thin and even, then forward again to wind the twisted thread onto the spindle.

After the death of her mother, she came to realize that her health was impaired and her father sent her to Fillmore, Utah for a rest and to recuperate. She lived with an older sister, Sarah Jane Dalton, who gave her every care and comfort possible. When she returned to Harmony after a year's absence, she met William Prince whom she later married. Her father was very much opposed to her marrying "that young, unsettled boy", whose prospects in life seemed not too bright at that particular time. Her father had chosen an older and well stablished man for her. She had no desire to be a polygamous wife and refused to accept the arrangement and for the first and only time in her life, she defied her father's wishes. He said to her, :Do you not think you owe me something? I have planned this marriage for you for years." To this she replied, "I owe you everything, Father, but the right to choose my husband and I am going to marry William Prince."

The only wedding gift she received was a pet lamb and a sack of wool from George Dodds, an old friend of the family. From this wool she wove cloth for a dress for herself and a pair of pants for William. The dress was not difficult to make but the pants were a different problem. When they did not fit, they resorted to Aunt Polly's grab bag where they found a piece of red flannel, the only thing big enough. She inserted a three-inch red stripe down each pant leg. William wore those pants until they were completely worn out, declaring he had started the fashion of striped pants. :)

Their first home was a dugout in Middleton. They later moved on to Kanarraville and then settled in Panguitch. They lived in the fort until spring then moved out with a few of the more hardy and venturesome families onto government land entries. The Princes built the first brick home in Panguitch, they also homesteaded at Panguitch Lake, about twenty miles west of Panguitch. During the summers while the homestead was being developed, their brick home in town was also in progress. With the supervision of both homes, William and Louisa were a very busy pair.

Little by little they had acquired some stock. With stock raising, dairying, cooking for the ranch hands, making hundreds of pounds of butter and cheese, harvesting hay, etc;, they had all they could possibly care for. Though their family was steadily increasing, Louisa found the time to nurse the sick, help officiate at births, wash and lay out the dead, assist in the making of the burial clothes, suits for men, dresses for women and children and many articles of temple clothing. Never was there a more industrious woman that Louisa, nor one who had a greater love for beauty, especially growing things.

She married William Prince on January 23rd, 1868 in New Harmony, Washington, Utah. He was born October 23, 1848 in Elephant Hooks, Cape Colony, Africa. He was the son of George Prince and Sarah Bowman Prince. William died on January 11, 1937 in Panguitch and was buried on January 13, 1937 in Panguitch. They left behind 13 children and many grandchildren and great grandchildren.

Mountain Meadows Massacre and More!

Pictured is my husband's Great-Great-Great Grandparent's Phelix and Sarah Byrum......I now know what my husband will look like at that age, LOL. They are my husband's Grandfather's Great Grandparents....I have found (so far) hat two of the Grandfather's from the maternal and paternal lines fought for the Confederacy (boo) I found that Felix's Grandmother died in Afghanistan (I can't wait to track down that story), I learned that my son is related directly to John Doyle Lee (through my mother-in-laws line), the man who was tried and executed for the Mountain Meadows Massacre (google it), he had 17 wives and his daughter (my son's direct decendent) refused the polygamous match he had made for her, followed her heart and married the love of her life (to which she was completely turned out). They in turn founded Panguitch, Utah and were much beloved by everyone that new them and apparently that my husband and son are related to Robert E. Lee (through this line) via a cousin.......I am now going to take a step away before my poor brain implodes again.

One of the funniest things I have come across is that my Mother-in-law's line and my daughter's Dad's Maternal line were both living in the same village in Scotland within 100 years of each other...I have a gnawing in my gut that somewhere I am going to come across one of my daughter's ancestors marrying one of my son's ancestors, LOL.

Tonight I am emailing my own family information to my mother-in-law. Her Aunt in St. George does family research for the ancestry library and she is going to send it too her and see what she can find out. Fingers crossed she can break down the wall surrounding my family before they came to the United States.

Cheers!

Sammee