For about three years, (I can't believe it's been that long), I've been pursuing the ancestors of my 3rd Great Grandfather, George Washington Turner (1835-1895),of Anson County, NC. Early on in my research, many, ..many..years ago, I had gotten to him and stopped. Let's put it this way, my grandfather, Lewis Theodore Davis, was aware of the names of his maternal grandfather, William A. Turner, and his great grandfather, G. W. Turner. In fact, he pointed out the beautiful antebellum mansion in Ansonville, NC, where G. W. had worked and lost his life. I was told that this was where his mother had grown up, taken in by the Smith family after the death of her father and grandfather, who had been in their employ.
After I grew up and began doing research on my own, I recalled these old family tales that I had heard and inherited. I had been fortunate to live with my grandparents for about 5 years as a child. I began to prove or disprove, what I had heard here and there over the years, from my grandfather, who lived until I was 37, and my great grandfather, who had lived until I was 15.
Fast forward to 2012, when I hit middle age, and picked genealogy back up with a passion. After raising a family, l joined ancestry.com, gedmatch and all the other sites. Yes, all of them (nearly). There were trees of other folks descended from G. W. Turner and that continues to grow. One of them, apparently followed by all of them, had a George Turner, who lived off of Richardson Creek near its conjunction with the Rocky River, and just across the river from the Davis Plantation, as the father of George Washington Turner.
Now, truly, George Turner had his place in the Davis family tree as the father of Elizabeth Turner. She had married Job Davis's youngest son, Marriott Freeman Davis, and became the mother of his only surviving child, Millard. Yet, search as I might, I could not connect George Washington Turner to George Turner. I did a thorough trace of all of George's children, several who had no descendants at all. G. W. was not there in any form.
What I did find, however, was George W. Turner living with two ladies, Mary and Martha Turner, as a 16 year old in the 1850 census. Mary turned out to be his mother, and Martha was her sister, who would soon after marry a Reddick Drew. I also found the will of a James Turner who died around 1842, who mentioned his daughters Mary and Martha. He was most interested in the future of his two unmarried (at the time) daughters, and his grandson, Washington. He also had three sons, Axom, Lazarus and James Jr. and three married daughters, Nancy, Sarah and Susanna. G.W. Turner turned out to be his grandson, and a fatherless boy to his unmarried daughter, Mary.
George Washington Turner
Through a great fortitude, my search, and my blog, got me in contact with a distant cousin. She has done a great deal of research on G. W. Turner, himself, and his children. This cousin got me in touch with a wonderful couple, more cousins, who not only had pictures of G.W. Turner, but owned the old homeplace, and also had a family bible. Through this wonderful discovery, I found out that James had a wife named Susannah, sister of William and Micajah Axom/Exum Jr. who had migrated to Anson from counties east.
From there, I researched the families of the two Turner brothers whose names were uncommon enough that I could, and traced Axom, the eldest, south to Alabama, where grant lands from his service in the War of 1812 lie. There exists a Turner DNA research group, and descendants of Axom are in it. They were hesitant to connect him to his family and self, in North Carolina. Those of Lazarus were not. Let's leave that there for a minute.
When looking at land grants and tax records, I made the discovery that Axom likely did not travel alone, there were other Anson County folk who arrived around the same time he did. One family in particular were the Threadgills. Lo and behold, quite accidentally, I discovered I shared DNA with some of the the descendants of this Threadgill family. Note, I had no known connections to or descent from , Threadgills, none that I knew of.
Serendipitously, there are many good books available on the Threadgill family, a few volumes by Janis Heidenrich Miller, and a few on the more local branch of descendants in Anson County, NC.
The newly met cousin, whose family has ownership of the treasured Family Bible, so kindly agreed to a Y-DNA test, and we ansciously awaited the results. At first, it wasn't totally helpful, as a litany of various surnames came up in his matches, and sometimes, that happens. It doesn't surprise me, considering the frailty of the human animal. But one reoccuring surname kept popping up, and over the last three years, on a very regular basis. Family Tree DNA, where the test was taken, kept sending notifications of more. That surname was Threadgill.
After three years of tracing matches and looking for connections, not to my own tree, but linking them to each other, the first thing I noticed was the reoccurring name of Thomas.
I just knew G.W. Turner had to be a relative of his, but through which line? With patience and painstaking deliberation, one head started floating above the water and one name became more and more familiar, Thomas C. Threadgill.
A second moment of discovery was when I came in contact with a decendant of Henry Thomas Axom.
We're distantly related as well. Henry Thomas and his brother, Jonas, had been raised by Reddick Drew, who had married G. W. Turner's Aunt Martha. His mother, Julia, also shows up in Drew's home in 1850.
I knew from the surname Axom, uncommon to the area, and the family connection, that Julia was likely descended from one of Susanna Axom Turners' brothers. Still, that put Henry Thomas Axom another several generations back.
Henry Thomas Axom named his father as Thomas Threadgill.
Coincidence much? I think not.
With some hesitation, I added Thomas to my family tree to see what would happen.
Not often, but periodically, I check Thrulines, like a fisherman checking the line, to see if any connections I have made, connect to me. This morning, this is what I found. Thrulines was suggesting a James Threadgill and his wife as 5th Great Grandparents of mine. I clicked on the link and BOOM! DNA matches.
To add to the circumstancial evidence, Thomas had a brother named James Stephens Threadgill. His father, James, may also have been a James Stephens. George Washington Turner named a son James Stephens Turner. Did he know?
The search is not over, but here, I can visually see I share DNA with not only descendants of Thomas Threadgills legitmate son, Benjamin, just one of the sons he left orphaned very young, but also with descendants of his brothers, William H. Threadgill and Henry L. Threadgill. Now reinspired, I go to dig deeper.
Now, I will try to complete the story with that of her younger 3 children, beginning with her son Stephen. Unlike the rest of her 6 children, Steve, as pppppP.o have been known, took the name of his father, Doc Crump, instead of that of his mother, Zilphia Cochran. Zilphia was 46 before she ever married, that I can tell, when she married Ben Davis. Ben, who was in his early 60's at the time, had been married and like Zilphia, had adult children. They had no children of their own.
Like his mother, Steve did not show up in the 1870 census. He first appears in an 1878 marriage record to Cornelia "Nelie" Howell. I know, the transcribed version shows his wife as "Candia Harvell", but the actual document is old and faded and the handwriting nominally legible, so I don't blame the transcriber for having a hard time. What the actual document does give me clearly, however, is the parents of the the two newlyweds, and the brides parents, with her as a child, did appear in the 1870 census, and in later records as well.
She was the daughter of Freeman Howell, not Harvell, and his wife, Francis "Fanny" Colson Howell. The daughter to fit the correct age to be "Candia" was Cornelia, age 7, his oldest. And while this transcription was also off by running the r and the n together to make 'Comelia' instead of Cornelia, a look at the actual document clearly read Cornelia to me. And that also makes sense when we move on to the 1880 census, where Steve and Nealie now have two children.
While Freeman Howell lived in Ansonville, just 6 miles south of the Stanly County - Anson County border, in 1870, by 1880, he had moved to Tyson Township in Stanly where Steven Crump lived. And again, what I read in the actual document as "Nely", short for Cornelia, the transcriber gives her the nickname, 'Neby'. I only hope I have briefly pulled the name of poor, young Cornelia Howell Crump out the dirt, for she didn't live long.
Steve appears to have been a tenant farmer on the property of D. R. Dunlap. Like Freeman Howell, David Richard Dunlap lived in Ansonville, Anson County in 1870 and had moved to Tyson Township in Stanly County by 1880. David, however, returned to Ansonville and lived there for the remainder of his like with his wife, Eugenia. His mother was a Crump, there may have been some connection between her family and Doc Crump, the father of Steven, as far a Doc's origins.
As for Doc, he had his wife, Elenor aka 'Ellen', set up household in the Big Lick community of Stanly County. Again, as in the case with her daughter, Dilsie, whose father was Harry Randle, husband of Celia Easley, Zilphia had had a child with a married man.
The marriage certificate of Steve and Isabelle gives her parents as Henry and Charlotte Spruell. It can be assumed that Cornelia, Steve's first wife, had died, before he married Isabell in 1883.
Spruell is not a local family name. It is unknown from whence they came, but they were in Tyson by 1880, and there is Isabell at 14, their oldest child.
Twenty years later, they are still in Stanly County, NC, but there is no sign of Isabell.
Name:
Henry Spruell
Side:
Union
Regiment State/Origin:
U.S. Colored Troops
Regiment:
35th Regiment, United States Colored Infantry
Company:
F
Rank In:
Private
Rank Out:
Musician
Film Number:
M589 roll 82
Memorial:
Part of the African American Civil War Memorial
Plaque Number:
C-51
Displayed As:
Henry Spruell
I did find a Henry Spruell who was a musician in the Civil War. I can't be sure if it's the same Henry Spruell, but it's quite interesting. Several of Henry and Charlotte's children married locally. Wincy married Will Gain in Montgomery County in 1902, James married Lucy Christian in Stanly in 1902, Joe married Annie Jones in 1905 and Francis Sms in 1909, both in Stanly; Emma married John Snuggs in 1903 in Stanly. Bessie, the youngest, was the last to marry, in 1919, to James J. Jones and her address given was in Badin, in Stanly County, however, I can't locate her, or any of the family in 1910 or 1920, with any certainty. They simply disappear.
Steve Crump, himself, died in January of 1926, in the Sheets Community of Richmond County, near Anson. He was 70 years old. I can't find any trace of children born to him and Isabell Spruell, or what became of his two children, Eliza and Walter, with Cornelia Howell. Perhaps he lost his entire famly to thyphoid or another deadly disease prevelent in those days of limited and little medical treatment and bad nutrition.
Name:
Steven Crump
Gender:
Male
Race:
Colored (Black)
Age:
70y
Marital status:
Single
Birth Date:
1856
Birth Place:
Anson Co.
Death Date:
25 Jan 1926
Death Place:
Sheets, Richmond, North Carolina
Burial Date:
26 Jan 1926
Cemetery:
Stanback Cemetery
Reference ID:
fn 998 cn cn 218
FHL Film Number:
4216608
Calvin Cochran 1861-1910
Calvin Cochran, the youngest son of Zilphia Cochran, was born either in Stanly County or Montgomery County. He was born at the very start of the Civil War and was freed as a young child. In records, he comes across as having been a forceful man, a strong man. He was a landowner and challenged a document of inheirtance in court. Calvin paved the way.
Calvin first appears in the census living in Montgomery County, living with the Nelson Christian family and working as a goldminer. This was hard work, and many a young man, both black and white, lost their lives in this occupation at the time. Several others in the Cochran family may have as well, as they dispapear from record after 1870, after working in the mines. But Calvin survived and maybe this is how he bought his land, by earning the money as a miner.
Cavins father was William "Buck" Howell, possibly related to Freeman Howell, whose daughter married Steve (Cochran) Crump, Calvin's half-brother. Little is known about him, as he was most likely, also a slave and there were several Howell families in the Stanly/ Montgomery/ Anson County area who owned a few slaves.
Name:
Calvin Cocheran
Age:
19
Birth Date:
Abt 1861
Birthplace:
North Carolina
Home in 1880:
Pee Dee, Montgomery, North Carolina, USA
Dwelling Number:
134
Race:
Black
Gender:
Male
Marital Status:
Single
Father's Birthplace:
North Carolina
Mother's Birthplace:
North Carolina
Occupation:
Farm Laborer
Cannot Read:
Yes
Cannot Write:
Yes
Neighbors:
Household Members:
1
By 1880, young Calvin, who had been working in the gold mines at 9 and 10 years old, was now working as Farm Labor, along with his older brother "Bill", or William M. Cochran, for Mr. Culpepper Watkins in the PeeDee Community, where his mother had spent a portion of her life.
In 1887, Calvin has apparently moved to Stanly County where he married Miss Mary Ella Threadgill, age 18, on January 30th of that year. Both parties were said to live in Stanly County, although Threadgill was an Anson County name and Calvin had been living in Montgomery . The groom was 25, the son of Buck Howell and Zelphia Davis, as Zilphia had now married Ben Davis, father noted as deceased and mother living. The bride was the daughter of Simon and Jane Threadgill, with the father living and the mother deceased. The wedding was performed by J. M. Redwine, Justice of the Peace, at the home of Sidney Threadgill in Tyson Township. Witensses were what looks like "ZyZy" Davis, W. M. Reap, and "Johas" Drake, with a 'his mark" in the middle and the handwriting matching that of Mr. Redwine. The other two signatures were their own, and I wonder if the first was that of Zilphia, attempting to sign her own name. It would tickle me to know that she could, as I feel I have gotten to know her in a way.
The Threadgill family was a very interesting one. Sidney Threadgill, at whose home the ceremony took place, was Mary Ella's grandfather. She was living wtih him in 1880. Her mother, Jane Crump Threadgill. had passed on and her father, Simon, had moved to New Jersey. Simon was the son of Sidney Threadgill and Nancy Mauney Threadgill, no doubts with ties to the businessmen brothers, Ephraim and Valentine Mauney, who had married into my Davis family, and who had business exploits in both Stanly and Rowan Counties, but I've found records of them in Mecklenburg, Cabarrus, Cumberland, Iredell and even into South Carolina, so they were men of means and influence.
Sidney Threadgill was also a landowner, and held a sizable estate in the Cottonville Community, impressive, considering the challenges afforded African Americans at the time. Calvin married well.
By 1900, Calvin and Ella had been married for 13 years, were living in Cottonville, and were the parents of 2 sons. Mary Ella was noted as having given birth to two children, with 2 living, so although there was a large age gap between the boys, aparently these two were her only ones.
The two sons of Calvin and Ella were Levander "Lee" Cochran , born around 1888 and Ernest "Dock" Cochran, born in 1896. The 1900 census captured the family on June 23 of that year, and they were living in the neighborhood of Julia Sibley Davis, widow of Benjamin Franklin Davis, the brother of my 2nd Great grandfather, Hawk. This tells me they lived in the southernmost part of the county, near the Rocky River.
Ella's grandfather, Sidney Threadgill, raised her, and treated her as a daughter, while her father, Simon, worked as a Teamster in New Jersey, lived in the community of Cottonville, just a hair north, and upon his arrival into old age, had acquired a substantial amount of property, through hard work, fortuity, and savvy business dealings.
The will of Sidney Threadgill mentions two tracts of land, 'The Floyd Tract' and ' The Crump Tract'. Later papers in the Probate stage refers to the Crump tract as " the old Crump Quarters', which means Sidney Threadgill serendipously ended up owning the old slave Quarters area of the enormous Crump Plantation of Stephen Crump, King of Cottonville Cotton.
A little bit about Mary Ella's grandfather, Sidney; Sidney Threadgill was born about 1826 and was the son of a James Crump and Susan Threadgill. Born into slavery, Sidney's father most likely worked the land that Sidney later owned himself, a clasic and deserving bit of irony.
Sidney wrote his will on June 20, 1899, at the age of 73. Medical conditions were probably coming upon him that led him to know the end was nigh, as his will was probated the next year. I have not looked into the realtions of Sidney Threadgill so closely to know how allof the people mentinoed in his will and probate papers are interrealted, however, I did discover Sindney's family is a little confusing. For one, his marriages.
In 1870, his first census, Sidney shows up with a wife named Sarah, about his own age, his daughters, Eliza Jane, his son, Simon, his daughter Alice and 8 month old 'Ellen', who I believe is Mary Ella, his granddaughter, a 25 year old Daniel and a 12 year old, Jane. (another Jane). He mentions Daniel Crump in his will. Maybe this Daniel is Daniel Crump, and perhaps these other two children are Sarah's children. The '2' in the age of Daniel is a typo, alook at the actual document shows 25, which is accurate for this to be Daniel C. Crump, husband of Calvin Cochran's sister, Harriett. Daniel C. Crump died in 1916 and his parents are listed as Doc and Sarah Crump. Doc's wife in the 1870 and 1880 census records and following records is named Elendar or Ellen, for short. Doc Crump was also the father of Harriett and Calvin's half-brother, Stephen Cochran/Crump by their mother, Zilphia Cochran. The entanglement of these two families is massive.
I wonder if Sidney's wife Sarah, who shows up in both the 1870 and 1880 cenesu with his, is also Sarah Crump, mother of Daniel, as Daniel is somehow an heir of Sidney Threadgill. She was not his first wife, as Simon, his oldest son, gives his mother in his documents as Nancy Mauney., and we will get back to that in a minute.
It is interesting to note the neighbors listed in the 1880 census with Sindeney, Sarah and Mary Ella. Heading the page is Dennis Davis, age 81 and his wife Mary, 40 and their children. I know Dennis to have been a slave of my ancestor, Job Davis and to be buried in the old family cememtery. Next up is Hampton Aldridge, aka Caleb Hampton or C. H. Aldridge, brother of my 2nd Great Grandmother, Francis Julina Aldrdige Davis. Then comes Sidney, a couple of families of black Crumps, followed by the whiite families of William and John Aldridge, John being Julina's younger brother.
This puts Sidney in the vicinity of present day Aldridge Road, and on what was known as the "Floyd tract, as C. H. Aldridge's mother-in-law-law, Sarah Floyd, lived with them.
Sidney Threadgill, age 65, married Martha Davis West, 40, on May 2, 1894. Martha was a widow, and the daughter of Dennis and Mary Davis, who were neighbors of Sidney Threadgill. Sidney gave his parents as James Crump and Susie Threadgill.
Then, on June 4, 1895, just 13 months later, Sidney Threadgill, age 68, (a few years off, but close enough, this was NOT Sidney Threadgill, Jr., son of his brother John), married Nancy Zinc, 65, daughter of Harry Randle and Celia Easley.
This couple has been named quite frequently in this narravitve, of the study of the family of Ben Davis and wife, Ziphia Cochran Davis, as their daughter, Judith, had married into the Davis family, and Harry Randle, had strayed from the bonds of matriomony, and had fathered a daughter, Disley Cochran, by Zilphia. So Dilsey and Calvin Cochran, were half-siblings. as was Dilsey and Nancy.
So, Sidney Threadgill married Nancy after he married Martha, YET, in his will and subsequent probate papers, his widow is Martha, not Nancy. Nancy, and this story, has a life of it's own. In a bit of a peak behind the curtain though, Sidney had been in a relationship with Nancy many years before. Did he committ bigamy, or was he just trying to correct a situation from decades prior, and inadvertently gotten it backwards, committing bigamy by igornance in the process?
The Will of Sidney Threadgill, again, written June 20, 1899, began, " I, Sidney Threadgill of Cottonville". He left to his son Simon, father of Mary Ella, who lived in New Jersey, 45 acres of a 55 acres tract, know as the 'Floid Tract'. He left Daniel Crump, whom I believe may have been his stepson, the remaining 10 acres of that tract. He left his wife Martha Threadgill, 25 acres of the 65 acres known as the Crump tract., and at the death or marriage of Martha, this tract to be divided between Simon, his daughter "Lizer Jane" Lilly, (Eliza Jane Threadgill Lilly), and Ella Cochran, his granddaughter whom he raised.
To Ella, alone, he left 26 acres of the Crump tract, to Maggie Colson, 4 acres of it, to Calla Thread gill, who was actually his nephew, Clavin Coley Threadgilll, son of John, 4 acres, and to Sidney Threadgill, Jr., his nephew and son of JOhn, he left 4 acres, the balnace of the 63 acre tract.
George Crump was his executor, and it was singed, Sidney Threadgill of Cottonville.
Calvin Cochran must have died shortly after the 1900 census. He wasn't mentioned in the division of the estate of Sidney Threadgill, although the spouses of the other female heirs were. Ella is found by 1910, living in the town of Albemarle, with ther two sons, Levander aka "Lee", and Earnest. She was living on Furniture Factory Street, which is no longer a street name in Albemarle. A look at the 1908 and 1922 Sanborn maps that mentioned a Furniture Factory located Northeast of the Courthouse, just beyond the town boundaries. Lee, 22. worked for the Railroad, Earnest, only 13, worked as Farm labor. Ella was working as a servant to a private family. Most of their neighbors were white and worked either at the Furniture Facotory or in a Knitting Mill, probably Lillian Knitting Mill.
Lillian Knitting Mill in Albemarle, from th estanly County Musuem collection
The next year, 1911, Ella, now 40, married Daniel Lee. In 1920, she put several properties up for sale in conjunction with her youngest son, Earnest and his wife Lillilan. Not mentioned was oldest son, Lee. Lee must have died young, prior to 1920, perhaps in a railroad incident. No more is known.
Earnest had married his cousin, Lillian Threadgill, in 1917. Lilly was the daughter of Calvin Coley Threadgill, who was Ella's first cousin, and his wife Hannah. That made Earnest and Lilly second cousins.
The 1920 census shows Ella and Daniel living on PeeDee and Yadkin Avenue in Albemarle with two of his children from another marriage, Gaines and Dashia. Daniel and Gaines are working as laborers in a Cotton Mill while both Ella and her stepdaughter, Dashia, jus 15, seem to be working for Privae famileis, probably as miads. The census calls it 'Work Women'.
Ernest Cochran and his wife, Lillian, show up in the City Directories of Winston-Salem, NC for awhile, with Earnest working first for RJR Tobacco and later as a bricklayer. They then moved to High Point and later,to Greensboro.
Dan and Ella remained in Albemarle until their death, but by 1930, they had moved to an area the census called 'South Albemarle', that was probably the area of town tha came to be known as Kingivlle, named after Dr. O. D. King. All of thier neighbors were now black, whereas before, most of thier neighbors had been white. Dan was still working in the mill and Ella was working as an Ironer at a Laundry.
Mary Ella Threadgill Cochran died on June 28, 1939 at the age of 63. She was buried at Cottonville. Her second husband, Daniel Lee, preceded her in death, having passed later in 1930, after the cencus.
Earnest Cochran, the last survivng member of the family, died January 2, 1943, at age 45. His tombstone called him Reverend. He is buried in Jamestown, Guilford County, NC.
