Looking for Leavy

Hartsell Mill Township, Cabarrus County, North Carolina

Margaret Leavy Starnes was my paternal grandmother's paternal grandmother. Until now, she has been a fairly elusive lady. While I have yet to discover all there is to know about her, and even her death date and final resting place, my journey has begun. It is the difficult- to -locate ancestors who intrigue me the most.

This is what I do know about Leavy, as she was known.

Shortly after I started this post, I found Leavy.  It began with finding out exactly who she was and totally putting aside other descendants claims that she died in 1881, as was listed on ancestry.com. The reason they believed so was so many cousins with the same name.

Margaret Arlevis Starnes, known for her entire life as "Leavy", was born January 19, 1855 in Union County, North Carolina. She was one of the descendants, like all of the Union County Starnes, of one Frederick Staring/Starn/Sterns born in 1700 in Alzey, Germany. Her father's name was Frederick Faison Starnes. He was born in Georgia. Several of the Starnes, Frederick II and Leonard, had left for Georgia years prior. F F Starnes returned. He moved his family to the confluence of Stanly, Union and Cabarrus Counties and has the unique fate of being buried in Stanly County at the Meadow Creek Primitive Baptist Church, on the border of Cabarrus and Stanly counties.

Leavy's marriage license to Robert Lemmonds lists her parents as Ff Starnes and M L Starnes.


She was married in Cabarrus County on Jan 20, 1881. She and Bob would raise their 5 children in Township 1, which is the greater Harrisburg area, of Cabarrus County, and adjoining the city of Concord. After Bob died , She would move to Charlotte, where her father and his second wife Abigail, were living. She was living next to her son Frederick Cleveland Lemmonds.

Harris Lemmons [Harvie Lemmons]
Age:	13
Birth Date:	Aug 1886
Birthplace:	North Carolina
Home in 1900:	Charlotte, Mecklenburg, North Carolina [Mecklenburg]
Race:	White
Gender:	Male
Relation to Head of House:	Son
Marital Status:	Single
Father's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Mother's Name:	Leann Lemmons
Mother's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Occupation:	View on Image
Neighbors:	View others on page
Household Members:	Name Age Leann Lemmons 45 Maud Lemmons 18 Fred Lemmons 16 Harris Lemmons 13 Minnie Lemmons 18

The 1900 census show Leavy as 'Leann' and living with 4 of her children. Only Sam is missing. The 4 chilldren of Bob and Leavy Lemmonds were  Maud A., 1881, Frederick Cleveland, 1884, Harvey Lafayette, 1886, Samuel Grier, 1888 and Minnie 1891. Since Sam was one of the youngest, it is a mystery as to why he was not enumerated with his siblings.

Margaret A. Starns [Margaret A. Starnes]  Age: 23 Birth Year: abt 1857 Birthplace: North Carolina Home in 1880: Rocky River, Cabarrus, North Carolina Race: White Gender: Female Relation to Head of House: Daughter Marital Status: Single Father's Name: F.F. Starns Father's Birthplace: North Carolina Mother's Name: Mary L. Starns Mother's Birthplace: North Carolina Neighbors: View others on page Cannot read/write: Blind: Deaf and dumb: Otherwise disabled: Idiotic or insane: View image Household Members: Name Age F.F. Starns 51 Mary L. Starns 43 Margaret A. Starns 23 Thomas M. Starns 19 Dalphia A. Starns 10 Georgia A. Starns 7 Fredrick L. Starns 5 Dasie L. Starns 2 Martha Byram 70

View Original Record View original image

ara Lemmons]
Age:	45
Birth Date:	Jan 1855
Birthplace:	North Carolina
Home in 1900:	Charlotte, Mecklenburg, North Carolina [Mecklenburg]
Race:	White
Gender:	Female
Relation to Head of House:	Head
Marital Status:	Widowed
Marriage Year:	1881
Years Married:	19
Father's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Mother's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Mother: number of living children:	5
Mother: How many children:	5
Occupation:	View on Image
Neighbors:	View others on page
Household Members:	Name Age Leann Lemmons 45 Maud Lemmons 18 Fred Lemmons 16 Harris Lemmons 13 Minnie Lemmons Leavy Lemons Age in 1910: 55 Birth Year: 1855 Birthplace: North Carolina Home in 1910: Township 2, Cabarrus, North Carolina Race: White Gender: Female Relation to Head of House: Head [Self (Head)]  Marital Status: Widowed Father's Birthplace: North Carolina Mother's Birthplace: North Carolina Neighbors: View others on page Household Members: Name Age Leavy Lemons 55 Meirie Lemons 18 Samuel Lemons 21 May Lemons 19 By 1910, Sam is living with his mother and sisters, whose names were the ones wrangled this time. Levie Lemmond [Susie Lemmond]  Age: 65 Birth Year: abt 1855 Birthplace: North Carolina Home in 1920: Rocky River, Cabarrus, North Carolina Race: White Gender: Female Relation to Head of House: Head Marital Status: Widowed [Widow]  Father's Birthplace: North Carolina Mother's Birthplace: North Carolina Home owned: Own Able to read: No Able to Write: No Neighbors: View others on page Household Members: Name Age Levie Lemmond 65 Maud Davis 38 Lula Davis 16 Maud would marry William A Davis from Cabarrus County and have one daughter, Lula. She would remain a widow and Lula would remain with her mother, unmarried, for life. Margaret Lenards [Margaret Bownds]  Gender: Female Birth Year: abt 1855 Birthplace: North Carolina Race: White Home in 1930: Township 1, Cabarrus, North Carolina View Map Marital Status: Widowed Relation to Head of House: Head Father's Birthplace: North Carolina Mother's Birthplace: South Carolina Occupation: Education: Military Service: Rent/home value: Age at first marriage: Parents' birthplace: View image Neighbors: View others on page Household Members: Name Age Margaret Lenards 75 Theo M Stams 65 Maud Davis 48 Lula Davis 26 By 1930, Leavy's brother had came to live with them. This is Thomas Mellon Starnes, not Theo. It was in researching Maude that I had discovered that Leavy had lived past 1930, but not to 1940. In 1940 Maude and Lula were living alone. Maude A Davis Age: 58 Estimated Birth Year: abt 1882 Gender: Female Race: White Birthplace: North Carolina Marital Status: Widowed Relation to Head of House: Mother Home in 1940: Hartsell Mill-Franklin Mill-Norcott Mill, Cabarrus, North Carolina View Map Inferred Residence in 1935: Rural, Cabarrus, North Carolina Residence in 1935: Rural, Cabarrus, North Carolina Sheet Number: 18B Neighbors: View others on page Household Members: Name Age Lula May Davis 36 Maude A Davis 58 I kept tracking the children and would not give up on finding Leavy. Knowing she had lived so long and died so recently (anything in the twentieth century is recent in genealogy), I could not give up on finding her. She had to be nearby. So I kept researching her children, and Mecklenburg and Cabarrus counties, knowing she was likely there. Name: Levy Lemmons Gender: M (Male) Residence Year: 1902 Street Address: Phifer Hill Residence Place: Charlotte, North Carolina Spouse: Robert Lemmons  Publication Title: Walsh's Directory of the City of Charlotte

Find-a-grave does not have Leavy. I will have to put her there. But I found Maude. In the old Oakwood Cemetery right in the middle of Concord.

And her daughter Lula.

Harvey Layfayette Lemmonds death certificate lists his father, Robert Lemmonds and his mother Margaret Leavy Starnes. He was born in 1886, after the 1880 census and due to the destruction of the 1890 census, he was never counted with his father. In the 1900 census, he is listed as 'Harris' and Leavy as 'Leann'. It takes some detective work and imagination to keep in the swing with the early census takers and decipher their handwriting. The transcribers had a hard time of it.


And a stone marked Davis Lemmons. On the back of the stone was "Bost". Youngest daughter Minnie had married Walter Layfette Bost. Strange that her husband carried the same middle name as her brother. It must have been popular in the area at the time.


And then there was Leavy. Margaret R Leavy Starnes.



Even her children were puzzled about how to spell that middle name 'Arlevis' and it became R. Leavy.
Cabarrus County had given up her ghosts. I still have not found Leavy's death certificate. I am sure she had one and they most likely mangled her name, but I am not giving up. I am sure there is more to come. I spoke to Leavy's grave, 'Hello there grandma'. And a beam of sunshine broke through the clouds. "I've found you."

The Best and The Worst Apples

The wonderful thing about a blog is that you can blog about anything you want to. In a geneablog, it can be one document, one individual, one event, or an entire family over the course of a century or two. This is going to be a very brief post with a very certain conclusion. In researching the many families and various branches that make up my family tree and the trees of friends and nonbiological relatives, the history of our area and the founding families of several towns and counties, I have discovered that the best and the worst apples all still come from the same tree.

The families that built a nation are also the same families from which the destructive and shameful individuals came from . Today's leaders of the community could very well be the grandchildren of  yesteryears' criminals and dregs of society, who themselves were the sons of  patriots and heros of  times past. 

A man who came from Virginia after the Revolutionary War, in which he was a hero,  became an important individual in the growth and founding of the community in North Carolina in which he settled. He started several profitable businesses and was a well-known and much loved individual in his place and time. He sent his children up north to be educated during the 1820's and 1830's. One of these sons became a deserter during the Civil War and was known as a thief, vagabond and finally a murderer. He was executed for his crimes, but left behind a young wife and 3 small children. His wife married an unscrupulous older man, who was an associate and partner in crime of her first husband. He raped her 14 year old daughter and a child was born of this rape. The boy grew up by the scruff of his teeth, never having enough and was treated very badly, but became an humble and frugal man. Eventually, he became a minister and was blessed with a lovely family and a growing ministry and was able to educate his children. Two sons started a business that would grow to make them and their heirs wealthy men. One daughter married a lawyer, another the Dean of a Christian University. His grandchildren would be known as leaders in their communities. One would die serving his country in WW II. This son's children would find no mercy or aid from their aunts and uncles. They went to work in the cotton mills of a midsized North Carolina city. The mills closed and the grandchildren of the soldier came of age in a dying town with no jobs. One of them used the area's overt depression and began a lucrative business of selling drugs. He was eventually arrested for a massive criminal business which included illegal weapons, drugs, and child prostitution. He had fathered a son while a senior in high school, who knew who his father was, but carried on no more than the name. This young man is now a minister in his late twenties lauded as an example and leader of the youth in his community. 

And so the story continues, and so the same trees keep putting out the same apples. Some fall to the ground and rot, others become nourishment to to the body. 

A Man Called Eliza

Eleazer McSwain, WW I Soldier with his mount.

Eleazer E McSwain did not live a long life. He was born December 30, 1891, almost a New Year's baby, to David Louis McSwain and his wife Sophronia Caudle McSwain of the Tyson community in Stanly County. The McSwains arrived in North Carolina and  Virginia from Ireland in the very early part of the 19th century. The Hudson and McSwain families were a populous and  integral part of the fabric of the Tyson and southern Stanly County farming community. There was a great deal of intermarriage and interaction between the two families. It began when William Joshua Hudson, Jr the great, great grandfather of Hattie Helen Hudson bought property from Lewis McSwain, an ancestor of Eleazer.

On June 5, 1917 Eleazer was drafted into the Army. He fought in World War I. He returned to the Tyson community, to the fields, the farms, the little houses going up everywhere as the farm kids grew up, to the grain mills, the many creeks and muddy rivers. He married Miss Hattie Helen Hudson, daughter of James Robert Hudson and Judie Aldridge Hudson. 

Elezer Mcsuan [Elezer McSwain]  [Elezer Mesuan]
Age:	8
Birth Date:	Dec 1891
Birthplace:	North Carolina
Home in 1900:	Tyson, Stanly, North Carolina [Stanly]
Race:	White
Gender:	Male
Relation to Head of House:	Son
Marital Status:	Single
Father's Name:	Louis Mcsuan
Father's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Mother's Name:	Sophronia Mcsuan
Mother's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Occupation:	View on Image
Neighbors:	View others on page
Household Members:	Name Age Louis Mcsuan 49 Sophronia Mcsuan 48 Arnal Mcsuan 21 John C Mcsuan 16 Mary E Mcsuan 11 Elezer Mcsuan John M McSwain, brother of Eleazer and his fish.	8

Leaser Mcswain
Age in 1910:	17
Birth Year:	1893
Birthplace:	North Carolina
Home in 1910:	Tyson, Stanly, North Carolina
Race:	White
Gender:	Male
Relation to Head of House:	Son
Marital Status:	Single
Father's Name:	Dave D Mcswain
Father's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Mother's Name:	Sorthwnia Mcswain
Mother's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Neighbors:	View others on page
Household Members:	Name Age Dave D Mcswain 59 Sorthwnia Mcswain 59 Ester M Mcswain 20 Leaser Mcswain 17

Leazer Mc Swain [Leaner Mcswain]
Age:	28
Birth Year:	abt 1892
Birthplace:	North Carolina
Home in 1920:	Tyson, Stanly, North Carolina
Race:	White
Gender:	Male
Relation to Head of House:	Son
Marital Status:	Single
Father's Name:	David Mc Swain
Father's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Mother's Name:	Saphronia Mc Swain
Mother's Birthplace:	North Carolina
Able to read:	Yes
Able to Write:	Yes
Neighbors:	View others on page
Household Members:	Name Age David Mc Swain 68 Saphronia Mc Swain 68 Leazer Mc Swain 28

Country folks in the South have maintained an accent derived from the old English and Irish accents of their ancestors that populated the Appalacians and the surrounding foothills. In this dialect, words ending in "A" often became "er" endings and words ending in "Er" often became "A".  On the back of the photo of Eleazer and his horse, my grandmother had written "Eliza Hudson WW I". In the same way that young eager brides going in front of the clerk to obtain their marriage licenses would tell the clerk her name was Lilla or Lula and the clerk would write Lular or Lillar instead.

On June 1, 1922 Eleazer McSwain died of encephalitis. The marriage had produced only one pregnancy, of a son, born far too early, who was considered stillborn, as he had no death certificate.

Eleazer E Mcswain
Gender:	Male
Race:	White
Age:	30
Birth Date:	3 Dec 1891
Birth Place:	Stanley, North Carolina, United States
Death Date:	1 Jun 1922
Death Location:	Charlotte, Mecklenburg
Spouse's Name:	Mrs Hattie Hudson Mcswain
Father's Name:	D L Mcswain
Mother's Name:	Froine Caudle

In censuses, he was known as Leazer, to his wife, he was known as 'Eliza'.