Since GeorgiaPioneers.com first appeared on the Internet in 1994, vast collections have been added, totaling millions of pages. The website is packed with data for Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia!
As everyone eventually discovers, finding certain illusive kinfolks is time-consuming, yet a most rewarding experience.
There was the tracking of the descendants of Thomas Franklin of Princess Anne County, Virginia, who bequeathed his plantation to the eldest son, smaller tracts to younger sons, and the eldest son who received no land. Little did I realize but what this son crossed the frontier and settled in the furthest point of the Virginia Colony, and that his grandsons would return to fight in the Revolutionary War and settle in Georgia.
Every family story involves a working plan that leads to intricate details of “why" and “how.”
Then there was John Evans, a shoemaker in South Carolina, whose poor descendants came to Georgia in search of fertile land, but ended up working in a cotton factory. And the long trail of the Adairs, from Galloway, Scotland to the Presbyterians (Scots-Irish) whose journey was first to Northern Ireland, before crossing the sea to Pennsylvania, and finally settling in Chester County, South Carolina.
And Gabriel Holland who was transported in 1624 on a “Supply” ship to Jamestown, Virginia. Gabriel was elected a Burgess, and made several journeys back to London to persuade King Charles I to sign a new tax law for the colony. But the king would not allow Parliament to convene, and so goes that story. Today, the descendants of Gabriel have their own town “Holland, Virginia,” and you can bet that I tracked every inch of Jamestown and Nansemond Counties to discover family stories because the county records did not survive. Tracing this family in English parish registers unfolded the genealogy back to about 1400!
Many records were lost over the years. Even today, family group sheets are disappearing in record numbers from the Internet. What was once a popular resource, got swallowed up in time. Yet, every genealogist knows that there is much work to do, even a lifetime of study.
A prized jewel lies in the personal research of each family. It is my hope that no one uses the new AI programs to assemble, as therein lies many errors!