From the Scrapbook of Shirley Sorrell, Part 10

by Glenn N. Holliman

As observed in early posts, the majority of the 20th Century  descendants of Isaac (1822-1864) and Caroline Greer Wilson (1828-1911), left family farms and pursued occupations in the communities and cities usually far from ancestral roots in Sutherland, Ashe County, North Carolina. 

In the United States, the number of persons employed in agriculture fell constantly from the Civil War to 1950 as agricultural mechanization and specialization increased, and as jobs in the growing industrial and manufacturing sectors proved more lucrative and attractive than subsistence farming.  Such was the case with the ancestors of Shirley Sorrell who kindly shares these photographs.

Above at the Wilson-Greer and Families Seminar in 2014 in Boone, North Carolina, left Shirley Sorrell and right, distant cousin Jeanette Suggs.

The lineage of Shirley Sorrell

Her parents:   Deronda (1918-1966) and Barbara McCall Donnelly (1922-1965)

Her parental grandparents:   Thomas Earl (1892-1964)  and Mayme Wilson Donnelly (1892-1975)

Her great grandparents:  John (1855-1928) and  Rebecca Wilson Wilson (1862-1954)

Her great great grandparents:  Isaac and Caroline Greer Wilson (the same as this writer)

Below, Shirley's father, Ronda Donnelly who served in India and Panama during World War II.  Ronda and wife, Barbara McCall, lived in Boone, North Carolina (where Shirley was born) and later moved to Richmond, Virginia.    Shirley's mother also served in World War II.  She joined the WACs as a secretary during the war and lived in Washington, DC when in Army.  Sadly, both Shirley's parents died young.

Below, left to right in the 1940s, Roger Donnelly, his mother, Mayme Donnelly, John Sutherland and his wife, Mayme's daughter, Becky Donnelly Sutherland. 

Roger (1928-2011) moved to West Virginia, married Pauline Wilson Roark, who had one son from a previous marriage.  Later, Roger worked in coal mines and road construction in Tennessee and owned a place in Shady Valley, Tennessee. He served in the Korean War.

John Thomas Sutherland of Sutherland was a descendant of the family that founded the community along the North Fork of the New River in Ashe County.  Neighbors married neighbors.   John (1918-1991) moved to Raleigh when he and Becky Donnelly wed, and drove a Greyhound bus until his retirement.  Becky graduated from Appalachian College in Boone and taught school a few years before marriage.

                                         The Grandchilden and Great Grandchildren 
                                             of Rebecca Wilson Wilson, 1940 ca

Extreme back: Verd Wilson

Back row: Marie Wilson Marsh, Boyd Wilson, Don Wilson in hat, Roger Donnelly, Argus Wilson

2nd row: ?, Shirley Marsh, Virginia Hurt, Becky Donnelly, Ernest Wilson, Meredith Duncan, Shirley Hurt, Joe Donnelly

Front row: Bill Wilson, Marie Wilson, Rebecca Wilson, Robert Wilson, (in chair) Anna Bell Wilson, Becky Wilson, Becky Hurt, Betty Wilson

Readers are invited to help with identification of persons in this picture, and please send along any memories or information on any relatives.


All are invited to join in building the family tree at Wilson-Greer-Osborne-Forrester-Donnelly and Associated Families of Western NC at Ancestry.com.  Just write to glennhistory@gmail.com for an invitation or to provide information on the reunion photograph.  Thanks!

A Forrester Trip

by Glenn N. Holliman

In what has become an annual excursion, descendants of Isaac and Caroline Wilson Greer, my Civil War great, great grandparents, have taken to visiting ancestral sites in southeastern Virginia, western North Carolina and upper eastern Tennessee.  I was not able to make this summer's trip, but am happy to produce the following article written by family historian, Clinton Getzinger.  Clinton deserves a tip of the hat for organizing the 2015 gathering and for his continuing research! - GNH

The Forrester-Wilson Family Tour, 2015   
by Clinton Getzinger

"On Saturday morning, May 23, 2015, nine descendants of Martha Wilson Forrester and one descendant of John Wilburn Wilson gathered in the Pine Branch Community of Grayson County, Virginia. They toured the former property of Martha Wilson Forrester (1857-1904) and her husband Andrew Johnson Forrester (1866-1938). 

Martha Evaline Wilson Forrester was the fifth child and last daughter of Isaac Wilson (1822-1864) and Caroline Nancy Greer Wilson (1828-1911) of Wilson Branch, Sutherland, Ashe County, NC. 

In 1898, Andrew and Martha and four of their children traveled by covered wagon to Grayson County, Virginia to make a new home. At this writing, we are not certain why they moved away, but two of Martha’s adult children lived in the Pine Branch Community on Kendrick Mountain and that is where they built their home.

As they built a new farm, it was necessary to plant an apple orchard and a maple tree to provide apples for desserts and syrup to sweeten their stack cakes. Martha’s sister, Jane Wilson Proffit (1852-1937), had used a slight bit of molasses or maple syrup to sweeten her cornbread, so the Forresters may have done the same. Their Grandma Frankie Brown Greer (1810-1905) also grew a maple to provide syrup on her North Carolina farm.  Although Hurricane Hugo destroyed most of the maples, one maple still exists to this day.

On the Forrester farm was a barn for the horses and other outbuildings such as a corn crib. The barn no longer stands, but some of the other outbuildings do.

Home of the Forrester Family built circa 1898

The tour began early in the morning at Mouth of Wilson. Ten Wilson descendants drove on to the Pine Branch Community that began at the Roger Cole Family Farm.

Our gracious hosts, Mr. and Mrs. Roger Cole, took us up to the former Forrester farm that is still a part of their land. We went inside the house and toured the inside and tried to imagine the Forresters living inside of the various rooms. 

Immediately after we took a family photo in front of the house, we drove on to see the cemetery where Martha and her daughter Lelia Wilson Hash are buried, as well as Martha’s youngest daughter, Callie Forrester Anderson. After we explored the cemetery, we went to tour the inside of the present Pine Branch Baptist Church where we discovered a pew with a memorial plaque dedicated to Lee and Lelia Wilson Hash.

Before we left the Cole Farm, Mrs. Cole presented this author with several jars of homemade apple butter made from the Forrester apple tree. Each Wilson descendant took home a jar of apple butter.

The tour ended at Ciro’s Restaurant in Independence where two more family members met this group for lunch. All family members had a great time and discussed getting together again in the near future." - Clinton Getzinger

Back row: Bina Gray, Betty Ankers, Connie Burns and Alexis Lilly.
Front left to right: Sandy Gentry, Clinton Getzinger, Phyllis Watt, Shirley Sorrell, Vickie Stamper and Phillip Marcus

Clinton also runs two family pages on Facebook that are of interest to Wilson-Greer-Osborne-Forrester and associated families.  Write him at these addresses and he will warmly welcome you to these sites:  https://www.facebook.com/groups/606867212667403/ for display of photographs of unknown relatives, and a link to the site of KNOWN family photos: www.picturetrail.com/andersontrimble .

All are invited to join in building the family tree at Wilson-Greer-Osborne-Forrester-Donnelly and Associated Families of Western NC at Ancestry.com.  Just write to glennhistory@gmail.com for an invitation.

From the Scrapbook of Shirley Sorrell, Part 9

by Glenn N. Holliman  

 One of the delights of the Internet has been to discover distant cousins and relatives of my grand and great grandparents; stories that would have been lost otherwise.  Thanks to cousin Shirley Sorrell, an avid family historian, we are able to continue to post photographs and biographical data about shared relatives.

Shirley and I are both great great grandchildren of Isaac and Caroline Greer Wilson, whose Civil War stories reverberate through our various family branches.  Shirley's ancestor was John Wilson, a son of Isaac and Caroline.  My great grandmother was Frances Caroline Wilson Osborne, a sister of John.  

So Shirley's grandmother, Mayme Wilson Donnelly (1892-1975), was a first cousin to my grandmother, ironically of the same first name, Mayme Torrence Osborne Stansbery (1896-1943).

As with my branch of the Greer/Wilson/Osborne families, Shirley's moved from rural areas to the technology employment opportunities of urban centers.  My great uncles, at least three sons and son-in-laws of Frankie and G.W. Osborne, also left family farms and in their careers, became automobile mechanics and salesmen in the early 20th Century.

Below in the late 1930s, Rebekah Sue Donnelly Sutherland (September 28, 1921 - August 8, 1999) , Mayme Wilson Donnelly and Roger Gus Donnelly at their home in Sutherland, North Carolina. Becky was Shirley's aunt, and Roger, her uncle. Mayme's other child, Deronda Donnelly, the father of Shirley, is not in these first photographs.

Below perhaps a decade older, are the same three persons, same home in Sutherland.

Below, at the same house in Sutherland, Becky holds Nancy, her only child.  Right is Barbara McCall Donnelly, another daughter-in-law of Mayme Wilson Donnelly, and wife of Deronda Donnelly,  Shirley Sorrell's father.  Barbara is holding young Shirley.  The date is approximately 1951.

Above, Deronda Donnelly, Shirley Sorrell's father and husband of Barbara McCall.  This picture was taken at Lee McCrae College in the 1930s, when 'Ronda' was a student in Banner Elk, North Carolina.

Below, Becky Donnelly, obviously on a special occasion!  She married John Thomas Sutherland (April 25, 1918- July 9, 1991) on November 20, 1942.  They had one daughter, Nancy Leigh Sutherland Broyles.  Becky graduated from Appalachian State College and taught school before her marriage to John, a Greyhound Bus driver.  The family moved from the North Carolina highlands, which their ancestors had settled in the late 1700s to Raleigh, North Carolina in the mid 20th Century.   

The lives of Becky and John illustrate the increasing education levels of the family, and the need to relocate to a major city for employment opportunities.  Families were leaving the mountains and migrating to urban areas.  And if Becky is an example, also becoming snappy dressers!

Later, more from Shirley Sorrell's Scrapbook, a 20th Century family in transition....

 All are invited to join in building the family tree at Wilson-Greer-Osborne-Forrester-Donnelly and Associated Families of Western NC at Ancestry.com.  Just write to glennhistory@gmail.com for an invitation.

From the Scrapbook of Shirley Sorrell 7

by Glenn N. Holliman


The sun was shining brightly on a September's day in Wilson Cove in Sutherland, Ashe County, North Carolina in 1935 when this picture of John and Rebecca Wilson Wilson's descendants was taken.  Shirley Sorrell has saved this and other photographs and has identified these family members. 

Below, the grandchildren of John and Rebecca.

Below are the son-in-laws of John and Rebecca Wilson. Front row, left to right are Earl Donnelly married to Mayme and Shirley Hurt, wed to Ruth.  Back row, left to right are Chall Osborne married to Minnie, William Wilson married to Cal,  Bower Duncan wed to Margaret (Maggie) and Arlie Wilson whose wife was Bessie.

When one analyzes the occupations of the son-in-laws, we begin to see the increasing economic diversity of the North Carolina highlands.  Several had moved to medium size cities for employment.  Two had become educators.  Only one remained a farmer in this generation.

Earl Donnelly was a hardware store salesman.  Shirley Hurt was a paint company salesman in Greensboro, NC and did landscaping. Chall Osborne was a farmer in Ashe County although he and Minnie had gone out west to tend sheep. William Wilson married his first cousin Cal.  He graduated from Trinity College (now Duke), class of 1914.  He served in the U.S. Army and worked for Liggett and Myers Tobacco in Durham from 1920 to 1959.  His father was the Methodist missionary to Japan who wrote the Wilson family memoirs of the violent 1860s. Bower Duncan served as a teacher principal and superintendent in Ashe County schools.  He attended Appalachian and Wake Forest, served in World War I and as a magistrate for many years.  

Arlie Wilson ran a store in Mabel community, and taught in Watauga and Wilkes county schools.  He and Bessie later moved in with Rebecca Wilson Wilson to care for her.

 In 1935, the U.S. Congress passed the Social Security Act ensuring retirement benefits to older Americans.  The descendants of John and Rebecca Wilson Wilson, unlike Rebecca, would be able to live their senior years more independently.

Below, a picnic at the reunion.  Shirley Sorrell has identified several of the persons as Deronda Donnelly, Ernest Wilson,  Don Wilson, Becky Donnelly and Geraldine Wilson in the middle of the photograph.  Additional identifications welcome.

 We invite you to rediscover your heritage at a Wilson, Greer, Wilcoxson, Osborne, Forrester, Adams and other families Forum, Saturday, 9:30 am, July 19, 2014 in the community room of the Boone, North Carolina public library.  Sunday, July 20th is also the annual Wilson Homecoming at Sutherland United Methodist Church in Ashe County.  The Family Forum begins at the Rustica Restaurant, Boone, NC. 6 pm, July 18th.  Email glennhistory@gmail.com for reservations, please.

 For details and schedule on the above event, contact glennhistory@gmail.com.  Isaac and Caroline Greer Wilson are great, great grandparents of this writer.

From the Scrapbook of Shirley Sorrell 6

by Glenn N. Holliman

We continue with our series on the Wilson and associated families of Sutherland, North Carolina. Thanks once more to cousin Shirley Sorrell for making available these marvelous photographs from 1935 of the John and Rebecca Wilson family reunion in Sutherland, North Carolina. 

Right, Annie Greer Heaton of Banner Elk, NC with Shirley Sorrell, front right, and Geraldine Stansbery Holliman Feick, back right.  This picture was made at our Wilson-Greer family forum in 2012.  Another is planned this July 19 and 20, 2014.
 
In 1935, the United States struggled to escape the Great Depression.  Ashe County historian, Arthur Lloyd Fletcher, states that the sheriff reported in 1932 to the County Board of Supervisors that enforcing the property tax law would result  in foreclosure of more than half the homes in Ashe county!   Such were the economic challenges of our ancestors in those difficult times.  

Shirley has identified the ten surviving children below.  John Wilson, born 1855, died in 1928.  His parents are Isaac (1822-1864) and Caroline Greer Wilson (1828-1911).

The Rebecca and John Wilson Descendants Family Reunion 1935

Above, front row in the summer of 1935: Ruth Wilson Hurt (1903-1999) , Bessie Wilson Wilson (1887-1976), Rebecca Wilson Wilson (1862-1954), and Conley Wilson (1882-1957).  Back row: Preston (1900-1989), Robert (1906-1987), Cal (1898-1999) , Margaret (1894-1992), Mayme (1892-1975), Minnie (1896-1987) and Don (1890-1975).

Four children died in infancy or childhood, Nora (1881-1887), Edgar (1883-1885), Boyd (1885) and Nancy (1912).

Above, from the same reunion, we have this picture of several generations. Shirley has made it easy for us to identify our ancestors.  Below is a numbered photograph and then under it, are numbers and names.

1. Roger Donnelly, son of Mayme Wilson and Earl Donnelly
2. Meridith Duncan, son of Bower and Margaret (Maggie) Wilson Duncan
3. Robert Wilson, son of Boyd and Lexie Wilson
4. Emojean Wilson Suggs, daughter of Ruth Kilby and Preston Wilson
5. Ruthel Wilson Merritt, daughter of Preston Wilson
6. Mary Wilson, daughter of Olive and Oscar Wilson, son of Ellen and Robert Wilson
7. Shirley Hurt Brand, daughter of Ruth Wilson and Shirley Hurt
8. Irene Wilson, daughter of Olive and Oscar Wilson, son of Ellen and Robert Wilson
9. Worth Wilson, son of Olive and Oscar Wilson, son of Ellen and Robert Wilson
10. Alice Wilson, mother to Arlie Wilson, husband of Bessie Wilson
11. Rebecca Wilson Igneizi, only daughter of Cal Wilson and William Wilson
12. Rebecca Wilson Wilson (b 1862), wife to John (1855-1928), sister to Ellen Wilson
13. Rebecca Hurt Johnson, daughter of Ruth Wilson and Shirley Hurt
14. Ellen Wilson Wilson, wife of Robert and sister to Rebecca Wilson Wilson
15. Virginia Hurt Breeden, daughter of Ruth Wilson and Shirley Hurt
16. Geraldine Wilson, daughter of Preston Wilson
17. Ernest Wilson, son of Bessie and Arlie Wilson
18. Olive Kilby Wilson, wife of Oscar Wilson, son of Ellen and Robert Wilson
19. Maude 'Tincey' Williams Wilson, wife of Clyde Wilson
20. Don Wilson, son of John (b 1855)
21. Conley Wilson, son of John (b 1855)
22. Shirley Hurt, husband to Ruth Wilson Hurt
23. Rebecca Donnelly Sutherland, daughter of Mayme Wilson (b 1892) and Earl Donnelly
24. Grace Donnelly Wilson, wife to Argus Wilson, son of Conley
25. Betty Wilson Elmore, daughter to Argus and Grace Wilson (baby in Grace's arms)
26. Ruth Wilson Hurt, daughter of John (b 1855)
27. Lexie Lawrence Wilson, wife to Boyd Wilson, son of Bessie and Arlie Wilson
28.Gloria Wilson Heimburger, daughter of Boyd and Lexie Wilson
29. Shirley Hurt, husband to Ruth Wilson
30. Boyd Wilson, son of Bessie and Arlie Wilson
31. Chall Wilson, husband to Minnie Wilson, daughter of John (b 1855)
32. William Wilson, husband to Cal Wilson
33. Arlie Wilson, husband to Bessie Wilson
34. Ruth Kilby Wilson, wife of Preston Wilson, son of John (b 1855)
35. Clyde Wilson, son of Bessie and Arlie Wilson 
36. Oscar Wilson, son of Ellen and Robert Wilson (b 1860)
37. Bessie Wilson, daughter of John (1855)
38. Unidentified blond boy
39. Cal Wilson, daughter of John (1855)
40. Preston Wilson, son of Rebecca and John (1855)
41. Argus Wilson, son of Conley
42. Bower Duncan, husband of Margaret (Maggie) Wilson
43. Deronda Donnelly, son of Mayme Wilson Donnelly
44. Earl Donnelly, husband to Mayme Wilson
45. Shirley Ann Marsh (b 6/15/1935), daughter of Marie Wilson (Conley's daughter) and Don Marsh

If one discovers any discrepancies in the above, please let us know.  One of the positive features of a blog is one can go back and change, add or subtract copy. 


Next posting yet more reunion photographs from the John Wilson family of Ashe County, North Carolina....

We invite you to rediscover your heritage at a Wilson, Greer, Wilcoxson, Osborne, Forrester, Adams and other families Forum, Saturday, 9:30 am, July 19, 2014 in the community room of the Boone, North Carolina public library.  Sunday, July 20th is also the annual Wilson Homecoming at Sutherland United Methodist Church in Ashe County.  A Friday evening, 6 pm, July 18th get acquainted dinner will be held at the Boone, NC Rustica Restaurant.  For reservations and details, email glennhistory@gmail.com.

 

From the Scrapbook of Shirley Sorrell 5

by Glenn N. Holliman

Continuing our Series of Wilson Photographs....

 Several cousins, Shirley Sorrell, Dale Wilson and Kathryn Wilson have made this article possible with their photographs and knowledge of ancestors who were born and for many, lived their lives in the North Fork of the New River in Ashe County, North Carolina.    We continue the series with more on John Wilburn Wilson (1855-1928), a son of Isaac (1822-1864) and Caroline Greer Wilson's (1828-1911).

John and Rebecca Wilson Wilson (1862 - 1954) had ten children who lived to maturity,  and while some descendants still reside in the Western North Carolina mountains, many have dispersed across the United States. 

One son of John and Rebecca's was Thomas Conley Wilson, born Feb 18, 1882 and died Dec 9, 1957. He married Verde M. Barlow, (1880 - 1969). Their children are Marie Wilson (1908-2001), Conley Argus Wilson (October 3, 1909 - January 3, 1994) and Thomas Earl Wilson (October 22, 1913 - July 23, 1977).  Earl married Neva Howard ( b. Aug 12, 1912).


Conley lived all his life on a farm that was part of the Issac Wilson home place. The house still stands on the right just before Wilson cemetery on Oscar Wilson Road, Sutherland, North Carolina.  John and Rebecca, his parents, lived a little further up the road from him. He died of what appeared to be a heart failure in his barn, where his son Argus found him.

 
Robert Wilson was the last child of John and Rebecca, born June 4, 1906 and died May 18, 1987 and is buried in Guildford Memorial Park in Greensboro, NC. As a young man, he went out west with his nephew, Earl Wilson (son of his brother Conley). Robert was a bachelor for a long time, but later married Imogene (last name unknown) from Galax, Virginia.  There were no children from the marriage. The coupled lived in High Point, North Carolina where Robert worked at Sears in Greensboro for years. Imogene worked at Pilot Life Insurance.

He loved horses but Imogene did not want him spending money on them. So he would buy one, and say it was his nephew's, Clyde Wilson. Clyde was the oldest son of Robert's sister, Bessie Wilson.  They did have dogs and cats at home.  Clyde Wilson, his wife Tincy and their daughter Kathryn lived in High Point also. Robert ‘s youngest sister, Ruth Wilson Hurt, lived in Greensboro within miles of Robert. Reportedly Imogene and Ruth had their differences and 'fought like cats and dogs'!

 

Above, recently in my sister's attic I found my mother's (Geraldine Stansbery Holliman Feick, b 1923) baby book kept by her mother, Mayme Osborne Stansbery (1896-1943).  They lived in Bristol, Tennessee, and visited John W. Wilson and families in Sutherland in July 1924.  According to the above entry my mother first crawled at her great Uncle John's home.  The photograph to the right, appears to be my great grandmother, Frances Wilson Oborne (1851-1924) holding my mother while her two siblings, Frances Louise Stansbery Sherwood (1915-2006) and Charles Stansbery (1981-2006) mount a horse in Wilson Cove. 

Below are the obituaries concerning John Wilburn Wilson and his death in 1928.  This is has become a comprehensive treasure chest of family names and relations. Notice the reference to the bushwhacking in 1864 of Isaac Wilson by Leonard Columbus Wilson, a cousin by marriage. Click on the pages twice and they should enlarge.