Baldwin County GaArchives History .....History of Baldwin County - Vinson Biography 1925
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 October 7, 2004, 7:49 pm

p. 457-462

THE VINSON FAMILY

    Five Vinson brothers came to America from Ireland, and settled in Maryland.
My great-grand-father moved from Maryland to Hancock county, Georgia, and was a
Methodist minister. His son, Ebenezer Vinson, moved from Hancock county, to
Baldwin county, Georgia, about 1854.

    Ebenezer Vinson built a home, three miles from Milledgeville, on the
Sandersville road. The house is still standing—a two story house, well preserved
and painted gray. The second story is only across the front of the house, and a
small front porch below, a type of architecture very much in use at that time.
The many out buildings have long been torn away.

    Ebenezer Vinson had two brothers and two sisters. One sister, Martha Vinson,
married Mr. Parham, of Warren county. The other sister was named Vina. One
brother, John Vinson, moved to Alabama and. the other brother, Tully Vinson,
moved to Texas. Ebenezer Vinson lived and died near Milledgeville. His wife was
Martha Crawford Dickson, and his children were: William Vinson, Henry Vinson,
Walter Vinson, Edward Vinson, Lucy Vinson, (Mrs. N. P. Williams), Dora Vinson
(Mrs. Wm. Williford), Anne Vinson (Mrs. Thomas Beall).

    Bishop Pierce performed the marriage ceremony of Ebenezer and Martha
Dickson, and came from his home to preach the funeral of Ebenezer when he died,
as he was a life-long friend.

    Edward Story Vinson is the only member of the family now residing in
Milledgeville. He married Miss Annie Morris, and the children are: Mrs. J. W.
Cannon, Cordele, Ga., Mrs. M. J. Guyton, Dublin, Ga., Mrs. Thos. Pollard,
Jacksonville, Fla., Hon. Carl Vinson, M. C., Washington, D. C., Edward Vinson,
Cordele, Ga., Fred Vinson, Honduras, C. A., Lieut. Wilbur Vinson, U. S. A., Ft.
Benning, Ga.

    One of the early settlers of Baldwin County was Mrs. Harriett Singleton
Morris, wife of Thomas H. Morris. They were married in Jones County, Ga., Feb.
4, 1851, and early moved to Baldwin County, in the Pleasant Grove neighborhood.
Mr. Morris died the first year of the Civil war, and Mrs. Morris died in
Milledgeville, May 27, 1912, in her eighty-first year, leaving the following
children: Mrs. E. S. Vinson, Milledgeville, Ga., Mrs. Ida Armstrong, Macon,
Georgia, Mr. Gus Morris, Milledgeville, Ga., Rev. T. H. Morris, Dallas, Tex.,
and the late Mr. Chas. Morris, Milledgeville, Ga.

    Mrs. Harriet Singleton Morris is a descendant of the Revolutionary soldier,
Captain Matthew Singleton, of S. C. The Revolutionary records of S. C., show
that Matthew Singteton was a friend of Nathaniel Greene, a great favorite of
his, and considered by Greene a good soldier. Matthew was Captain of a company
during the war, and his son, John was in the company. He became a Captain before
the war ended.

    The Singletons ranked, during the colonial period in Virginia, as one of the
most prominent families. The Singletons of South Carolina were very active
during the Revolutionary war, and their name appears in several different
companies. One of the women of the family, Sarah Angelica Singleton, married the
son of Martin Van Buren, and as Pres. Van Buren was a widower, his son's wife
presided over the White House. We copy from the Washington Post, Nov. 15, 1914,
the following:

    "There is no figure in the period costume at the National Museum more
admired than the graceful form recently placed in a case representing Mrs.
Angelica Singleton Van Buren, mistress of the White House during the
administration of President Martin Van Buren. Mrs. Van Buren's father was
Richard Singleton, a large land owner and planter of Sumter County, S. C., a
member of a family that ranked among the "blue bloods" of that exclusive state.
To complete an education in keeping with her elevated social position, Miss
Singtelon was sent for several years to Mme. Ireland's School in Philadelphia,
and in 1837, she spent a portion of her holidays in Washington with her
kinswoman, Mrs. Dolly Madison, who took pride and pleasure in presenting her to
President Van Buren. She was a girl of rare beauty, and most accomplished, she
at once became a reigning belle and one year later she was married, at her own
home in South Carolina, to Maj. Abram Van Buren, eldest son of President Van
Buren, a graduate of West Point, an officer in the army, who at the time was
acting as his father's private secretary."

    The same newspaper article goes on to describe her first appearance at the
White House, and describes her costume. There are many descendants today in
Milledgeville of the Singleton and Morris families, among them the Vinson family
and the Morris family.

(Written by Mrs. M. J. Guyton—(Lelia Vinson).

    The Vinson family, originally of Hancock County, was transplanted to Baldwin
after this manner:

    Ebenezer Callaway Vinson, tho' still a comparatively young man, began to
suffer a physicial decline: he decided that the climate of South Georgia would
be more agreeable, and therefore more desirable, as a place of residence. This
thought perhaps as to the mildness of the climate was dominant, but the fact
that the family owned a great deal of land thereabouts also had its weight as a
determining factor. Accordingly, Vinson quitted his Hancock plantation and
started out with South Georgia as his objective, to decide on the exact location
for the future home of his family. He and an older brother had surveyed, for the
government, large tracts of land in South Georgia.

    Horseback travel was slow and he was not well, so when Milledgeville was
reached, he resolved to tabernacle here. Even in that day and generation,
Milledgeville offered superior school advantages. Mr. Vinson therefore made a
quick purchase of the plantation, for many succeeding years known as the Vinson
place, situated three miles east of Milledgeville, with the expectation that it
was to serve only as a temporary home for him and his family. As a lad, Ebenezer
had become familar with the capital city; his brother, Tully Vinson, in later
years, Gen. Vinson, represented Hancock County in the Legislature and the youth,
Ebenezer, often accompanied him on his trips to Milledgeville. So this old time
acquaintance with the town exerted its influence in changing his decision to
establish there his Lares and Penates.

    Many years after the days when Tully Vinson was Hancock's representative in
the legislature, old timers, remembering his name and fame, supported a young
scion of the family from Milledgeville who sought political preferment in the
Halls of Congress.

    The new home in Baldwin indeed proved a temporary abiding place for Ebenezer
Callaway Vinson. In two years time, on Dec. 25th., 1857, at the age of fifty, he
passed on to the Great Beyond. He left his wife, Martha, and ten children as
follows: Maria Jane, who became the wife of Col. Eli Gumming, of Wilkinson
County; Anne, who married Thos. N. Beall, of Wilkinson; Wm. H. Vinson, who
married Julia Beall, of Talbot County; Dora A., who became wife of V. Wm.
Williford; Henry Crawford Vinson, whose first wife was Lou Brake, of Baldwin,
and whose second wife was Lorene Wood, of McRae, Ga.; Lucie Catherine, wife of
Wm. Pleasant Williams; Charlie, who died when thirteen years of age; Edward
Storey, who married Annie Morris, of Baldwin County; Walter Dickson, who married
Anna Caraker, of Baldwin County; and Mary Rebecca, wife of John Roberson. All,
with the exception of Anne and Mary, had children and there is now a large
family connnection, scattered widely.

    Martha Dickson Vinson, the widow, had strength of mind and character and she
"carried on" in the best sense, as a mother, and as manager of her plantation,
for nearly fifty years after her husband's death. She was the daughter of Wm.
Dickson and Lucy Crawford. The latter's death occurred, unexpectedly, at her
home in Sparta, on the well remembered night "when the stars fell." A son of
Lucy Crawford's uncle, and therefore her first cousin, was Wm. H. Crawford,
Georgia's governor. Of him the great Napoleon said, after Crawford's visit to
France, "He is the only man to whom I unconsciously feel impelled to make
obeisance." That, for Crawford's appearance and bearing. The mother of Lucy
Crawford was an Atwood and, according to family tradition, three times an
heiress. Ebenezer was given the name of Callaway because that had been his
mother's name. His two sisters, Levina and Martha, were Quakers. These side
lights have their physological significance in the history of the family.

    The only representatives, now in the county, of this once numerous family,
are ;Edward Storey Vinson, son of the first Vinson and his wife; and their son,
Carl Vinson, representative in Congress of the Tenth District of Georgia. Dixon
Williams, with his wife and sons; and Mrs. Leverett Montgomery and her family.
Mrs. Montgomery was Lois Scott, granddaughter of Win. H. Vinson. Mrs. Lucie V.
Williams lives in Birmingham. She and E. S. Vinson are the only members of the
original family now living.

    Of Ebenezer Callaway Vinson, who planted the family in Baldwin Co., it would
well be said in the words of Shakespeare, "He was a man, take him for all in
all; I shall not look upon his like again." Of Martha, in the words of Proverbs,
"Her children rise up and call her blessed."



Additional Comments:
From: 

Part V

HISTORY of BALDWIN COUNTY GEORGIA

BY MRS. ANNA MARIA GREEN COOK

ILLUSTRATED

ANDERSON. S. C.
Keys-Hearn Printing Co.
-1925—


File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/ga/baldwin/history/other/gms330historyo.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/gafiles/

File size: 10.0 Kb