NEWS: Lone Stars, 2003 - Madison Co, GA Submitted by Mary Love Berryman 25 Apr 2003 Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm *********************************************************************** All documents placed in the USGenWeb Archives remain the property of the contributors, who retain publication rights in accordance with US Copyright Laws and Regulations. In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, these documents may be used by anyone for their personal research. They may be used by non-commercial entities so long as all notices and submitter information is included. These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit. Any other use, including copying files to other sites, requires permission from the contributors PRIOR to uploading to the other sites. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. *********************************************************************** Madison County Journal, 16 Apr 2003 Lone Stars The love of Madison County can stretch for many years — and over many states. Mary Love Berryman and Jeanne Arguelles are both Texas residents, but both are Madison County, Georgia, history enthusiasts who maintain websites about this county. Click on to their Internet sites and you can find connections with Madison County’s past. There’s the “Muster Roll” of Company D, 16th Regiment “Danielsville Guards” from the Confederate Army, plus other military records pertaining to Madison County. You can find biographies on James Colbert, who the town of Colbert was named after, or Crawford W. Long, widely recognized as the world’s first anesthesiologist. There are biographies about those with familiar Madison County surnames: Bullock, Daniel, Eberhart, Gunnells, Meadow, Moore, Power, Scott, Strickland, Thompson and White. There are also court records, obituaries, property deeds, maps, census information, vital records on births, deaths and marriages, Bible records, information on cemeteries and more. The old newspaper articles are particularly colorful, with several pieces included about turn-of-the-century crimes in the county. There’s the chilling 1896 Atlanta Constitution account of a Madison County man killing his wife and four children, before killing himself. There’s an 1892 account of a Danielsville man dying while on a possum hunt. You’ll find an account of an 1893 shooting involving two brothers fighting over a whiskey still. There’s a Danielsville Monitor story from May of 1900, noting that a William Black, “an old and respected citizen of Hix, this county, has had the misfortune to lose his mind.” “Judge Boggs went up Monday to try him for insanity,” the story went on to say. “But his wife did not want him carried to the asylum and will take care of him herself.” There are old wills extending back to the days of slavery. “To my son William Millican, one Negro boy named Anthony,” read the 1818 will of John Millican. “To my son James Millican, one Negro boy named Lewis. To my son John Millican, one Negro boy named Ci....” The websites show the more verbose form of writing in the old days, such as a flowery 1893 wedding announcement for Dr. R.C. Morley and Miss Ella Sanders in Danielsville: “...A large number of relatives and friends were royally entertained at the Morley house...where was tastily spread a wedding supper faultless in design and preparation and long to be remembered by those, who, amid the flow of unity and good cheer, gave substantial evidence of their appreciation of the occasion.” The old documents are part of the GAGenWeb Archives, which is “a library of documents which have been put into a text format so that they will be long lasting and recognized in any word processing software.” MARY LOVE BERRYMAN The two website coordinators first became acquainted through researching a common ancestor, Charles Berryman, who lived in what is now known as the Harrison District before Madison County was formed in 1812. Many of Charles and Nancy Bragg Berryman’s descendants still live in Madison and surrounding counties. The father of Hoyt Berryman Sr., Mary Love’s father-in-law, left in the early 1900s for Texas where he worked in the oil fields. Hoyt Jr. and Mary Love grew up in Tyler, Texas, and married in 1951. In 1962, the couple brought Hoyt Sr. back to Georgia for a Berryman family reunion on Easter weekend. “All of the eight children of Jasper and Fannie Guest Berryman attended the reunion and most of the 43 grandchildren were present at the home of Theodore Berryman for Sunday lunch,” Berryman said. “It was truly overwhelming, but at that time we fell in love with the Georgia family and Madison County.” Sparked by an interest in the family ancestry, Berryman began keeping old letters, some records, pictures, obituaries and other keepsakes. She also made several trips back to Georgia to visit and find out more family history. “I began to piece together the family and traced it back into Virginia,” said Berryman. “But more than that we became better acquainted with many of the historians of that (Madison County) area. Mary Bondurant Warren and Charlotte Bond became very good friends and contributed a lot to our genealogy. They helped me to know who to talk to and where to go to find records.” Berryman agreed in 2001 to serve as the file manager for the Madison County GAGenWeb Archives project, though she had been contributing records before then. She said the interesting thing about the project is “that we had people all over the country working on this.” “Rick Elliot in California put the files together and added soundex to make our indexes the very best,” said Berryman. “We had people from Alaska, Georgia, Ohio, Maine, Texas and other states contributing money and working on the indexes. Nancy Bedell abstracted the 1820-1840 census records. Madison County researchers can view all the census records which have been released from their computers at home.” Berryman said she sees similarities between the area she lives in now and Madison County. “The area is very much the same, rolling hills and lots of trees,” she said. “Guess that is one reason we feel so at home in Madison County. I also do the Smith County TXGenWeb Project and Archives so I really enjoy when I can tie the two counties together.” Berryman said she would “like to have a lot more records and would appreciate anyone who would send them to us.” Her email address is marylove@tyler.net or she can be reached by mail at 3106 Rollingwood Drive, Tyler Tex. 7570. Berryman’s site is available at www.usgwarchives.net/ga/madison.htm JEANNE ARGUELLES Jeanne Arguelles’ family moved a lot during her childhood, which included a stay in Atlanta during the 1970s. Arguelles said the stint in the Peach State was “exciting for my mother because she had family in Georgia whom she had never met.” “After watching ‘Roots’ on TV, my mom decided to delve into her family history, which led us to Madison County,” said Arguelles. “Her goal was to learn the origin of her unusual maiden name, ‘Human.’ I was just a kid, but I loved tagging along to the courthouses and traipsing through cemeteries in search of ancestors. And I’ve been hooked ever since.” Arguelles, who lives in Rockwall, Texas, not far from Dallas, said she still doesn’t know the European origin of the Human family, but that she’s learned a lot about other Madison County ancestors — the Browns, Braggs, Hawks, Thompsons and Berrymans. “The Berryman family is especially fun to research because I have Mary Love as a partner, and because my great-great-great-grandmother, Frances Penn Berryman, was involved in a ‘Madison County murder mystery’ in the 1840s which we are still trying to solve!” said Arguelles. Arguelles said researching Madison County ancestors is difficult when living in another state, so she was excited to find the GAGenWeb project. “That’s where I bumped into Mary Love and learned how much we have in common, not only in our connection to the Berryman family, but also our love of Madison County history and our enjoyment in helping others find their Madison County roots,” said Arguelles, who took over as coordinator of the Madison County GAGenWeb project in 2000. Arguelles said her goal is to make it as “easy as possible for researchers to find the information they need to trace their family history.” “The website includes county history, maps, tips for finding records at the courthouse, how to locate vital records and conduct land research, lists of helpful books and publications, information on many Madison County families and links to the hundreds of records in the Archives contributed by Mary Love, myself and many other volunteers,” said Arguelles. Arguelles said she and Berryman plan to keep expanding their sites. “Soon we will have all of the Madison County wills 1812-1922 online and fully indexed, and then we’ll find another project to work on,” said Arguelles. “It’s been great fun working with Mary Love and very rewarding to know that our efforts are helping others enjoy Madison County history and genealogy.” Arguelles can be emailed at: Her website is available at www.rootsweb.com/~gamadiso/