J.J. and Elmina (MITCHELL) BURKS, Rusk CO. TX Special thanks to Marylee W. Knight at panola911@sat.net This is how she fits into the picture: J.J. & Elmina (MITCHELL) BURKS > Chester Cortez & Eddie Ollie Lee (BURKS) CRAWFORD > her father>her Joshua Jonathan BURKS (son of William & Lucinda (NORMAN) BURKS) was born Oct 10, 1847 in Arkansas. His mother died in Arkansas and William returned to Georgia with J.J. and his sister Mary E. According to family tradition, William soon remarried, but the wife (name unknown) was so cruel to the children that the marriage soon ended. J.J.'s father then married a kind, loving woman (Unity) who was very good to the children. William and Unity left Henry County and went to Coosa County, Alabama. The 1860 Census of Coosa County lists Unity as a widow and head of a household. After William's death, Unity had her own children, plus the two stepchildren and had no way of supporting them. J.J. was sent back to Clayton County, Georgia to live with his uncle Dave NORMAN. During his early years, J.J. went to school only long enough to learn to read, but not to write. After he was living with the NORMAN family, he went to a writing school with the help of his cousin Yancy BARTON. (Yancy's mother was a sister to Lucinda (NORMAN) BURKS) On Dec 24, 1871 in Clayton County GA, J.J. married Elmina MITCHELL (daughter of Thomas & Elizabeth (RUFF) MITCHELL) in a civil ceremony conducted by A.P. Adamson, Justice of the Peace. Elmina wa born Aug 17, 1851 in Clayton County GA. J.J. and Elmina lived in Clayton County for approximately six years, then moved to the Brachfield Community of Rusk County TX in the early months of 1877. There they began farming and raising their family. They joined the Zion Hill Baptist Church in July 1877. Being active and faithful members of that church, J.J. was ordained as a deacon on July 31, 1886. According to church records, on Sep 2, 1893 he was recognized as "having the gift of exhortation." On Jan 4, 1901 he was ordained as a minister and began pastoring churches all over Rusk County. For a time he was a circuit riding missionary, serving churches as far away as the Flatwoods Community in the extreme southeastern portion of neighboring Panola County. J.J. loved to sing religious music. His daughter Lee (BURKS) CRAWFORD remembered his favorites as being some of the Sacred Harp songs such as #288 "White", #418 "Rees" and #470 "There We Our Jesus Shall Adore". On Aug 28 1913 the family was gathered so the men could help Dr. Tim Deason cut hay. After lunch J.J. suddenly felt ill. Someone fixed him a pallet on the porch of his house so the afternoon breeze could help him stay cool. He laid down and requested that the women and girls go on singing hymns as they had been doing to amuse themselves. Suddenly he turned very blue and said simply, "I'm gone!" and he died. He was buried in Zion Hill Baptist Church Cemetery near him home. Elmina then became the strong head of the family, continuing to live on in the home J.J. had built upon their arrival in Texas. A quiet, unassuming woman, Elmina loved her family and worked hard at keeping the family unit strong. Elmina died June 21, 1940 at her home and was also buried in Zion Hill Cemetery. Two months after her death, her children, remembering how they had always gathered to celebrate her birthday, decided the most fitting memorial to their mother would be to hold a family reunion each year on the Sunday closest to her birthday. That tradition, begun in 1940, continues today with the 57th Burks Reunion being held on Sunday, Aug 10, 1997, over a half century after Elmina's death, reinforcing the family ties she felt were so important. Children of J.J. and Elmina (MITCHELL) BURKS: 12 Lydia Florence Burks 1872-1951 Georgia Ann Russ Burks 1874-1902 William Clifford Burks 1876-1954 Tommie Elizabeth Burks 1878-1936 Martin Edward Burks 1880-1959 Wyatt Alden Burks 1882-1942 Lexie Jane Burks 1885-1963 Eddie Ollie Lee Burks 1888-1973 Rufus Columbus Burleson Burks 1892-1975 Stewart Joshua Burks 1892-1975 Infant son Burks 1894-1894 Emma Odessa Burks 1896-1975 * * * * * * * * * * * * * ** * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Here is another installment of my BURKS stuff. But, first, a little personal note. I began genealogical research about 25 years ago when research was so very difficult unless you lived near the few metropolitan areas where there were good research libraries. I remember well how quickly the jubilation of finding a new scrap of information was replaced with the gloom of knowing that now you had to retype many pages of data just to put the new tidbit in it's proper place. Of course, the natural offshoot of that is that I have file folders chock full of scraps of paper with scraps of information that never got dovetailed into place. Early on, I assigned my research the umbrella title of "How Did We Get From Here to There?" because that is the fascination to me - the converging and diverging of families and locations made all the more interesting by the melody of the "old-timey" names and the harmonious flow of the same names repeated generation after generation. * * * * * * * * * * * * * ** * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The following is a piece my grandmother Lee (BURKS) CRWAFORD wrote for me in 1966. Lee (1888-1973) was the daughter of Joshua Jonathan and Elmina (METCHELL) BURKS. The head of the Bruks family as we know it in Ruck County TX was born in Arkansas where his mother passed away from this life when he was nine weeks old. When his father, witha little sister and Joshua, returned to Georgia where he remarried. Not ever having heard Papa say, I don't know how soon, nor how long they lived together, but she treated them badly. Papa remembered that well enough. He said that once when his father was away on business (I suppose) he left the house and went into a corn field that was in roasting ear and crawled into a hollow log and spent the night while bears came to eat the corn. He said he was more afraid to return to the house and his stepmother than of the growling bears. His father separated from this wife and later married another who was very kind and good to him. After a few years his father passed away. Joshua was nine years old at this time. The kind stepmother had little children of her own, so she had to let the larger stepchildren go for she could not care for them all. Joshua went to his Uncle Dave Norman, who was his mother's brother. Only once did the kind stepmother have to scold Joshua. He was near her when she hit him once with a wet cloth which was in her hand. He said it did not hurt him other than to hurt his feelings badly. When he was having to leave her to do to another place to live, he said she washed his face and hands, combed his hair and then gave him a goodby kiss. I don't recall ever hearing Papa say what her name was, or even what his own father's name was. Isn't it pitiful we don't know that? Our Father went to school only enough to barely learn to read and could not write. He said a writing school was beginning near by and he wanted to go, but Uncle Dave said, "No, you must plow." So as he was plowing a cousin of his came along and, seeing him, stopped and asked why he wasn't going to the school. This cousin was Yancy Barton. Yancy said, "Well, you are going. I will pay your expenses and see that the plowing gets done." Except for the goodness of that cousin, Papa would not have known how to write. Cousin Yancy Barton's sister, Elizabeth, became the wife of Joshua Crow. I remember them. Some of their descendants are living near and most of our family knows them. R.E. Rogers is their grandson. Maud Crow is their grandson. Rev. T.A. Crow who taught science in Beckville High School is a great grandson. Dr. John Rousseau's children are great grandchildren of Joshua and Elizabeth Crow. Levi Crow married Ollie Burks, she was a sister of our Father's father. Will Jones who lives in Henderson and his sisters are grandchildren of Aunt Ollie and Uncle Levi. Our Father married Elmina Mitchell near Christmas of 1871. She was a true Christian young lady and I have often said that she preached the Gospel as much (if not more) than he did. He being a proud man and having a large family which he was proud of and he wanted them to be well cared for, thought that he must stay at home to make a living for them. Mama said that he left Georgia and came to Texas running from the call to preach. But the Lord had laid his hand on him and sent one chastisement after another on him until he was middle age. Mama told him to go and preach, that she and the children could do the farming, the two older sons (or should I say three) being almost men, so he surrendered to preach and was ordained by the Missionary Baptist Church of Zion Hill in Rusk County. So, the Rev. J.J. Burks began to pastor churches, to name a few of them: Pleasant Hill, north of Henderson; County Line, 4 or 5 miles east of Kilgore; Sulphur Springs, west of Mt. Enterprise; Sweet Gum Grove, some miles west of Minden and many others. To the best of my memory he was elected missionary for the Mt. Zion Association for 1907-1908. This included Panola County also. His work was mostly east of the Sabine River in what is now the Deadwood Community of Panola County. Often times he would be gone from home six or eight weeks without us hearing from him. Let's call to memory here that in those days travel was by horse power, which is different. If the minutes of this association could be found, they would probably yield more information. Papa loved good milk cows for his family to have at home. This needed and succulent food was always the best that could be had back then in those days so many years ago. He also usually raised horses and mules and kept the best for the use of his family. The stock was well cared for and always ready when called on for service. As each daughter married, or became mature, they were given a heifer or milk cow of their choice from whatever was in the herd. Of course, since farming was the general occupation back then, as each son became about 18 years of age, Papa began to look around for a work animal - horse or mule - to give that son. Also, on the morning of each son's twenty-first birthday, Father would have a special talk with them about what they might do in the future and whether or not they desired to further their education, if so he would help them financially as far as he was able. I remember Mama saying that Papa had half brothers that were fine looking men, large men, who were good singers. When our father was home, at a certain time every day, he would walk off, crossing the road that was in front of the house and go down a cow trail that led through the forest and into the cow pasture. Many times I wondered why he was going or where he went. Oft times he asked Mama to accompany him. Years later I learned that he went to a large tree where he knelt to commune with our heavenly Father. Father loved singing, especially church hymns. He said, "When you sing these, do so in rememberance of me." He loved children and to play and joke with them. He also loved company. Often, while sitting on the front porch near noon, he would see some friend going down the road. Papa would call and stop them and invite them to eat with us, knowing that Mama most always had plenty cooked. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * The following is a piece written in 1978 by Allen (CRAWFORD) WATSON describing her parents Chester Cortez and Lee (BURKS) CRAWFORD: Eddie Ollie Lee Burks, eighth child of the Rev. J.J. Burks and Elmina Mitchell Burks married Chester Cortez Crawford on December 22, 1909. Lee's father, the Rev. J.J. Burks performed the ceremony in the open hall of his home in the Brachfield Community of Rusk County, Texas. Lee was born, raised and married all in the same house. She was a good reader even in her early years, often reading from the Bibly for her father when he was tired from working so hard in the fields. When she finished the school at Patrick Community, she spent six weeks in Henderson at a summer Normal. That enabled her to get her teacher's certificate so she could teach school. The taught at Liberty School in the eastern edge of Rusk County for two years. Tehn she taught at Brooks School in the western edge of Panola County. After teaching one year there she married and devoted her time to rearing her family that eventually grew to include four boys and three girls. She was well known for being and excellent cook and a talented seamstress. Lee's love of reading was a constant thing and her knowledge of the Bible and her school teaching experience made her a valuable member of her church. She did not give up teaching Sunday School classes or holding women's Bible Study lessons until forced to by declining health and failing eyesight after she was past eighty years of age. Chester was born and reared on a farm the was located along the Panola-Rusk county line. He quit school when he was in the fourth grade, but continued his education by a life-long habit of constant reading. In 1914 he left his wife and two children with her parents in Brachfield while he went to barber college in Houston. He and his brother Sam Crawford had a shop together for several years in the Pine Hill Community in Rusk County. Then Chester, with a growing family, began to work his farm for five days a week and cut hair with Sam on Saturdays. In 1920 Chester opened his own barber shop in Beckville in Panola County and soon moved his family there. In his later years he worked in a barber shop in Carthage and, having never owned a car or learned to drive, he hitch-hiked to and from work regardless of the weather. Chester and Lee lived out the balance of their lives in Beckville. They were devoted to each other, to their expanding family and to their church. Although both have now passed on, they are still remembered by their family and by a host of friends. ============================================================================ Submitted by: Bonnie Palmer (bpalmer@bihs.net) USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, material may be freely used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material, AND permission is obtained from the contributor of the file. These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by other organizations. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for non-commercial purposes, MUST obtain the written consent of the contributor, OR the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent.