Appalachian Values and Some People Who Exemplify Them

Senior scholar, Loyal Jones, a native of nearby Cherokee County, North Carolina, and for many years director of Appalachian Studies at Berea College, Kentucky, wrote an essay on “Appalachian Values” first published in Twigs in 1973. His intention when he first wrote the essay was to dispel the misconceptions often held about people of the Appalachian mountain region. Betty Payne James of Disputanta, Kentucky, suggested to Mr. Jones that his essay be made into a book with pertinent photographs. The word artistry and depth of thinking from “Appalachian Values” of Loyal Jones were combined with excellent black-and-white photographs by prize-winning photographer Warren Brunner of Berea, Kentucky to make a book published by the Jesse Stuart Foundation of Ashland, Kentucky in 1994. If you have not yet read this provocative book, I recommend that you find a copy at your library—or better still—purchase your own copy, because you will want to refer to it again and again.

It occurred to me, while thinking about a worthy subject on which to write for his column, that it would be appropriate to name the values Loyal Jones calls to our attention and think of persons within Union County, Georgia, past and present, who exemplify the values worthy of emulation. I thank Loyal Jones for such a thought-provoking book. I give him deserved credit for calling to our attention the characteristics and values held dear and lived out by our ancestors. And Warren Brenner’s excellent photographs brought to my own mind persons and places with whom I am acquainted that fit so well the values Loyal Jones enumerates. I only wish I had photographs to illustrate this article that carry the same sense and depth that those in Appalachian Values convey. I ask my readers, therefore, to think of persons you know, and make a “mountain pictorial” of them as you read about these values, still alive and well in the coves, valleys and hillsides of our beloved Appalachian region.

Loyal Jones sets the stage for Appalachian Values by devoting a chapter to the early settlers to the region and their origins. Many Scots-Irish, German, English and Welsh people came to America and eventually found their way to our Appalachian wilderness and mountains, an ideal place with plenty of wild game, land for clearing and farming, and isolation that afforded them the seclusion they desired, “away from ‘powers and principalities’” (p. 24) that would rob them of their desire for freedom. “They came for many reasons, but always for new opportunity and freedom—freedom from religious, political, and economic restraints, and freedom to do much as they pleased. The pattern of their settlement shows that they were seeking land and solitude.” (p. 29)

Here we have but to do a roll-call of people who were listed on the 1834 (first) Union County census. Which from that list of 147 heads-of-households enumerated in 1834 are your ancestors? They fall into Loyal Jones’s category of people with European ancestry that came seeking freedom and independence. We salute them all.

Religon is one of the values cited by Loyal Jones. “Mountain people are religious…we are religious in the sense that most of our values and the meaning we find in life spring from the Bible. To understand mountaineers, one must understand our religion” (p. 39). I thought of the Rev. Milford G. Hamby (1833-1911), who became a Methodist Circuit Rider in 1852. As a minister in the North Georgia Conference, he often filled as many as twenty-nine appointments for preaching per month. He married Eleanor Hughes on May 9, 1850. She was the daughter of the Rev. Thomas M. Hughes. Her father was also a faithful minister in Union and nearby counties in the early settlement days. Eleanor’s grandfather, the Rev. Francis Bird, was likewise a minister. A brother-in-law to Rev. Hamby was the Rev. John Wesley Twiggs (1846-1917) who married Eleanor Hughes Hamby’s sister, Sarah Elizabeth Hughes. Rev. Twiggs was a noted minister, school teacher and farmer. These early ministers in the county did much to set a pattern of religious practice. Rev. G. W. Duval, writing in his eulogy of Rev. Milford Hamby in the 1911 Conference Journal of the North Georgia Conference Methodist Episcopal Church South (pp. 80-81) said of him: “He conferred not with flesh and blood but was obedient to the heavenly vision…He made the Bible the man of his counsel, the guide of his young life. His library was not extensive. He made his sermons from the revelation of God’s love to man.” Here I have briefly cited only three of the early ministers in the county; there were many more, both then and since. Oftentimes laboring under great hardships and certainly without much monetary remuneration for their labors, they planted the gospel in hard-to-reach places as itinerant preachers and religious and educational leaders.

Mr. Loyal Jones combines three of our Appalachian Values in chapter three, perhaps because the three are so inter-related and so vital a part of the fabric of our mountain people’s lives. These are independence, self-reliance and pride.

He quotes John C. Campbell (for whom Campbell Folk School is named) by saying in the mountains “independence is raised to the fourth power” (p. 52)—meaning we have an exceeding strong spirit of independence. I think of John Thomas, chosen to be the first representative from Union County in 1832 to the state legislature. When a name for the new county was being considered, he said, “Name it Union, for none but union-like men resides in it” (The Heritage of Union County, 1944, p. 1). Although our ancestors were patriotic and supporting of our nation, their geographic isolation and dependability on local resources bred independence. Several of the early-settler men had seen service in the American Revolution and desired independence from tyranny and outside rule. The lay of the land to be tamed and a living to be made from the wilderness inspired an independent spirit.

Closely tied to that spirit of independence is self-reliance. I think of my own ancestors, the Collins, Dyer, Souther, Hunter, Nix, Ingram, England and other settlers who began productive farms, established churches, set up mills, began schools, were elected to government positions—all showed the spirit of self-reliance. True, our ancestors sometimes over-did the self-reliant bent and depleted the land and its resources, like cutting timber and not allowing it to be replenished, before they learned to be conservators. Not all qualities of self-reliance are applaudable.

Then pride is a part of our values; not the puffed-up, vain, egotistical, arrogant, “better-than-thou” kind, but a sense of self-esteem and self-respect for a job well done. I think of my Aunts Avery and Ethel Collins who fashioned many quilts, woven coverlets, and other handcrafted items, entering them into the Southeastern Fair in Atlanta, Georgia and consistently winning blue ribbons. Dr. John Burrison and his crew of historical preservation people from Georgia State University filmed my Aunt Ethel before her death as she showed many of the items that had won acclaim. Never did she seek accolades for her work, but it was worthy of notice and was recorded in a documentary entitled “The Unclouded Day.” She and Aunt Avery had pride in their work, and rightly so. As Loyal Jones notes: “The value of independence and self-reliance, and our pride, is often stronger than desire or need” (p. 68).

In my next column, I will explore more of Loyal Jones’s listing of Appalachian Values. Dr. Stephenson asks this question in the introduction: “Who really knows Appalachia?” (p. 9, 11). This is a probative question. Even though I was born and reared in that area of America, and have experienced all the values named by Mr. Jones, I realize that we only begin to scratch the surface of the complexity and depth of a people whose characteristics, as he writes, represent “the core elements of regional culture, the bones upon which the flesh of a people is layered” (p. 10).

[Resource: Jones, Loyal. Appalachian Values. Photography by Warren E. Brunner, with an Introduction by John B. Stephenson. Ashland, Ky: Jesse Stuart Foundation, 1994.]

c2012 by Ethelene Dyer Jones. Published February 23, 2012 online by permission of the author at the GaGenWebProject. All rights reserved.

Militia Districts in Union County

The state of Georgia is divided into 159 counties. Within each county are further subdivisions called Militia Districts. Union County is divided into fourteen districts, but only five voting districts. Beginning along the northern border at the North Carolina line and proceeding southward, these militia districts are Dooly, Ivy Log, Gum Log, Lower Young Cane, Blairsville, Upper Young Cane, Coosa, Arkaquah, Owltown, Choestoe, Coopers Creek, Canada and Gaddistown. These names are more for location than for political divisions, as changes have occurred over time to warrant a look at how present election districts have evolved.

Even though there were fourteen districts in 1849 listed for the then seventeen-year old county of Union, those districts were changed through the years due to part of Union being taken into Fannin (formed in 1854) and Towns (formed in 1856). The tax lists of 1849 had the fourteen districts in Union named thus: Hiawassee, Choestoe, Ivy Log, Noontootla, Blairsville, Hemptown, Brasstown, Stevenson, Gaddistown, Arkaquah, Young Cane, Gum Log, Cut Cane and Skinah (Skeenah). You can easily recognize from this listing that only eight of these fourteen remain in Union today, with names the same. As changes in geographical divisions occurred through the county’s history, the districts were realigned accordingly.

Historical records show that a fifteenth district was added in 1851, before the counties of Fannin and Towns were measured off from portions of Union. That new district did not receive a name until 1855, when it was named Young’s District. Later, the Young’s District was split into two and received the names Lower Young Cane and Upper Young Cane. An interesting sideline about districts not only in Union but throughout Georgia is that they were sometimes named for a person prominent in the area, or for families who settled there, especially when several by the same name resided within a given geographical area. Examples of this naming in Union are Young Cane (upper and lower), Coopers Creek and Gaddistown, and although I do not find any named Dooly in the county until the 1850 census, this district name, too, might have been from a family or a remembered family name from a previous place residents lived. The Dooly District was officially added to the tax lists of Union in 1857. Other names were adopted from names the Cherokee had given the place before their exodus on the Trail of Tears. Some of these names are Arkaquah, Choestoe and Coosa.

By 1870, Coosa and Coopers Creek had been added to the tax list districts. And then in 1887 Owltown was formed, taking portions of Choestoe, Arkaquah and Coosa to form the legal entity numbered 1409. In order to get the Owltown District, a petition was presented, with some of the leaders being citizens Thomas Fields, Daniel Mathis and others. The parameters of Owltown were surveyed and recommended by a court-appointed team made up of Quiller F. Reece, John M. Rich, and Milford G. Hamby. The act to form Owltown District took effect on April 4, 1887 when Ordinary William Colwell signed the official document.

Stability remained in the district names for about a hundred years. But even during that time, district lines changed somewhat due to petitions of citizens and surveys that led to resetting some of the district lines by small margins. In 1981, Georgia Code, Chapter 34-7 and 34-701, amended, gave impetus to resetting “election districts” to cut costs in holding elections (not one for each of the fourteen districts), but according to locations, with some of the districts realigned and combined for precincts. Brasstown and Blairsville were combined into Election District 1. Others were combined as follows for precincts: District 2 covered Upper and Lower Young Cane and Coosa. District 3 encompassed Choestoe, Arkaquah and Owltown. District 4 contained Dooly, Ivy Log and Gum Log. And “across the mountain” District 5 combined Coopers Creek, Gaddistown and Canada.

Then in 1983, Representative Carlton Colwell introduced a bill in the state legislature to make the Union County School Districts correspond to the voting districts. Members of the Union County School Board—instead of being from the fourteen districts—would be elected from within the five voting districts. And it was so ordered.

Nowadays, the 14 Militia Districts of the County are remembered from past history and for sentimental reasons. However, we still like to hail from whatever district we or our parents might have claimed. Simplification in government alignment sometimes leads to loss of pride in place. But we still look at the old district lines on a map of Union County and remember “how it used to be.” I look at old marriage records of the county and see names of those important district officers, Justice of the Peace (JP) and Notary Public (NP). They served notably in the capacity they had as legal representatives in their districts. These names appeared frequently on legal documents in the first decades of our county’s history: Jesse Reid, JP; Thompson Collins, JP; Hampton Jones, JP; J Duckworth, JIC (Justice of the Inferior Court); T. M. Hughes, JP; James Bird, JP; M. M. Roberts, JP; John B. Chastian, JP; Enes M. Henry, JP; Posey D. Guthrie, JP; and Bennet Smith, NP, to name a few.

c 2010 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published Aug. 5, 2010 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Merchants operating stores in Union Co. in 1881

In last week's column we revisited the store of Mr. John Andrew Wimpey and his wife, Nellie Jane Duckworth Wimpey. I neglected to write that their store, first opened in Choestoe, had the misfortune to burn down. But they rebuilt on the same location on the Town Creek Road and, though suffering considerable financial losses by the fire, did not keep them from the store business. They had a good bit of experience as merchants when they bought out Nellie's Uncle Frank Duckworth in Blairsville and operated the merchandising business there until they retired in the early 1950's.

From census, tax and other records we learn the locations and names of merchants in 1881 in Union County. With no railroad near and no adequate roads, it was difficult to get items for the stores. Depending on the location of the stores, the owners had to go by wagon to Gainesville, Murphy, NC, or some went as far away as Atlanta and Augusta to trade items they had bartered in their stores for merchandise they purchased to stock their businesses. It was not unusual for the trip out to market and return with a load of goods to take a week from Blairsville to Gainesville.

In 1881, the county seat town of Blairsville was blessed with ten merchants. Those operating stores, by name, were John Hudgins, William J. Conley, Thomas Butt, James A. Butt, Eugene Butt, Thomas Hughes, Milford Hamby, William Colwell, Henry Carroll, and John England. I do not know where these places of business were located, or how close together they might have been. Blairsville was second in number of stores of the districts listed.

Ivy Log had the most stores of any of the districts. In fact, Ivy Log was described as "a bustling place" in early records. Those who kept the residents supplied with opportunities to purchase store-bought goods were Ruben Deavers, Isaac, Glazier, Napoleon Bonaparte Hill, L. P. King, William Lance, J. Ledford, Larkin Lewis, Henry McBee, Jasper Owen(s)by, Cannon Stephens, Caleb Thompson and James Reed. These twelve merchants were among the outstanding citizens in that section of the county.

Third in number of mercantile places operating was the Choestoe District. There Archibald Collins, Ruth Collins, James M. Dyer, James Nix, John Combs Hayes Souther, T. M. Swain, Willis Twiggs and Joshua Audern had places of trade. Except for Joshua Audern (whose last name may have been spelled wrong by the census taker), the store keepers had descendants who still live in that district today.

Gaddistown District "across the mountain" at Suches had six merchants in 1881. These were James A. Cavender, Charles Davis, John Davis, Henry Gurley, James Gurley and John A. Thomas. There, as in the other districts, last names of these merchants are familiar among citizens who live there today.

Coosa District had four stores operated by William Ledford, C. Nelson, Arthur Owensby and George W. Cavender. Coosa was noted for its gold mines which opened and operated before the Civil War. An estimate is that over two million dollars in gold ore was extracted from the Coosa Mines. The Coosa settlement vied for the county seat to be located there early in the history of the county, but Blairsville won the bid for the location of the courthouse and county government.

Camp Creek settlement had four stores operated by Jesse Low, Thomas M. Lance, John Davenport and J. J. Cobb.

Young Cane had one store owned by James F. Reed.

All the forty-five merchants in 1881 offered needful products such as salt, sugar, coffee and tea. Many had barrels of staples from which they measured dry beans and rice. The barest essentials were main items in these stores. Far from well-stocked with goods, the community stores were noted nonetheless for hospitality, and places where people could learn the latest news. The pot-bellied stove or open fireplace was a place of warmth in winter inviting everyone in to "sit a spell" and visit.

c 2009 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published April 30, 2009 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

A Look at Owltown

Travel Highway 129/19 south from the old courthouse square in Blairsville and you will come to the Owltown District of Union County lying around the vicinity of the Experiment Station. It was the last of the fourteen districts of the county.

This district numbered 1409 was signed into law on April 4, 1887. Court appointed commissioners John M. Rich, Milton G. Hamby, and Quiller F. Reece had been assigned the task of laying out the lines of the proposed new militia district. Daniel Mathis, Thomas Fields and other citizens had petitioned for the new district and signed a request for it with the Court of Ordinary in Union County. Portions of already-existing districts of Arkaqua, Choestoe and Coosa were surveyed and made a part of the new Owltown District. Mr. William Colwell, County Ordinary, signed the completed papers and the new district was summarily formed.

One is reminded of the words of naturalist John Muir, who in 1867, passed through beautiful Union County, Georgia on his walk from Louisville, Kentucky to Cedar Keys, Florida, a journey of over one thousand miles. He wrote of this mountainous region: "Oh, these vast, calm, measureless mountain days...in whose light everything seems equally divine, opening a thousand windows to show us God."

Whether Muir passed through what became Owltown twenty years after his visit, we know not. But he could well have been describing that section of Union County nestled along the Nottely River and its tributaries. County Historian Edward S. Mauney, in his description of Owlton in 1950, said of it: "Being no less mountainous than the county's entire terrain, with its dark recesses called coves, the natural habitat of that wise old bird, the owl, suggests what is believed to be the origin of the name." (p. 72, Sketches of Union County History III, 1987).

Hoot Owl Town and Hoot Owl Hollow were eventually shortened to Owltown. Others have thought that in addition to being "the natural habitat of the owl," Owltown may have received its name from a settlement of Cherokee Indians with Chief Owl as its leader.

Some of the early-settler families that chose Owlton as their place of residence were Hamby, England, Fortenberry, Rich, Davis, Stephens, Reece, Spiva, Akins, Curtis, Majors, Fields, Mathis, Colwell, Bowers, Rider, May, Crump and others. Even today, these family names remain in residents in the coves and hollows of District 1409 and elsewhere in Union.

If John Muir did, indeed, traverse land in what became the Owltown District twenty years after his sojourn here; he would have seen cleared patches in the bottom lands where the farmer settlers grew corn, potatoes, cabbage, onions, beans, wheat, rye, oats and flax. In garden patches were tomatoes, cucumbers, pumpkins and peppers and in yard patches, herbs like sage and rosemary for seasoning. Growing out from their mountain cabins were the beginnings of mountain orchards of apples, pears and peaches. Owltown has been noted as a place of production of good-tasting, juicy apples.

On the mountains were chestnut trees, the annual fall crop of which provided food for ranging hogs and cattle, and enough to pick up and haul to market in Gainesville over the Logan Turnpike. This extra crop from the forest helped to provide coffee, tea, sugar, cloth for making clothes and even shoes for members of the mountain families.

Another distinctive early industry of Owlton was the gold mine at Owltown Gap. The yield of this mine is not currently known, but it, along with the Coosa Mines, caused enough excitement to produce a mini-gold rush to Union County in the heyday of gold mining here.

Fort Mountain is within the area of Owltown District. The ancient fort, some of the remains of which can still be seen, is a great mystery. Legend prevails that it was built by a contingent of Spanish conquistadores who came through the region in the sixteenth century under the leadership of one Juan Pardo and built a fortress on the mountain. Lost in mountain mists and lack of records, we may never know the origin of the fort on this mountain.

Out of Owltown have come many distinguished citizens. To name a few, the following come to mind. Rev. Milford G. Hamby was a noted minister in the North Georgia Methodist Conference. Mr. Newton Curtis was termed a "good teacher" and an able debater. Solomon Hill Rich and Nancy Conner Rich had a son named Charles Edward Rich who was a noted Baptist preacher and educator. The Rev. Luther Colwell, another long-time Baptist minister in Union County, was a son of John Theodore and Amy Elizabeth Bowling Colwell. John Theodore Colwell was county ordinary when "the old courthouse" on the square was built in 1899.

"A thousand windows," to quote from John Muir, open throughout Owltown. One has but to drive its roadways to be surprised by beauty and a quality of "divine light" that emanate from a lofty past and point toward an optimistic future.

c 2008 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published November 20, 2008 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Brief Thoughts on Thanksgiving and a Look at the Firstborn Son of the Rev. Milford G. Hamby

As you gather with family and/or friends for a Thanksgiving Day celebration may you find many things for which to give thanks. In our family celebration, no two years are exactly the same, except that the menu does not vary that much. But with extended family, we never know who will be invited for the first time or who will be unable for scheduling and other reasons to attend the Thanksgiving fest. For many years one thing has remained traditional with our family. As we hold hands around the laden board, ready to offer thanks, one by one each names a highlight in the year just past for which he or she is thankful. This tradition helps us to focus on God’s providence in our lives and the true meaning of Thanksgiving. We are admonished: “In everything give thanks, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.” (I Thes. 5:18).

Last week this column was about the Rev. Milford Gilead Hamby (1833-1911), outstanding early circuit-riding preacher whose influence reached across not only Union County but into many counties in north Georgia.

While Rev. M. G. Hamby was in his charge in Franklin County, GA, at Carnesville, his first son, named William Thomas Hamby, was born September 16, 1860.

It has been written that with 25 churches to visit and exhort, the young son’s father was gone from home much of the time. Monday was an exception because it was “wash day” when Rev. Milford’s wife, Eleanor Caroline Hughes Hamby, got her husband’s clothes laundered and ready for his week’s circuit. Likewise, much of the rearing of Elder Hamby’s ten children was left to their mother, who succeeded well at mothering.

It was noted of the Rev. William Thomas Hamby that “blood of preachers coursed through his veins.” He was the fourth generation of known Methodist ministers. He being in the fourth generation ordained, his father, Milford, in the third, his grandfather, Rev. Thomas M. Hughes, in the second, and his great, great grandfather, the Rev. Francis Bird, in the first. There could have been preachers in generations back of these, but these are known. Likewise, three uncles were Methodist preachers: the Revs. W. C. Hughes, Francis Goodman Hughes and Tom Coke Hughes.

Rev. W. T. Hamby spent forty-five years in the active ministry. His first charge was the Hiawassee, Georgia Mission. He held pastorates at Calhoun, Winder, Trinity Methodist in Rome, Epworth, Buford, Barnesville, Walker Street Methodist in Atlanta, Carrollton, Marietta, and Kirkwood in Atlanta. In one year at Kirkwood, he made 1,046 church-related visits and took into the membership 146 persons. He also served as Superintendent and Presiding Elder in both the Augusta and Gainesville Districts. He was a trustee of Young Harris College for 45 years and served as president of the Board.

In retirement he remained active, preaching on the average of 75 times per year. In a news article lauding his life of service, he was called the “nestor of Methodism.” During his active ministry he delivered 8,000 sermons, conducted 500 funerals and married 300 couples. His annual salary for pastoral duties ranged from $65 in the beginning to $3,250 at his retirement.

Some of the lighter moments he shared were about weddings. While he was at Calhoun, he drove a wild horse 20 miles in a storm to get to the place of the wedding. After he had performed the ceremony, the groom took him aside and said he wanted to “reverence” him for his trouble. The preacher was given 50 cents. At a wedding at Walker Street in Atlanta, the groom gave Rev. Hamby an envelope with the words, “I think this will make you happy.” When the pastor opened the envelope, neatly written on a piece of paper were the words, “Thank you.” When he was pastor at Marietta, he had more weddings than at any other church. One he counted unique was of a man who had received six honorable discharges from the U. S. Army. His own wedding was the first the military man had ever attended.

Rev. W. T. Hamby married Emma Jane Curtis, daughter of Spencer Lafayette Curtis (1835-1865) and Mary Lou Twiggs (1835-1899). To William and Emma Jane were born five children: Frank Munsey Hamby (1883-1894); Nellie Lou Hamby (1889-1979); George Robins Hamby (b. & d. 1893); Fannie Lee Hamby (1895-1903); and Emma Lillian Hamby (1901-1902). Only one of the five children grew to adulthood. Nellie Lou Hamby marrried Dr. William Lester Matthews in Rome, Georgia on April 7, 1918.

Emma Jane Curtis Hamby was born October 10, 1860 and died in Rome, Ga., Dec. 23, 1901, evidently from complications from the birth of her last child, Emma Lillian, who died January 14, 1902. Rev. Hamby married, second, Mozelle Whitehead. Rev. William Thomas Hamby died August 25, 1947 in Decatur, Ga., shortly before his 87th birthday.

At Thanksgiving, another item to place on our thanks list is the legacy of a good ancestry. From our forebears we get not only physical characteristics that mark us as their descendants but the upbringing that helps to mold and make us who we are.

c2005 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published Nov. 24, 2005 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved

Circuit riding preacher—Rev. Milford Gilead Hamby

The work of circuit riding ministers in the early days of settlement in the mountain counties of north Georgia required a person of strong physical constitution as well as one with strong commitment and dedication to the spread of the gospel ministry.

Milford Gilead Hamby was born in Spartanburg, S. C on May 18, 1833. His parents were William and Nancy Christopher Hamby. In 1852 when he was nineteen years of age, he received a license to preach and was soon accepted into the North Georgia Conference of the Methodist Church.

By 1855 he was a fullfledged minister whose circuit included Dahlonega in Lumpkin County and a far-flung area including Upson (it is not clear if this is Upson County or a town named Upson), Cusseta, Blairsville in Union County, Carnesville in Franklin County, Canton, Cumming, Powder Springs, Ellijay, Morganton in Fannin County, and Homer, Georgia, in Banks County. From 1855 through 1885, a total of thirty years, he kept 29 appointments per month. Before modern transportation, except perhaps a train in some areas that would take him to Powder Springs, we can only imagine what trusty steeds he must have owned during this period to get him to his charges.

An error appears in the marriage date of this minister of the gospel in both the article in the “Union County, Georgia” History book (1994, p. 176) and the earlier “Sketches of Union County History, Volume 2” (1978, p. 70), both of which list him as marrying in 1850. The Union County marriage record gives the date of his marriage to Eleanor C. Hughes as August 9, 1859, with Joseph Chambers, minister of the gospel, performing the ceremony.

Eleanor Hughes, known as Nellie, was the daughter of a Methodist Minister and a merchant, the Rev. Thomas M. Hughes (1809-1882). Eleanor’s mother was Nancy Bird Hughes (1818-1881), daughter of the Rev. Francis Bird, another early Methodist Minister in Rutherford County, N.C. Like so many early settlers to Union County, the Hughes family stopped first in Habersham County. They were among those who moved over the famed Unicoi Turnpike to settle in Habersham, and then across the mountain later to Union before 1850.

Born to Milford G. and Eleanor Hughes Hamby were seven sons and three daughters. Son William Thomas Hamby became a noted Methodist minister; other sons were Francis B., Joseph O., Melvin, John M., Lovick O. and Manley P.; and daughters Nancy, Martha and Sallie.

During the Civil War Milford G. Hamby served for six months in the Cherokee Legion, Company A. of the Georgia State Guard. Records show his pay was forty cents per day.

In the eulogy to his wife, Eleanor Hughes (April 1, 1827-July 18, 1902) published in the “Wesleyan Advocate,” this account is given of how she helped him during the Civil War:

“During the war, while her husband was serving the Canton Circuit, surrounded by both armies, Brother Hamby’s wearing apparel was so badly worn that he thought he would have to stay at home. Sister Hamby happened to think of an old sheep skin that was in the house. She sheared the wool off and with some thread which she had, she made her husband a pair of pants that he might be able to go on with his work.”

The eulogy praises her for “walking by the side of her husband for forty-three years, proving herself in deed and in truth his helpmeet, cheerfully sharing with him the joys and hardships of the itinerant work.”

I looked for a printed eulogy for the Rev. Hamby who died in May, 1911, but to date my research has turned up only the one for Eleanor Hughes Hamby, who, upon her death in 1902, left “a devoted husband and six children to mourn their loss.” Both Mrs. Hamby and Rev. Hamby were interred at the Shady Grove Methodist Cemetery in the Owltown District of Union County where their tombstones may be viewed. Many are the Hamby descendants of these two stalwart ancestors who worked hard in the mountain region in the latter half of the nineteenth century.

c2005 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published Nov. 17, 2005 in The Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Rev. Thomas Coke Hughes

The last column looked at the life and work of the Rev. Thomas M. Hughes (1809-1882), an early Union County settler who was associated with the noted Methodist minister, the Rev. William Jasper Cotter, who became the official Methodist Conference appointee to the Blairsville Mountain Mission Charge in 1846.

Rev. Thomas M. Hughes and his wife, Nancy Bird (1818-1881) daughter of the Rev Francis Bird and Frances Abernathy Bird, had thirteen children. The eighth of these children was Thomas Coke Hughes who himself became a Methodist Minister and worked as a circuit-riding preacher in Union, Towns and Fannin counties.

Thomas Coke Hughes was born June 22, 1844. He was eighteen years of age when he joined the Confederate Army on September 27, 1862, enlisting in Company G of the 65th Regiment of the Georgia Infantry. One of his good friends, Eugene Butt, joined at the same time. His particular unit was known as the Infantry Battalion of Smith’s Legion and also as the “Georgia Partisan Rangers.” The roll for August 31, 1864 shows that Hughes was present. He and his friend Eugene Butt came through the fighting without injury. Hughes was an officer, a 2nd Lieutenant of his Battalion. Records show that he surrendered with his command at the close of the war. In 1911 he received a pension for his service in the Confederate Army.

Rev. Hughes was a self-educated man. After the Civil War, he read avidly, choosing as his theological and Biblical guides Clarke’s Commentaries of the Holy Bible and the Theological Encyclopedia. It is said that he studied the grammatical structures and spellings in the Blue Back Speller so that he could become literate in good English usage for his writings and speaking.
Rev. Thomas Coke Hughes married twice. On September 23, 1868 he married Rhoda (also called Rady) P. Butt. Rev. Milfred G. Hamby, performed the ceremony. He was a brother in-law to Rev. Hughes, married to his sister Eleanor (Nellie) Hughes Hamby. To Thomas Coke and Rhoda Butt Hughes were born six children.

Rhoda died and the minister married, second, Sallie Daniel on April 13, 1884. Again, the Rev. Milford G. Hamby, brother-in-law, performed the ceremony. Four children were born to Thomas C. and Sallie Daniel Hughes. This writer did not find the names of all the ten children born to Rev. Hughes. However, two sons of Sallie were William Coke Hughes (b. 1890) and Claude Cofer Hughes (b. 1893). Both of these sons attended the Blairsville Collegiate Institute and served in the U. S. Army during World War I. Both sons also worked for the Georgia State Highway Department. William Coke (Bill) worked for the Tennessee Valley Authority during the time when TVA dams for generating electric power were being built. Claude owned and operated the first Farmers’ Cooperative Exchange in Union County.

Rev. Thomas Coke Hughes owned a good horse that would take him to the Methodist Churches in his circuit throughout Towns, Union and Fannin Counties. He was known as a preacher of power, plain spoken and dynamic. He was often in demand as a revival preacher and for the Methodist Camp Meetings held throughout the mountains in the summertime.

He was especially beloved by the black Methodist Church members in Union County. When he preached at the black church, it was reported that the members became so filled with the Spirit that someone always accompanied Rev. Hughes to help him safely through the crowd when the congregation was caught up in spiritual enthusiasm. Rev. Hughes was often referred to as “The Bishop of the Mountains.”

c2005 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published Sept. 22, 2005 in The Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

An early Union County Minister: Rev. Thomas M. Hughes

For several weeks now we’ve explored aspects of the Eli Townsend family and its branches. That subject still has many avenues to explore, but for now I change directions and focus on the Rev. Thomas M. Hughes family. His legacy in Union and other north Georgia counties was as an early minister of the Methodist Church.

In 1846 the Rev. William Jasper Cotter, a noted Methodist minister in his own right, was sent by the Conference to his new charge at Blairsville, Ga. In writing his autobiography published in 1917 when he was an old man, Rev. Cotter made several references to Rev. Thomas M. Hughes. He wrote of arriving at the Blairsville Mission.

“The next evening (after five days on the road from Murray County) we reached Blairsville and were kindly received at the home of Rev. Thomas M. Hughes, a local preacher.” The Rev. Hughes helped the Cotters to find a cabin to live in and helped them get settled. The Hughes family and the Cotters became steadfast friends. While Rev. Cotter was on preaching missions to Tennessee, North Carolina and throughout North Georgia, he wrote in his autobiography: “Our good friends, the Hugheses…never allowed Rachel to spend a night alone while I was gone.”

The Rev. Thomas M. Hughes was born in Buncombe County, N.C., on January 31, 1809. He was a son of Goodman Hughes and Eleanor Payne Hughes. In Habersham County, Ga., on January 1, 1828, he married Nancy Bird. She was a daughter of the Rev. Francis Bird and Frankie (Frances) Abernathy Bird. Nancy was born in Rutherford County, N.C. Both the Hughes and the Bird families had come to north Georgia to live when Cherokee lands were opened up for settlement.

Rev. and Mrs. Thomas M. Hughes had a family of thirteen children. Martha (1828-1881) married Joab Addington and William R. Logan; William Chapel (1830-1906); Francis Goodman (1833-1908) married Amanda F. Goodrum and became a Methodist minister; Louisa (1834-?); Eleanor C. called “Nellie” (1834-1902) married the Rev. M. G. Hamby; Frances Jane (1840-1904) married W. R. Duncan; Rosetta (1841-1912) married James Calvin Erwin; Thomas Coke (1844-1932) married Rhoda Butt and Sallie Daniel and became a Methodist minister; Sarah Elizabeth (1847-1885) married the Rev. John Wesley Twiggs; John Wesley; Andrew Paxton; Calley; and Samuel.

Rev. and Mrs. Thomas M. Hughes, through his ministry and through their family, contributed much toward the upbuilding of the Methodist Church in the 19th century. Rev. Cotter in an article in “The Wesleyan Advocate” following Rev. Thomas M. Hughes and Nancy Bird Hughes’ deaths wrote: “Brother Hughes was a worthy local preacher, gifted in song, popular in his county, filling offices of trust…Sister Hughes was Miss Nancy Bird before her marriage, and like her husband, a sweet singer, amenable, and one of the best of women. Her father, Rev. Francis Bird, joined the S. C. Conference in 1805 with Lovick Pierce and Reddick Pierce. Rev. Bird baptized me in 1842. He was the son of Rev. Thomas Bird who lived to be quite old. This places brothers Francis Goodman Hughes (son of Thomas and Nancy) and W. T. Hamby (grandson of William and Nancy) in a long sacerdotal line.”

In an obituary in “The Wesleyan Advocate” written by Weir Boyd following Rev. Thomas M. Hughes’ death, these outstanding achievements were noted about his life: He was licensed to preach in 1839, ordained a deacon in 1847, and ordained as an elder in 1867 by Bishop Pierce. He was a local preacher, in labors abundant, regular and prompt in appointments, impressive in his preaching. He was stable of character, uniform in deportment, the patriarch of a large family several of whom are ministers of the gospel. He served as Clerk of the Superior Court of Union County for sixteen consecutive years. In addition to his duties as a local pastor and as Clerk of Court, he also was a merchant. He died August 22, 1882 in the 74th year of his life.

A lofty obituary to Nancy Bird Hughes was written for The Wesleyan Christian Advocate by J. B. Allen. In it he praised Mrs. Hughes as one who sought first and foremost “the will of God,” was faithful in “the great congregation, in the Sunday School, in her family circle.” Three of her sons became ministers of the gospel. She died March 9, 1881 and her slipping the earthly vale was described as follows: “Her face beamed with divine light, and her whole appearance presented anything but that of fear and sorrow... We have seen many die but none so triumphantly.”

Rev. and Mrs. Hughes were interred in the Old Blairsville Cemetery.

c2005 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published Sept. 15, 2005 in The Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

A Gold Prospector Named Hamby

Stories abound about those who hoped to make their fortune from gold found in Union County mines. One told by the late Preston Turner and Robert Corn is about a mysterious fellow named C. A. Hamby who spent eighteen or more months prospecting along Coosa Creek.

The story goes something like this. It was a cold rainy morning in 1937. Robert Corn was with his father, John, and a neighbor, hunting on Duncan Ridge. There they came upon a man digging along a creek bank. He was unkempt, dirty and looked like a hobo. The hunters learned from him that he had made himself a temporary shelter from bark but would like a more permanent place to stay while prospecting for gold.

The Corn family took him in. They learned his name was C. A. Hamby, he had been born in Western North Carolina, and that he had spent fourteen years teaching in an Indian school in Oklahoma. Mr. Hamby spent most of his days during the next eighteen months out on Coosa Creek and elsewhere digging for gold. He brought in a pound nugget that was assayed at a value of $420.00. In those days, with the nation trying to recuperate from the Great Depression, that was no small find.

With John Corn’s help, Hamby boxed up and shipped forty-five pounds of quartz to a mining company in London, England. The company assayed the ore and made a proposal that if other ore were as rich in gold as the sample, the England Company would finance up to a million dollars to set up mining operations in the area. They instructed C. A. Hamby to purchase mineral rights so that the project could move forward.

As happens with the best laid plans, history interfered and England declared war on Germany on September 3, 1939. That London Mining Company could not proceed with plans to finance a gold mine in Union County.

However, Mr. Hamby seemed to have an alternative plan. After his eighteen months of prospecting, he told the Corns that he was going to Seymour, Indiana. He knew a wealthy lady there who could finance the venture. He would go, possibly marry her, and then return with the necessary equipment to mine the rich vein of ore he had found. The nuggets had rich gold on one side and were white on the other side.

On November 2, 1939, John Corn walked with his boarder to Owltown Gap. Hamby was carrying a small pouch of gold nuggets and had only the clothes on his back. The men bade each other farewell.

Later in the day, Mr. W. H. Nix saw C. A. Hamby. He was carrying two heavy suitcases which he did not have when he left the Corn residence. Hamby boarded the bus at Harve Davis’s store, still with the two suitcases in tow.

On November 10, 1939, John Corn received a letter from C. A. Hamby. He had, indeed, reached Seymour, Indiana, and there the “wealthy lady” had become his wife. She had agreed to finance the mining venture. He asked Mr. Corn to hire ten to fifteen men to begin mining operations. He would be back soon to supervise the operations.

Who was this wealthy lady? Her name, if ever known in Union County, has been lost to time. But it is reported that she, herself, came to investigate the situation. She said that C. A. Hamby had borrowed $450. 00 from her to go to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania or to Virginia to purchase mining equipment to send to Union County. As he left her in Indiana, he had the same two heavy suitcases with which he was seen leaving Union County.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation was called into the case. Four men, two in New York and two in San Francisco, were caught trying to smuggle raw gold out of the country. That raw gold, by the nature of its golden patina, was identified as gold from Coosa Creek. Was one of these four men the mysterious C. A. Hamby? Or had he been robbed of his heavy suitcases, maybe even murdered? Were others trying to make a fortune from his eighteen months of prospecting and hiding his gold-filled ore?

The unfinished story of Prospector Hamby and his gold cache lies somewhere in the hidden records of mountain mists. Perhaps someone with a propensity for a novel will delve a little deeper and come up with a like-life story of the Corn family’s boarder who made off with two suitcases of Union County gold ore.

[The sources referenced for this article are “Sketches of Union County History, Volume III” (1987), pp. 22-23 and “Mountain Relic, 1980”, pp. 38-40.]

c2004 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published June 3, 2004 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.