Tag Archives: Harts Creek

Spottswood Items 10.02.1903

13 Tuesday May 2014

Posted by in Big Harts Creek, Dingess, Spottswood, Timber

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“Ayer,” a local correspondent from Spottswood in Logan County, West Virginia, offered the following items, dated September 29, 1903, which the Logan Banner printed on Friday, October 2, 1903:

Miss Belle Dora Adams, one of the wealthiest belles of Spottswood, was entertained last Sunday by Joseph Baisden, a popular young and wealthy citizen of Dingess.

Peter Mullins and L.M. Riddle, two prominent young men of this place, got left last Sunday. “Shorty” Adams and Joseph Baisden took their girls, Miss Belle Dora and Susie Adams.

Sol Adams, Sr., has bought a fine mule of Stephen Mullins.

Crops are better than farmers were expecting.

K.F. Atkins has finished his job of trucking logs on Hoover.

Spottswood is growing fast. There are three stores in the town and John M. Adams will soon complete the fourth. It is also said that Attorney Riddell will engage in the mercantile business here.

James Thompson and Sol Baisden are doing a fine business hauling logs.

Last Sunday a number of drunkards entered church during services, but were quickly led out and guarded till services were over by Peter Mullins, Joe Adams, Constable A.F. Gore and Squire Sol Adams. Squire Adams says he will have peace at church if he has to hang the rough boys.

Miss Belle Dora Adams, accompanied by Joseph Baisden, left Spottswood this morning for her school near Dingess. They are well respected and well liked young people.

Peter Mullins paid a visit to the Big Cash Store today. He found the ever-smiling clerk at the counter, glad to see him enter. He bought 15 cents worth of tobacco and was invited to come again by the owner, Miss Alice Adams.

John R. Slade is so in love with Miss Aquilla Mullins that he had to quit school on account of her presence. He couldn’t get his lessons for looking at her.

In Search of Ed Haley 304

13 Tuesday May 2014

Posted by in Ed Haley, Stiltner

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Things got kind of quiet after that. I asked Faye if we were wearing her mother out and she said, “No, I don’t think so. She sits there and… Of course, she makes quilts. She’s made twenty since the first of the year. We’ve got them stacked upstairs. She made sixty-four the year before last. Last year she only made fifty-four. I don’t know how many she’ll make this year. She makes them upstairs. She pulls herself up there — you know, a handrail.”

Brandon asked if Daisy sold her quilts and Faye said, “Yeah, she sells them. Well, she gives us kids all one every year for our birthday. I’ve probably got forty or fifty.”

I asked how much they sold for and Faye said, “Thirty dollars.”

I said, “Have you got one you’d sell me?” and Faye laughed and said, “I’ve got a dozen if you want them. As a matter of fact, she’s even got her name and the date she completed it on each quilt.”

Faye looked over at her mother and said loudly, “He wants to buy one of your quilts.”

Daisy said, “Well, they’re upstairs.”

Brandon, Faye, and I went upstairs and fished through a bunch of quilts in a bedroom. We bought several; they were great souvenirs.

Back downstairs, Daisy told us more about Green McCoy’s “other family” in Eden, Kentucky.

“He had two children by his first wife,” she said. “Mary come and seen us and we was all tickled about it. I don’t know how she found us. She’d come to Kenova and stayed with some woman and found out where we lived up there above East Lynn in Stiltner way up in the country in a hollow. And she stayed a week or two. I don’t know how long she was aiming to stay, but she’d stayed with some lady and cleaned house and she cleaned out her wardrobe and took it with her and the law came and got ‘er. We don’t know what ever happened to Mary — we never heard from her no more. She was from down in Kentucky somewhere. I was just a little girl when she come up there.”

As for Green’s other child: “They had another’n, but I don’t know whether it was a girl or a boy.”

Not long before we left, Daisy revealed a final interesting connection between Green McCoy’s family and Cain Adkins’ family. She said Green McCoy had a brother named John who came around Cain’s place on Harts Creek.

“He’d go up there when Mom and Green lived out there in one of Grandpaw’s shacks. I think he was younger than Green.”

He might have been the same John McCoy, Brandon said, who land records showed owning 526 acres on Twelve Pole in Lincoln County in 1883.

About two years after Green’s death, John had a fling with Spicie’s sister, Angeline Lucas (Boney’s widow).

“Aunt Angeline went and had a young’n by him,” Daisy said.

A little later, she married Lee Adams and had seven more children, bringing her total to fourteen.

Boone County’s “Little Johnny” Hager 1

12 Monday May 2014

Posted by in Big Creek, Big Harts Creek, Music

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In the early 1900s, two musicians traveled as a pair throughout West Virginia and spread the influence of their musical talents to fiddlers and banjo-pickers in countless towns and hamlets. One of these men was Ed Haley, a Logan County native, who took up the fiddle after being blinded by his father as a child. The other was Little Johnny Hager who, although born in Logan County, spent a great deal of his life in Boone County.

John Washington Hager was born on December 8, 1876 to Joseph and Lucinda (Baisden) Hager, Sr. on Big Creek in Logan County, West Virginia, near the Boone County line. Johnny was the youngest sibling to Victoria Hager (1869-1942) and Aaron Hager (c.1872-c.1884). During his childhood, his parents moved from their home at the North Fork of Big Creek in Logan County to the Big Ugly Creek area. His family appeared in the 1880 Lincoln County Census. Subsequent years were difficult: Aaron Hager, Johnny’s older brother, died at the age of twelve years old. Victoria Hager married George Washington “Ticky George” Adams and moved to Big Harts Creek in Logan County. Finally, Johnny’s parents divorced due to his father’s infidelity with a local woman named Armilda Adkins. Joseph Hager soon married his mistress and fathered four more children: Edward Hager (1887), Joseph Hager, Jr. (1888-1940), Eliza Hager (1891), and Olivia Hager. Joe Hager lived in the vicinity of the old Mud Post Office near the Lincoln-Boone county line.

Remarkably, Johnny moved to Kansas with his mother, where he spent many years among Hager relatives. Just how long Johnny lived in Kansas has not been determined despite interviews with his close relatives. There is some indication that he and his mother lived in other Western states like Missouri prior to finally settling in Kansas. All the versions regarding Johnny’s stay in Kansas are given below because any one of them might be true. His niece Roxie (Adams) Mullins told that Johnny lived out West for six months. Johnny’s half-niece Dolly (Hager) Bell thought he came home from Kansas when he was twenty years old (circa 1896) or when he was aged in his twenties (circa 1896-1906). Hager’s half-great nephew Jess Chambers said that he had been told that Johnny lived in Kansas for twenty years, meaning that he would have returned to West Virginia around 1905. In the personal opinion of this author, accounts placing Johnny out West for several years seem at this time the most likely scenario simply because Johnny cannot be accounted for in the 1900 West Virginia Census. Instead, he shows up as a farm laborer in the home of a cousin, William Hager, aged 26, in Battle Hill Township, McPherson County, Kansas.

Kansas would have offered a West Virginia boy like Johnny Hager many new adventures. One can be sure that he spent a great portion of his time there working on the farm since he later described plowing fields into mile-long rows. According to family stories, he also chauffeured female cousins into town on wagon rides. Dolly Bell suggested that Hager probably learned to play the banjo while in Kansas and Jess Chambers said of Hager, “He played all his life.” Johnny was self-taught and played the old clawhammer style on the banjo.

According to tradition, Johnny’s mother died during their stay in Kansas. Roxie Mullins stated that Lucinda Hager was buried on the banks of the Wabash River, located along the borders between Illinois and Indiana. Another source said that she died in Missouri. Johnny always cried when he spoke of his mother and said that had lost “everything” when she died.

Some time after 1900, perhaps about 1905, Johnny returned to West Virginia. Although his father Joseph was still alive, Johnny never forgave him for divorcing his mother and refused to associate with him. He also refused to recognize Joseph’s children by his second wife. A story is told how Joe Hager, Johnny’s half-brother, rode to see him at John Baisden’s home on Sanders Branch. He was excited to meet the brother he had never known. When he came into the yard and yelled for him, Johnny wouldn’t even come outside.

In Johnny’s eyes, his sister Victoria Adams was all that remained of his family and he spent a great deal of time boarding at her Harts Creek residence in Logan County. During Johnny’s stay out West, Victoria had give birth to several children in a family which would grow to include Maggie “Mag” Adams (1888-1959), John C. “Johnny” Adams (1891-1965), Anna Adams (1901-1982), Geronimo Adams (c.1903), Roxie Adams (1905-1993) and Lola Adams (1911). It is likely that Johnny spun great stories for the Adams children about his experiences in Kansas. Roxie Mullins remembered him as being “funnier than a monkey,” Jess Chambers said he was a jolly fellow, and Dolly Bell remembered that he loved to joke and laugh. Dave Brumfield, a great-nephew, said that he pranked with the Brumfield children when he visited his parents’ home on the Smoke House Fork of Big Harts Creek in Logan County.

NOTE: Originally published in “Kith and Kin of Boone County, West Virginia” Volume XXII

Published by Boone County Genealogical Society

Madison, West Virginia, 1997

Dedicated to the late Dolly (Hager) Bell

In Search of Ed Haley 302

04 Sunday May 2014

Posted by in Culture of Honor, Ed Haley, Lincoln County Feud, Stiltner

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I asked Daisy again about her mother’s escape from Harts Creek.

“Grandpaw and the oldest boy had to come on out and come down into Wayne County to save their lives,” she said.

This seeming abandonment of his family in such a dark time appeared to be a blemish on Cain’s otherwise “spotless record.” I thought about that and said, “Seems to me like the safest way to get everybody out was to get the menfolk out first. And also, too, the menfolk could have got out of there quicker without the womenfolk.”

Faye said, “Well, I remember Grandmaw saying the Brumfields said they’d kill everything from the housecat up. I guess that’s why Grandpaw left, but I still wonder why he left the womenfolk. I can’t help it if it is my great-grandpaw.”

Not long after Cain left Harts, Daisy’s grandmother, Mariah Adkins, killed twelve sheep and some hogs and stored the meat in barrels, then loaded the barrels and all of the other family possessions onto a rented push-boat.

“They couldn’t get nobody to row the boat,” Daisy said. “Grandmaw tried to hire a colored man and he said he would, but he said, ‘I know they’d kill me.’ So they had to do it all theirselves. And Mom and Sissy done the rowing.”

“It was a pretty big size boat cause they had all the stuff they had in their house and their barrels of meat all in there,” Daisy said. “But they couldn’t get nobody to row the boat. Grandmaw tried to hire a colored man and he said he would but he said, ‘I know they’d kill me.’ So they had to do it all theirselves. And Mom and Sissy done the rowing.”

Those on the boat were 46-year-old Mariah Adkins, 23-year-old Spicie McCoy, 18-year-old Mittie Adkins, 13-year-old Lena Adkins, 13-year-old Liza Adkins, nine-year-old Cain Adkins, Jr., and one-year-old Sherman McCoy. Daisy wasn’t sure if Aunt Angeline (aged 28) was on the boat with her six kids, including a newborn.

“I don’t know whether she was already down here or not,” she said. “She didn’t come on the boat with them, I don’t think. She come down and married Lee Adams and lived out on the Napier Ridge.”

Daisy gave a chilling account of the ride down-river.

“Mom was about four months along with my brother Green and she had that little baby. Sherman was about a year and a half old — and it was raining and cold. 8th day of January. They come down through there and the peach trees was in full bloom, she said. Had been kind of a warm spell and the peach trees bloomed out that year. Mom said she was cold; she was numb.”

As they crept out of Harts, little Sherman McCoy pulled a long hair pin from his mother’s hair and stuck it repeatedly in her breast. She was afraid to take it from him because he might cry and alert the Brumfields of their exodus.

“He’d take that straight pin and poke it in her breast and pull it out,” Daisy said. “She knowed she was gonna be drowned every minute, so she wouldn’t scold him for it. She said, ‘It didn’t hurt and he had fun at it.’ He was just a little fella.”

It was the beginning of a rough ride: Mariah almost tipped the boat twice before allowing her daughter Mittie to pilot it.

The Adkinses spent the night at Ranger where they stored their goods at a local home. The next day, they got off the boat at Branchland and crossed over a mountain to Laurel Creek in Wayne County.

“Then they got Bill Frazier from Stiltner to go back up there to Ranger in a wagon — he was a young man then — and haul whatever they had stored down there,” Daisy said. “By the time he got there, the hams and meat didn’t have much meat on them.”

This story about the Adkins family’s exodus constituted one of those unforgettable tales in our search. Hearing about the Brumfield threat to kill “everything from the housecat up” caused Brandon to feel horrible that his ancestors would’ve perhaps harmed innocent women and children. Things had apparently come to that in Harts. Women shot from ambush. Young widows. Orphans. The entire community seemed to be coming undone. Of course, the determination of the women and children to survive their horrible ordeal was both inspiring and awesome, especially considering they weren’t the strong, raw-boned mountaineer women which one imagines them to have been. (Spicie McCoy only weighed about 91 pounds.)

Ferrellsburg News 3.14.1912

04 Sunday May 2014

Posted by in Big Harts Creek, Ferrellsburg, Logan, Timber

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“Old Hickory,” a local correspondent from Ferrellsburg in Lincoln County, West Virginia, offered the following items, which the Lincoln Republican printed on Thursday, March 14, 1912:

Mr. G.D. Davis, an aged and respected citizen, is very low with chronic indigestion.

David Dingess, of Big Hart, passed through town today en route to Court at Hamlin.

Mrs. Salena Estep was a pleasant caller at this place recently.

Willis Dingess, of Smoke House Fork, is very low with fever.

John P. Fowler, of Logan, has moved into our midst. We welcome John.

Mrs. B.B. Lucas and little daughter were shopping in town Saturday.

George H. Thomas, the hustling timberman, was in Huntington the first of the week on business.

Born: To Mr. and Mrs. John P. Fowler on the 4th, a fine girl. Mother and baby are doing well and John is happy.

The Monitor has accused God Almighty of being partial toward the County Road Engineer; Democrats who have contracts on the roads of “voting right” and a “Hill Billy” lawyer with an “operatic voice” of writing an article signed “Duval” “Sweet Magnolia of Savanah!” We knew the Engineer was on the Lord’s side, but never dreamed of the good Lord being partial. Well, who comes next?

Chapman Adkins, of Big Hart, was here on business Saturday.

Jerry Lambert was here bidding on the roads Saturday.

Miss Velva Dial is contemplating attending school at Hamlin this spring.

Ferrellsburg News 12.21.1911

26 Saturday Apr 2014

Posted by in Big Harts Creek, Ferrellsburg, Fourteen, Rector, Sand Creek

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“Old Hickory,” a local correspondent from Ferrellsburg in Lincoln County, West Virginia, offered the following items, which the Lincoln Republican printed on Thursday, December 21, 1911:

Mrs. Brook Adkins is teaching one of the best schools in Harts Creek district. She is a faithful teacher.

Misses Maud Toney and Maggie Fry of Rector, were visiting Mrs. Ward Lucas last Sunday.

A.G. Adkins and wife, and M.C. Farley were calling on Misses Maggie and Lottie Lucas Sunday.

Miss Minerva Dingess was visiting Mrs. A.G. Adkins Sunday.

Everett Dingess has just returned from a flying visit to Big Hart. He reports a fine time.

Born to Mr. and Mrs. Ward Lucas on last Monday morning, a boy. The mother and child are doing well, and Ward says the boy will be a republican.

F.B. Adkins on returning from the Toney lodge on last Saturday night lost his hat.

M.C. Farley has returned from Big Buffalo, Logan county, where he has a good job of work.

Mrs. Martha Farley, mother of M.C. Farley, died at the home of her youngest son, David Farley, on Dec. 5th. She had been a member of the Methodist church since early life and was ever faithful to the teachings of that church. She was past 74 years of age. The remains were interred at the place selected by her on the home farm.

A small child of Allen Nelson, of Sand Creek, caught its clothes on fire the other day and was burned to death.

Hazel, the six year old daughter of F.E. Adkins, caught on fire the other day and was badly burned.

M.C. Farley went to Hamlin last Monday.

The boys of this vicinity are preparing for a lively time. Xmas and the children are looking for Santa Claus.

Charles Adkins Family Cemetery

20 Sunday Apr 2014

Posted by in Big Harts Creek, Cemeteries

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The Charles Adkins Family Cemetery, which I visited on April 19, 2014, is located at the mouth of Cole Branch of Big Harts Creek in Lincoln County, West Virginia.

Row 1

Unmarked rock

W A on unmarked rock

Unmarked rock

Unmarked rock

Billie Brumfield, Jr. (20 February 1910-12 March 1955; s/o William “Bill” and Hollena “Tiny” (Adkins) Brumfield

Row 2

Hollena Brumfield (13 December 1873-11 December 1963); d/o Charles and Minerva (Dingess) Adkins; m. William “Bill” Brumfield

Brady Dingess (7 January 1917-30 January 1960); PFC 1330 BASE UNIT AAF WWII; s/o Tom “Stink” Dingess and Mary Jane Brumfield

Mary Brumfield (25 September 1897-November 1917); d/o William “Bill” and Hollena (Adkins) Brumfield; born September 1898; died 26 June 1917

Mollie Brumfield (8 April 1899-May 1917); d/o William “Bill” and Hollena (Adkins) Brumfield

Pearlie Brumfield (May 1895-1902); d/o William “Bill” and Hollena (Adkins) Brumfield; not listed in 1900 census

Bill Brumfield (2 July 1871-2 November 1930); s/o Paris and Ann B. (Toney) Brumfield; born July 1875

Garnet J. Willis (11 March 1909-26 September 1938); d/o William “Bill” and Hollena (Adkins) Brumfield; m1. Edward Miller; m2. Harvey Willis

Row 3

Mayme Adkins (March 1912-November 1913); d/o Stonewall “Dick” and Weltha (Dingess) Adkins

Lace Adkins (1916-1916); s/o Stonewall “Dick” and Weltha (Dingess) Adkins

Ward Adkins (10 October 1914-17 October 1914); s/o Charles “Reb” and Laura (Tomblin) Adkins

Charles Adkins, Sr. (1850-1922); s/o Isaiah and Mary Jane (Toney) Adkins; born March 1850; died 12 July 1919

Minerva Adkins (1852-1925); d/o Harvey S. and Patsy (Adams) Dingess; m. Charles Adkins; born November 1850; died 10 September 1920

Stonewall Adkins (18 June 1889-10 December 1936); named Richard “Dick” Adkins; s/o Charles and Minerva (Dingess) Adkins

Row 4

Enoch Adkins, Jr. (30 November 1933-30 November 1933); s/o Enoch and Cynthia (Moore) Adkins

Enoch Adkins (1881-1933); s/o Charles and Minerva (Dingess) Adkins; born November 1883; died 20 September 1933

Maurice Adkins (20 September 1928-25 December 1928)

Row 5

Benjamin Adkins (1881-1938); s/o Charles and Minerva (Dingess) Adkins; born 1 November 1880; died 18 July 1938

Draxie Webb (20 November 1929-29 June 1963); d/o Enoch Adkins and Emerine Browning

Up on Hill

Earl Black (1910-1956); s/o Nim Black and Martha Alford; died 15 November 1956

Charley Curry Family Cemetery

11 Friday Apr 2014

Posted by in Big Harts Creek, Cemeteries

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The Charley Curry Family Cemetery, which I visited on November 23, 2005, is located in the head of the Curry Branch of Big Harts Creek in Lincoln County, West Virginia.

Row 1

Dora Smith (01 June 1940-19 Mar 1981); d/o Victor and Virginia (Workman) Adkins; m. Okey Smith

Okey Smith (14 Sept 1938-still alive as of 2005)

Claude Adkins (1932-1993); s/o Benjamin and Hollena (Alford) Adkins

Betty J. Adkins (1938-2002); d/o Alvie and Vada Maynard; m. Claude Adkins

Row 2

Will Browning (14 Jan 1900-27 July 1972); s/o Lewis Kaleb and Cosby (Dalton) Browning; m. Nora Curry

Victor Adkins (1915-1982); s/o Charles Workman and Hollena Alford

Virginia Adkins (1920-1988); d/o Tilman and Flora (Curry) Workman; m. Victor Adkins

Row 3

Tammy Cox (26 June 1962-15 July 1993)

Unmarked rock

Unmarked rock

Row 4

Sadie Curry’s old headstone is used here to mark the grave of George Curry.

Homemade stone with no dates reading “Boy Baby.”

Sadie Curry (6 Jan 1867-26 July 1927); named Francis Parsadie Butcher; d/o Melvin Butcher and Lydia Eveline “Shug” Adkins; m. Charley Curry

Charley Curry (26 Nov 1866-10 April 1942); s/o Jesse and Nickiti (Thompson) Curry

Row 5

Georgia Bryant (26 Jan 1911-17 July 1978); d/o Charley and Sadie (Butcher) Curry; m. Hassell Bryant

George Curry (30 Dec 1893-28 Dec 1895?); s/o Charley and Francis (Adkins) Curry

Headstone reading “Son of Kenneth Tiller and Shirley Curtis June 21, 1963.”

Ellen Dalton (2 July 1940, only date); d/o John and Nessel (Curry) Dalton

Row 6

Owen Dalton (27 March 1927-9 Nov 1976); s/o John and Nessel (Curry) Dalton

John Dalton (20 March 1906-31 Aug 1993); s/o James and Viola (Tomblin) Dalton

Nessel C. Dalton (18 Sept 1909-08 Oct 1971); d/o Sallie Curry; m. John Dalton 11/26/1928

In Search of Ed Haley 284

09 Wednesday Apr 2014

Posted by in Big Harts Creek, Ed Haley, Music

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Inspired by Brandon’s visit to Daisy Ross, I called her to ask if she knew that Green and Milt were fiddlers.

“Brother Sherman and brother Green’s father was a fiddle player,” she said. “Mom said he was the best she ever heard. I didn’t know what Milt played — they played together — but Green played the fiddle. Brother Sherman played a banjo. Brother Sherman could play any kind of music. I guess Green McCoy could, too.”

I asked about Sherman’s tunes and Daisy said, “I remember when I was little and I wanted him to play that ‘Indian Girl’ and he’d have to tune that banjo different. He’s been gone fifty-some years but he was a good banjo player. He was a singing teacher. Three of my brothers was singing school teachers. Sherman and Green, and then my full brother Harkins Fry, he made music. He wrote songs all the time. He musta wrote a thousand or more and had them in Gospel songbooks. ‘Heaven On My Mind’, ‘Eternity Is So Long’ and ‘Jesus Walked All the Way’. The first ones he wrote, he was just a teenager; he was about sixteen, I think. ‘Time Is Passing By’ — he sent that off and got a thousand copies made of it and after that they liked his music so they went to putting them in songbooks and they put two in every Stamps Baxter songbook that come out.”

I was really curious to hear more about the Adkins family’s exodus from Harts Creek but Daisy only added a few new details.

“I don’t know exactly where they got on the boat at, but they got off at Ranger and had to store their stuff there at somebody’s house,” she said. “Grandpa got a man down here, Bill Frazier, to go up with a wagon and haul their stuff down. People had a hard time then.”