Sharing my EXCITEMENT!!!

For those of you who are not deeply involved in genealogy, tracing your family's roots or searching for your ancestors, you will not understand this.  However, compare it to fishing and finally landing that largemouth bass that has evaded you for years or to being a collector and finally finding a missing piece to your collection.  Are you feeling the excitement?  Oh come on, you know you can feel it!!  Feel the tingle in your feet?  Makes you wanta dance doesn't?  Oh stop it, you look silly, at least turn on some music and close those blinds.  What will the neighbors think?

First, as you will notice on the right side of my homepage, I have added a picture/photo.  This is my Great Grandfather Horace Monroe Bell, his wife Harriett Cornealia Farrar Bell and their children.  My Granddad, B. Charlie Bell, the man in the buggy at the top of my homepage, is the little guy in front, between his parents. Then to the left is his brother Arzo Monroe Bell, next standing behind his dad's right shoulder is Horace Cornealius (Neal) Bell and the tall fellow in the rear is my great uncle William Albert Bell.  To Uncle Albert's left is Aunt Ida.  Is it just me or does she have a remarkable resemblence to her mother?

Yes, since I had never seen my Grandmother Bell and the only photo I had ever seen of Granddad Bell was the one where he is standing between the two horses, just below the family photo.  Receiving this was truly exciting, but, my excitement didn't end there.  Through this blog I have contacted someone who is related to the Yates family and I am truly convinced their Yates and my Yates are one and the same.  Wow!!!  This is the most exciting thing I have encountered with those rascally Yates since I first discovered the Cleghorn murder trial.  That sounds terrible, I apologize!  Anyone taking the life of another, regardless of the situation, should never be compared, in any way, to a celebration.  However, I cannot and will not deny it was extremely interesting and now to have found relatives I didn't know existed is great.

It seems Joshua Yates did not die in 1862 as I had believed.  He left Missouri and ventured into Illinois, marrying a Martha Clutts, 5 February 1870, in Alexander County, Illinois.  This marriage resulted in the birth of one child, Charles Joshua Yates, born 29 January 1875.  I'm still working on information and when I get it more organized, I will share.

Well that's it for now, just wanted to share my excitement.  Have a GREAT Sunday, stop by whenever you have a chance and feel free to share anything and everything you may have that might connect our paths in life.

Tim

Questioning Accuracy

Sometimes I am amazed when watching documentaries of the American Revolution, the War of 1812 and/or the Civil War.  I wonder, where did they get the information?  Sure, there are numerous historical documents, some with detailed accounts of battles, expectations, casualities, etc., but what about those narrators.  How is it possible to know what someone was thinking during a battle that person did not survive?  My goodness, I have had trouble just finding some of my ancestors and/or their/my kin.  I'm sorry, but I am a skeptic!  And, the deeper I dig into my ancestory the more I wonder about the history I was taught in school.  Too much of our history, in my opinion, has been written by those who do not know, were not there and have no realistic way of knowing fact from fiction.  Oh I know that sounds terrible, but I have seen and read things that happened in my lifetime in which today's historical accounts do not match the events as they occured.  One glaring example is the racial tension in the 1960's.  I could write page after page on this, but I will try to be brief.  The "history" of school intergration suggests violence in different degrees throughout the South.  I was a Freshman in high school when our county schools first intergrated, but instead of problems, the white kids embraced the thought.  As bad as this may sound, there were some black athletes our entire high school actually looked forward to having join our football and basketball teams.  There was NEVER a racial divide or any problems throughout my four years of high school.  And, that first year of intergration we got a new teacher, a black man who to this day may be the most beloved teacher the high school has ever had.  Also, I am not aware of any racial problems in surrounding counties, so to suggest there were racial problems throughout the South is not true.
Another example of "Today's History" versus "Being Alive and Watching" is the stories of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Growing up, watching Dr. King on newscasts, we seldom if ever heard his message.  The cameras rolled, showing viewers the violence mainly of police using billy clubs and striking those who were in the crowd.  Yes, it appeared Dr. King was a trouble maker, but now we're allowed to hear his words and he surely spoke, preached if you will of non-violence and peace.  The news media controlled what America saw and heard and it never appeared to be anything associated with non-violence.  I consider this to be a sad situation and wonder how many were injured and possibly killed because of misunderstandings and/or the news media sensationalizing something other than the facts that existed?
All of this brings me to a discrepancy in my previous posts concerning my Great Uncle Alonzo Park's death.  I first posted he was riding a bicycle when the crime was committed, but in the second post, the newspaper article plainly states he was driving a horse and buggy.  The bicycle inclusion came from stories I grew up hearing, but it is possible I misunderstood and Alonzo "sometimes" rode a bicycle.  Maybe when he was delivering mail in town??  Hmm, sounds reasonable!  Okay, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.
Seriously, I try my absolute best to be accurate, I want to be accurate.  Otherwise, what is the point in doing any research, just make up stories and say they are true.  However, as hard as I try to be accurate, sometimes things are foggy at best.  Therefore listening to a narrator tell the audience what somone was thinking shortly before their demise seems more a product of making a better story than making accuracy a priority.  Just my thoughts and opinions!

Have a Safe St. Patrick's Day and should you partake of the spirits, do so responsibily and have a designated driver.

Thanks for stopping by, please come again and perhaps share a comment just to let me know I'm not talking/writing to myself.

Tim

Highway Robbery - The Murder of Alonzo Park

First, I would like to thank Sheila Hopkins, TnGenWeb - Carroll County Coordinator and Jere Cox at the Gordon Browning Museum in McKenzie for the research they did searching for information on the Alonzo Park murder.  Thanks guys, I really appreciate ALL of your effort and certainly am indebted to you both.

Okay, as Sheila commented in an email, there was good news and bad news.   The bad news was, there was a fire in the Carroll County courthouse in 1931 and all the criminal court case files were burned.  However, Sheila and Jere found the following article from the Carroll County Democrat, May 25, 1906.

Highway Robbery

A genuine case of attempted murder and highway robbery, terrible in its' every detail, occurred near Hollow Rock Wednesday afternoon.

The victim was Alonzo Park, a rural mail carrier out from Buena Vista.  He was waylaid and fatally shot while crossing Green's turnpike, two miles south of Hollow Rock, but only a short distance from the Hollow Rock Junction.  The perpetrator of this foul deed was Alvin Condor, 16-year old son of Rev. E.R. Condor of Hollow Rock.  No one witnessed the crime but Condor was later arrested and confessed the crime.

Sid Aden, who lives near the turnpike, seeing Park's horse and buggy near the levee with no driver, went on the hunt of Park, thinking an accident had happened to him and found him lying on the side of the road with two bullet holes in his head and in an unconscious condition.  Neighbors were called and the unfortunate man taken to the junction and later placed on the evening train and carried to his home in Buena Vista.

The action of young Condor aroused suspicion against him.  He was seen on the levee a short time before the shooting and in the bottom shortly after.  Several parties who believed that the boy did the shooting went out on a hunt for him.  He was found near the old P.T.& A. depot and arrested.  Messrs. Bradford and Bowen made the arrest.  Condor ran when he saw the parties coming toward him but after being shot at a few times he gave up.  He at first claimed he knew nothing of the matter, but a pocketbook was found on his person and recognized to be Alonzo Park's, and after being pressed made a confession and told all about how it was done and what actuated him to commit such a crime.  He said he was afraid of Park and as he (Condor) was aiming to leave the country he wanted to put Park out of the way before he did so.  He said he hid behind a tree and as Park came along he stepped out and Park said, "you are that same boy", where upon he commenced shooting Park.  He shot four or five times and used a 22 caliber pistol.  He said after the shooting the horse ran about 100 yards before Park fell from the buggy.  He followed Park up and robbed him, taking a watch and pocketbook containing over $2.00.  The money was found on his person.  He had hid the pistol and watch but later told where they were and they were secured.

The boy is about 16 years old and has the reputation of being a very bad boy, although his parents are splendid people.

Park is about 36 years old, has a wife and one child and has been carrying the mail over this route for over two years.

I found it interesting, odd, strange, perculiar or even weird how the article begins calling this a "case of attempted murder".  Clearly there was a murder.  I do not know what Condor's sentence was, but do know family lore has it that the family did not want him put to death.  Also, the stories I have heard include Condor's stating he had been reading of the exploits of Frank and Jesse James before commiting this crime.  Oh, I should include this was in Tennessee.  I just realized this is not mentioned in the article.