Some Descendants of the Famed Adam Poole Vandiver
THROUGH
MOUNTAIN MISTS
Early Settlers of Union
County, Georgia
Their
Descendants...Their Stories...Their Achievements
Lifting the
Mists of History on Their Way of Life
By: Ethelene Dyer Jones
Some
Descendants of the Famed Adam Poole Vandiver
Several
have commented that they particularly enjoyed my
column of January
13, 2005
entitled “Adam Vandiver—Truth or Legend?”
In it we traced facets of the stories Adam Poole Vandiver
(1788-1877)
told to a Mr. Lanman and collected in his book entitled “Letters from
the Alleghany
Mountains.” The legendary “Hunter of Tallulah” was,
indeed, a living, breathing mountain man whose exploits are still kept
alive
through family history.
Mr. Theodore Thomas who moved in 1996
to Union
County following
his retirement, and who
is involved with historical research and preservation, called to tell
me that
Adam Poole Vandiver was his great, great grandfather. Ted Thomas, as he
is
better known, was delighted to read an account of his ancestor’s
notable
exploits. Readers of “The Sentinel” will
recall an article on May
6, 2004 about the restored turbine from the old Souther Mill
of
Choestoe having been donated to the Union County Historical Society in
memory
of Ted’s mother, Frances Rosanna Vandiver Thomas. His
grandmother was Rhoda Lucinda Souther
(1853-1947) who married John Floyd Edward Vandiver (1849-1923). Rhoda Lucinda was the daughter of John
Souther (1803-1889) and Mary “Polly” Combs Souther (1807-1894). It was John Souther’s brother, Jesse William
Souther, who built Souther Mill on Cane Creek, Choestoe, in 1848. The mill operated for almost 100 years.
John Floyd Edward Vandiver, Rhoda
Lucinda Souther’s husband, was a son of George Vandyman Vandiver
(1812-1910)
and Frances Wheeler Vandiver (1816-1915).
George was the second child of the famed Adam Poole Vandiver
(1788-1877)
and his first wife, Martha Whiting Vandiver (1794-1840).
John Paul Souther of Gainesville,
Georgia,
whose grandfather, Jesse William Souther founded the mill, and whose
father,
Jeptha, continued the milling tradition, and Ted Thomas are combining
their
historical interests and expertise to plan a marker placement at the
location
of the Souther Mill. The historical
program is set for Saturday,
April 30, 2005. Please
watch for further announcements about this observation.
Rhoda Lucinda Souther was the twelfth
and youngest child of John and Mary “Polly” Combs Souther.
Her parents had purchased and settled about
1836 on four lots where the New Liberty
Baptist Church is located
today. In fact, Rhoda’s father gave land
at the intersection of the four lots to build the church and cemetery. Both her parents were born in Wilkes County, NC,
but had migrated to Rush County, Indiana before deciding to move to the
Choestoe District of Union County, Georgia.
Just how Rhoda and John Floyd Edward
Vandiver met is not known to this writer.
But it was not that far from the section of White County, Georgia
where Vandiver’s mother and father, George and Frances Wheeler Vandiver
lived
across the mountain to Choestoe. Rhoda
and John very likely met at New Liberty
Church
and their courtship blossomed. They were
married in Union County,
Georgia January 9, 1872.
They lived at the old John
Souther
homeplace, she being the youngest of the twelve Souther children. Rhoda and John Vandiver had thirteen
children, twelve of whom were born at the John Souther homeplace. The youngest was born in Asher, Arkansas,
after the Vandivers moved west in 1895.
From Arkansas
the family moved to Wyoming
and from Wyoming
to Washington
state.
Here is a listing of their
children and
birthdates: Mary A. Vandiver (1873)
married Frank L. Smith; William Joshua
Vandiver (1874) married Ida Hilderbrand; Cordelia Jane Vandiver (1876)
married
Andrew Jackson Townsend and Carl Sieverts; John Joseph Vandiver (1878)
married
Lula Mae Estee; James Harley Vandiver (1880) married Mae Larsen;
Frances
Rosanna Vandiver (1882) married John W. Thomas; Marion Thomas Vandiver
(1884-1900); Della Lucinda Vandiver (1886) married Joseph McDonald, Chaney Canning and Carl
Zieske;
Sarah Evelyn Vandiver (1887) married John Durham; Nellie May
Vandiver
(1890) married Frank Whitley; Hartwell Franklin Vandiver (1891) married
Ella
Hazel Blackwell; Callie Buenaulsta
Vandiver (1893) married Barr Patton, ?
Peabody, and Hans Peter Walloe; and the last child, Jesse Edward
Vandiver
(1897) was born in Arkansas
and married Ella Frances Bielby.
The sense of adventure continued
to
succeeding generations from Adam Poole Vandiver as evidenced by the
challenges
and changes his descendants experienced.
[Sources for
this article and the January 13 column
on Adam Vandiver are the book “Souther
Family History” by Watson Benjamin Dyer, 1988, pages 241-268
and a
monograph by Cornelia Vandiviere Barton of Sorrento, LA
on the Vandiver family: “Pedigree Chart” and “Adam Poole Vandiver
Descendancy
Chart.” -EDJ.]
c2005 by
Ethelene Dyer
Jones; published Jan. 27, 2005 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville,
GA.
Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
[Ethelene Dyer
Jones is a retired educator,
freelance writer, poet, and historian. She may be reached at
e-mail edj0513@windstream.net;
phone 478-453-8751; or mail 1708 Cedarwood Road, Milledgeville, GA
31061-2411.]
Updated October 11,
2009
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