Continuing the Ledford Legacy: Benjamin's Son Silas and Grandson Mercer

Last week we looked at the life and times of early Union County settler, Benjamin J. Ledford (1800-1892) who settled on land along Ivy Log Creek. He had a large family of fifteen known children. His third child, Silas L. Ledford (1822 – 1891), and one of Silas’s sons, Mercer Lafayette Ledford, will be the focus of this article.

Silas L. Ledford had an older sister, Hannah (b. 1819) and an older brother, Josiah (b. 1820) when his mother, Grace Ownbey Ledford (07/30/1799 – 06/12/1864) gave birth to him in Buncombe County, North Carolina on October 22, 1822. He would have other siblings: Sallie, Martha, Porter, Amy Vianna, John C., Carolina L, Patterson and Mercer, all born in North Carolina before the family came to Union and settled in Ivy Log. The youngest of his siblings, Pinkney, was born after the family arrived in Georgia. Later, after his mother died, his father, Benjamin J. Ledford, married Sarah Salena Chapman Miller and Silas L. had three half-siblings, Solomon S., Mary and William, who were younger than Silas’s children.

As we saw in last week’s account of Benjamin J. Ledford, Silas’s father, he was a large land owner. He gave his son Silas some acreage and on it he build a log cabin which became the first house for him and his wife, Dolly Elmira Bowling Ledford (b. ca. 1821) whom he married in Union County on December 19, 1841. She was a daughter of Thomas and Mary McDonald Bowling. This marriage blended two early settler families, for Dolly’s father had helped to cut timbers to build Union County’s first court house in the early 1830’s, and he also was elected an early sheriff of Union County.

To Silas and Dolly Bowling Ledford were born five children: Thomas (1845), Benjamin A. (1846), Gracie Caroline (1848), Louisa (1849), and Ellantha M. (1851). The exact date of Dolly’s death is unknown, but it occurred between 1851 and 1856. Silas married his second wife, Eliza Arminda Bowling (1837-1897), who may have been a sister of his first wife, Dolly. To Eliza and Silas were born nine children: Andrew, Jane, John S., Alice V., Mercer Lafayette, Ida, Virgil C., Sallie Isabelle and Frank H.

When the Civil War came, Silas L. Ledford served in Captain Young’s Company, the Georgia Cavalry, Local Defense Troops. Whether he saw action in battle or just defended the home front is not known. His main occupation was farmer. No record was found of the burial of Silas, Dolly and Eliza Ledford in the Union County cemeteries book. It is believed that he and his second wife, Eliza, were both buried in unmarked graves in the Antioch Baptist Church Cemetery. Silas left a will, probated in 1888. In it, he made no mention of children Thomas, Louisa, Ellantha or Frank. They may have preceded their father in death.

Some interesting facts are known about Mercer Lafayette Ledford, tenth child of Silas Ledford, whose mother was Eliza Bowling Ledford. He was born September 24, 1865. Mercer attended the Ivy Log High School. At age seventeen, he took the Georgia certification test and became a teacher. He taught first at Ebenezer School, a country school located on land his grandfather and then his father had owned.

On June 16, 1897, Mercer Lafayette Ledford married Florence Iowa Christopher. She was a daughter of John A. and Sarah Martin Christopher. Well educated for a woman of her era, Florence had attended school in Blairsville and also graduated from the Hiawassee Baptist Academy. She taught school for several years before her marriage. To Florence and Mercer were born four children: Sarah, Ina, Curtis and Louisa.

Mercer and Florence moved to Gwinnett County where he continued to teach. He became interested in law, and began to “read” law in the firm of Juhan and McDonald. He passed the state bar in 1892 and began the practice of law in Lawrenceville.

Union County drew this couple back to their roots. They moved back to Union County where he set up a law practice. It is said that his first trial in Union County was held at the Ebenezer Baptist Church. What precipitated this place for the trial is unknown to this writer. In Union County, Mercer Lafayette Ledford distinguished himself as a lawyer and community servant. He was on the County School Board and served for a time as County School Commissioner (Superintendent). In 1902 he was elected to the state senate to represent the district and served for three terms, authoring bills and serving on committees.

The Mercer Ledford family moved to Cairo, Georgia (Grady County) about 1905. There he practiced law, became county attorney, served on the school board and was active on the Democratic executive committee from that district. He held membership in various civic organizations and had leadership positions in Woodmen of the World and Cairo Lodge F & AM. He and Florence were active members of the Baptist Church in Cairo. Mercer Lafayette Ledford is an example of a grandson of an early settler who went out from the environs of Union County and did well in his chosen profession.

c 2010 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published April 29, 2010 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Reece Family in Union County, GA (part 3): Quiller Frank Reece, Second Child of William and Mary Daniel Reece

Pvt. Quiller Frank Reece (1843-1932)
Civil War - Confederacy
6th Georgia Cavalry, Company F.

Quiller Frank Reece (4.20.1843 – 10.13.1932) was the second of ten children born to William “Billy” Reece and Mary “Sarry” Daniel Reece. As the second child and first son, Quiller held a responsible position in his parents’ household, for he helped to provide leadership and example for his older sister Sarah Elizabeth and the eight other children born into that Reece family.

Union County marriage records show that Quiller Frank Reece married Eliza C. Logan on November 15, 1866. Thompson Collins (not the first settler Thompson Collins, but his son, Thompson), a justice of the peace in the Choestoe District, performed the marriage ceremony.

This marriage was after the Civil War, after Quiller had performed his duties as a soldier in the Confederacy in the 6th Georgia Cavalry, Company F, Hart’s Battalion, Smith’s Legion. When the men signed up for service for three years, they had to furnish their own horse. Commanding officers of Reece’s Company F were not Georgians, and were not listed in the roster of those who served from Union. Records show that Quiller was taken prisoner on December 18, 1862 in eastern Tennessee. Whether he remained in prison until the war ended is not indicated in the records. Many years after he and his sweetheart married, in the year 1910, he registered for a pension for his service in the Civil War. Whether he received it is not clear from available records.

Although Quiller Frank Reece’s wife’s name was listed in the Union marriage records as Eliza C. Logan, her full name was Elizabeth Clarica Adelia Logan Reece (06.04.1849 – 03.08.1936). Elizabeth (shortened to Eliza) was the youngest child of Drury Logan (1766-1855) and Mary Addington Logan (1759-1847). Eliza’s father, Drury, was a brother to Major Frank Logan who owned and operated the famous Logan Turnpike across the mountain between Blairsville and Cleveland, the route over which farmers and traders hauled loads of produce to barter for what they could not grow in Union County. Drury and Mary Addington Logan built their double-story log cabin on Land Lot 50 in the Owltown District on the south side of the Nottely River. The house, remodeled through the years, still stands today as a testament to the solid building of pioneer settlers. It was there that Eliza’s parents reared their eleven children, nine of whom were born in Union. When Drury and Mary Logan were old and incapacitated, it was their youngest child, Eliza and her husband Quiller Frank Reece who took her parents into their home and cared for them until their deaths.

Frank Quiller and Eliza Logan Reece had a very large family, sixteen children, twelve of whom lived to adulthood. Quiller Frank was primarily a farmer by occupation, but he no doubt pursued other trades to bring in extra money to rear his large family. They were Methodists by denomination and faithful members of the Shady Grove Mehodist Church. Upon their deaths, they were interred in the Shady Grove cemetery where their monuments may be viewed today.

A listing of the sixteen children of Quiller Frank and Elizabeth Clarica Adelia Logan Reece follows:

(1) William Drury Reece (02.22.1868) married Roxie Potts.
(2) Mary Rachael Rowena Reece (10.06.1869) married John S. McDonald.
(3) Martha Elizabeth Jane Reece (06.22.1871) married William J. Jackson.
(4) James Roberson Reece (07.21.1873) married Millie Henson.
(5) Thomas Joseph Hughes Reece (12.05.1875) married L. Henrietta Gardner.
(6) Eli Josiah Reece (04.02.1878) married Sallie Luella Stephens.
(7) John Henry Reece (03.27.1880) married Nellie I. Self.
(8) Francis Allen Reece (08. 25. 1881 – 11.01.1881).
(9) Simon Edward Reece (11.14.1882) married Fleta Belle Colwell.
(10) Charles Logan Reece (12.20.1883) married Louise Jane Davis.
(11) Frank Wellborn Reece (03.05.1885) married Sarah Ann Ledford.
(12) Richard Marvin Reece (04.23.1886) married Hailie C. Grendle.
(13) Mintie Della Reece (06.30.1888 – 07.? 1888)
(14) Baby Boy Reece (twin – b/d 07.18.1890)
(15) Baby Boy Reece (twin – b/d 07.18.1890).
(16) Alice Eliza Louise Reece (01.23.1893) married Olin Hayes.

In looking over the list of Frank Quiller and Elizabeth Clarica Adelia Logan Reece’s twelve adult children and who they married, it is easy to see how these descendants of the early Reece settlers married into families of other early settlers. Several of these Reece-connected families remained within Union County. Present citizens can look back with pride and claim their roots to this Reece couple who worked hard to rear dependable, hard-working children.

c 2010 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published Jan. 28, 2010 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Della L. Vandiver Zieske's long life

Della Vandiver was born in Choestoe, Union County, on February 1, 1886. Her parents were John Floyd Edward Vandiver (1849-1923) and Rhoda Lucinda Souther Vandiver (1853-1947).

The span of Della's years was 102. She put a lot of living into the century and more of her life.

When Della Vandiver was a young girl of nine, in 1895, her parents decided to "go west." This call of western land opportunities was strong in that era, and John Floyd Edward Vandiver, grandson of the famed Adam Poole Vandiver (1787-1876) and son of George Vandiver (1812-?) and Frankie Wheeler Vandiver (1816-?), took the challenge to move westward. As review, you may access my accounts about this family's move westward in previous articles now in The Sentinel Archives online. See, in particular these articles: "From the Memoirs of John Joseph Vandiver” (May 3, 2007); "Continuing the Saga of Vandiver's Life in the West" (May 10, 2007); and "John Joseph Vandiver Settles Down in Washington State" (May 17, 2007).

But this is the fascinating story of John Joseph Vandiver's younger sister, eight years his junior. She was nine years old when her parents loaded the children who were going west with them (two of their children were already married in 1895) into their covered wagon and left the home of John Souther and Mary "Polly" Combs Souther on Choestoe, where Della was born that cold February 1, 1886. In fact, all their married life until this point when they decided to "go west," Rhoda Lucinda and her husband had lived with her parents near New Liberty Baptist Church, Choestoe, Union County. The farm, though containing several acres along Town Creek, was still not large enough to support John Joseph and Rhoda Lucinda Vandiver's growing family.
But this is Della L. Vandiver’s story…and I will move on to highlights in her long life.

Imagine the excitement of a nine year old girl leaving the only home she had known in the shadow of Bald Mountain in Choestoe to set out to unknown places with her parents and siblings. She was sad to leave her friends and relatives, and especially her cousins about her own age with whom she liked to play when they visited at her grandparents' house. But Della had deep anticipation for what she would find as their exciting adventure unfolded.

The family went to Gainesville, Georgia in 1895 where they took a passenger train westward. "Our first major stop was in Asher, Arkansas," Della Vandiver wrote. There her father got work and Della's brother, Jesse Edward Vandiver, was born there on March 17, 1897. This sibling was thirteenth and last of the children born to Della's parents. The Vandiver family remained in Arkansas until 1900. Again the urge to move farther west propelled John Floyd Edward Vandiver to move his family on to Back Creek, Wyoming.

A sad day came for Della and her family on June 17, 1900 when her brother, Thomas Marion Vandiver, died at Back Creek. He had been born, as had Della, in Choestoe, Union County, on March 30, 1884. He died at age 16 on June 17, 1900.

Della L. Vandiver Zieske poses at age 100 showing the large fish

she caught at Port Townsend, Washington.

Della Vandiver celebrated her sixteenth birthday on February 1, 1902 in Wyoming. She and her brother John Joseph, to whom she was especially close, decided they would go to Medicine Bow, Wyoming. They got the family buckboard and the horses and started out early on that cold February morning. They had only traveled 15 miles when one of the sudden snowstorms of that part of the west began. The temperature suddenly dropped to about 15 degrees above zero. (How did they measure temperature in 1902?). The snow was blinding them, and the horses could not travel. Besides, Della and John Joseph were freezing in the buckboard, even wrapped up as they were in woolen blankets. Finally, they found a house along the way and the kindly people took the Vandiver siblings in. When the storm abated, not to be outdone by the weather, Della and John Joseph went on to Medicine Bow and celebrated Della's birthday late. She remembered into her old age that her sixteenth birthday was one of the best.

A few years after Della's birthday celebration, she was able to pursue education for the career she had dreamed about. Her beloved brother was living in Washington State at the time. He invited Della to come and begin her nurse's training. She became a student nurse at Seattle's Wayside Emergency Hospital. It was then located aboard a hospital ship docked in the harbor. She enjoyed her training and graduated in the class of 1908 with her nurse's certification. For the next fifty years of her life, she was a caring and hardworking nurse.

Her nursing career was not confined to Washington state. She was called to assist in Treadwell, Alaska when a gold mine there collapsed, leaving several miners dead and many severely injured. She went there as a nurse relief worker and sought to minister to the men whose lives hung in the balance.

During the Great War, or World War I, Della served as a military nurse. She didn't like to talk about this period of her life. Perhaps what she experienced was too traumatic to tell in accounts of her -nursing career. Mainly, she worked in hospitals and as a private nurse in the Seattle area.

Della Vandiver was married five times. Her first three husbands died, leaving her thrice a widow. Her last two marriages, unfortunately, ended in divorce. Her first marriage was January 1, 1913 to Joseph McDonald. After his death, she married Chaney Canning. After his death, she married a Carl Zieske. Unknown to this writer are the names of her last two husbands, unions that led to divorce. When Della Vandiver visited Union County, GA in April, 1986 to see one more time the place where she was born, she was going by the name of Della Vandiver Zieske. Della had no children of her own, but her nieces and nephews loved her, her stories, her zest for life.

She enjoyed fishing and reading. At age 100 she went out in her aluminum boat to her "bigger" fishing boat in Port Townsend Harbor, Washington. Boarding the larger boat, she steered it to the "saltchuck" where the big salmon ran. One of the largest she caught there was a 28-pound salmon. One weighed in at 17 pounds; still another at 11 pounds, and one was a 35-pound lincod that had an 8-pound silver she had hooked, it had gotten back into the water, the lincod swallowed it, and Della hooked the big fellow with the silver fish in its mouth. And these are no "fish tales." They're true experiences of a seasoned seawoman who plied the waters of Straight Juan de Fuca to find and hook the big fish.

Della Vandiver Zieske's 100th birthday cake had this inscription: "Della - 100 Extraordinary Years." She died in Seattle, Washington at age 102.

c 2008 by Ethelene Dyer Jones; published June 26, 2008 in The Union Sentinel, Blairsville, GA. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.