52
Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 2 (Jan 11-17)
Prompt:
Favorite Find
#52ancestors
My favorite find always seems
to be the last new piece of information that I found, but they don't come very
often any more as I reach further and further into the past.
Last summer I was not really
researching but playing around with Google when I came across a FindAGrave
notice for Margaret (Sumner) Wood. She
is my husband's 3rd Great Aunt, so not a close relation at all, but the
information on her FindAGrave was interesting enough that I spent hours
researching the historical event that it mentions and how she fit into the
family.
Margaret Sumner, her
daughters, and mother, Mary Ann "Polly" (Smith) Sumner were arrested
for treason by William T. Sherman in July 1864. They were working in a textile
mill in Roswell, Georgia making uniforms for the Confederate Army while their husband and father was fighting in the Civil
War.
By some accounts, 249 women
and children were arrested and shipped by train to Kentucky.
Margaret and her mother, Mary Ann died while in route. Margaret's daughters Lucinda Elizabeth
"Lizzie, Easter, and Mary Ann "Molley" survived the train trip. At the end of the war, they were not given
any help in returning to Roswell, GA. The daughters remained in Kentucky and
married men from that area since they didn't have the means to return to
Georgia. Some of the ladies who
were arrested eventually did move back to Georgia with their
Kentucky husbands. Many of the other
women, remarried without knowing if their husbands survived the war and remained
in Kentucky. Many of the husbands returned
to Roswell apparently unable to find their wives and/or daughters, remarried
and had another family.
Margaret (Sumner) Wood is the
daughter of Benjamin and Mary "Polly" (Smith) Sumner, my husband's
4th Great Grandparents.
There is a book related to this event that I am trying
to track down. For more information there
are several accounts on the internet, including one at: https://www.americancivilwarforum.com/charged-with-treason-the-plight-of-the-roswell-women-472.html
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