Snodgrass-Arkansas

Wanda McGehee, 8303 South 30th Circle, Ft. Smith, AR, 72903 asks for

periods?  Was William a brother of Eli McGehee, resided 1850 in Jackson Co., AL, and 1860 in Sebastian Co., AR, d. 1865 in Lawrence Co., MO?  Were Eli & William McGehee b. in Lincoln Co., TN?  Was Lydia, b. ca. 1813, married James Ivy, Franklin Co., AR, 1850 a sister to these two men? Was Mary, b. ca. 1828, a sister?  She married Robert Snodgrass and resided 1850 in Franklin Co., AR.<BR>

contained in a Snodgrass family Bible in possession of Edgar L. James, 528 N.E. 72nd Ave., Portland OR 97213.  Edgar James is the son of Laura Ader (Ada) Snodgrass listed below.  This Bible record was contributed by James H. Goggin, 12364 S.W. King George Drive, King City, OR 97224, who is the son of Alice Lidia (Lydia) Snodgrass Goggin.  People interested in this line should write to James H. Goggin.<BR>

[Alice Lidia, Laura Ader, & Finis Luther are children of Robert Bean Snodgrass and his second wife, Susan Anthony Ivy.]<BR>

I was given your name by Mr. Thomas Howe Neal, Route 12, Box 372,

Knoxville 18, TN.  He said he had been informed you were a descendant of the Snodgrass family and had collected much information about the Snodgrass Family.  I too am a descendant of the Snodgrasses.  I think Mr. Neal and I are likely both descendants of the same family in Virginia.  But as yet I have no proof.  In fact, I have only sketchy information about the earlier ancestors of mine and have no proof that they are the Snodgrasses of Washington Co., VA.<BR>

Our family had a Bible record dating back into the 1700's.  It is not complete and does not give Brothers and Sisters.  But I have traced some of them back into Franklin Co., AR, and in the 1850 census of that county, I discovered one of my ancestors was born in Kentucky.  Mr. Neal informs me that some of the older Snodgrasses went from Virginia to Kentucky, and I see there is a great repetition of family given names in my Snodgrasses and the ones I have located thus far in Washington Co., VA.<BR>

I have been working on my family history since 1947.  I am interested in all of my ancestors equally; thus I have a really great undertaking.  I will type out a sketch of my line of ancestors.  I hope you will have some information about them that you will be able to let me have.  I include not only the ones I know are my family, but I am also including the Virginia group.  I feel there is a possibility my William W. Snodgrass may be the son of the Virginia Joseph Snodgrass who is no. 2, but as yet I have not proof.<BR>

This group of Arkansas people is our family.  It may not be complete. The Bible gave mostly the direct line of ancestors and did not include all of their children.  From letters and things the older living Snodgrasses remember hearing about, we have pieced the information together to decide that the eight I list are ours.  There may be others.  W. L. Snodgrass and his wife Mary Elizabeth died in the home of their dau., Mrs. Mary Black, but we do not know where she lived for sure.  There was also a list of McGehee children included in the Bible record.  We have no explanation as yet about them, other than the list of their names.<BR>

I hope you can help me with this information.  I have some information about the different ones I have placed on the charts.  If you are interested in any of them, I will be glad to send a copy of what I have.<BR>

The information about the 8 children of W. L. Snodgrass came partly from my family Bible and partly from the 1850 U.S. census for Franklin Co., AR.<BR>

Wilson Snodgrass who lived all resided in Dallas Co., Webster Co., or Greene Co., MO.  [Some] of them died rather young.<BR>

I received your very nice letter and the blanks you wished filled out.  I have intended to go to the library again before I answered you, but have not gotten around to it, so am not going to wait longer.  I am a cripple, and this cold weather, ice, and snow prohibits my going out much.  I have filled in the blanks to the best of my knowledge.  Please excuse my errors.  I have as my assistant my two-and-one-half-year-old dau., who proves to be far from a HELP.  The information is correct.<BR>

I do not KNOW that the Virginia Snodgrasses ARE my people.  But since I do not know, I can and should suspect them of being [my ancestors], since I believe my people did come from that general area.  I have kept such information as I found about Snodgrasses in different areas since I might be able at some future date to connect them to mine.  There are microfilm copies of marriages in Virginia in the Denver Public Library.  Plus microfilm 1850 U.S. census records.  The 1790 (book form) census is here also.  I have been slowly working my way through the maze of information I find there.  They have a number of excellent works on Virginia.  The Tennessee information is totally lacking.  There is pitifully little about Tennessee.  The Kentucky records are somewhat better than TN, but not equal to VA. <BR>

I took up research of the various branches of my family history back in 1947 and have working as time allows until the present.  About my family history work--<BR>

My mother, Anna May (Allgood) McCurry, d/o of Francis Margaret

(Snodgrass) Allgood, has been working with me.  She accumulated information from the family and also from cemeteries and newspapers in that area of Missouri in which our people lived.  I do the other part, such as writing you,  searching the library, and writing various historical libraries for information I cannot find here.  We both get a great deal of satisfaction out of our work and have collected an amazing amount.  There is still much more we hope to get from the family.  Then I hope I can connect our family information to the early records and perhaps trace my family to the time they arrived in America. I see they are all from the general area of the first Virginia settlement, by that I mean as I learn more about them, they work back in that direction. Many came through TN, NC, & KY.  Only one, a Mr. Samuel Clark (mentioned in the Snodgrass record) is from the north.  I have thus far not been able to do much with the North Carolina records, as there isn't too much organized material here, and NC will not give any assistance at all.<BR>

I have compiled and written my husband's family history already.  His people came to America more recently.  Except the well-known Clinton family. I have had trouble with that line of his and hope to write an additional section some day if the information becomes available.  I did not publish his work, just had good typed copies made up and allow them to circulate.<BR>

As you see, the family history work with me is truly a great job.  I

thoroughly enjoy it, and as time allows, I work on it.  I hope you will be able to help me some with the Snodgrasses.  I will try to check more Virginia records soon and will pass along any information I can find that I think might help you.  You may have far more than I will.  I have gotten stuck, so to speak, with the Snodgrasses in Arkansas, and I simply cannot find more.  Mr. Dallas Herndon, Arkansas State Library, has had different things searched for me to no avail.  Franklin Co. knows nothing of my people.  Herndon did find James Wilson Snodgrass's service record, which my dau. seems to have removed from it's appointed place.  I was fortunate enough to find my Snodgrasses in the census, but there my luck stops.  I decided to turn my research to the older people in the hope that I will one day stumble upon the right track and bring them down to my people.  This makes the work so much more complicated.  I have a feeling my line will connect to the ones I have found.  There is a repetition of names, for one thing, to indicate there might be a connection.  But I have no actual proof.<BR>

You did not say what your fee is.  I see you say you are not a

professional genealogist, but I still wonder if you have a fee.  I can pay some for the information, but we are what you might call average people, and I can't actually hire an entire tree made up for me, much as I would like to do so.  I have names of 43 of my ancestors.  I am working on the entire family tree, you see, not just one name or line.  Therefore it is a really big undertaking.  I have some success at times and other times nothing seems to work out.  The Denver Public Library is supposed to have a very good collection of material, and they are very helpful and the information is readily available.  I want to work more in the Snodgrass records there, as there are a number of things I have not looked into as yet.<BR>

I see too that you are the Historian General for the National Society of the Sons of the American Revolution.  Does your organization have a central library and reference department?  Does it have research workers available to the public?<BR>

I will be looking forward to hearing from you again.  Please ask any

I received your letter and regret that I have not had an opportunity to answer it before.  Since you last heard from me, I have had a dau. who is now eight months old.  She has added much to my work as was as to my joy, and I have therefore set my work on the family history aside temporarily.  I am still very much interested in it, however, and am very hopeful I will one day be able to find the connecting link that will prove who my oldest known Wm. W. Snodgrass really was and where he was born.  <BR>

     I have given up tracing my line back step by step.  I think if I am ever to find it, I will simply have to search state by state until I find this William W. Snodgrass, and hope that when I do finally find him there will be reference to his son, W. L. Snodgrass, so that I will know him when I do succeed in finding him.  It is a wild shot into the dark, but that is all I have left to do.<BR>