Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1902-01-27
A Family Tree While You Wait.
BY GEORGE c. SMITH, vIneviIIe, Macon, Georgia.

those who came through South Caro-
lima.
8. The North Carolina state papers.
4. The Maryland archives.
s. The list of Georgia head rights as
found in the secretary of states Of
fee and as published in the appendix
to my history.
6. A careful personal examination
of the records in the clerks Offices
z. Family Bibles.
And last, family traditions; but per-
sonal recolleetions are always to be
taken. cautiously. There is a very
honest intent to tell the truth, but
old people are sometimes forgetful, and
sometimes remember too much.
The faithful chronicler.
A conscientious genealogist will
have a hard time, fear, because there
are so many things one wants to find
that he can't find, and so many things
one does not want found that turn
up; so unless he is making genealogy
to order and unless he carefully obeys
instructions he will disappoint his ell
ents.
CONCLUSIONS.
1 find IT to be true almost univer-
sally that in very few families of any
position in Georgia there are not to
be found somewhere representatives
of the best English and Scotch bloods,
and in very few is 1t. what the English
call a pure strain,
The study. of genealogy bring out
some very important moral truths. 1
find descendants of some of the noblest
families on every line in the depths of
poverty and shame. brought there by
vice, and some of the humblest who
have risen from the lowest walk to the
highest place by religion and industry.
But oftentimes one who was born In
a cabin and brought up by a mother
who could barely read, and has made
by force his merit known" has been
found to have descended from one Of
the best of old English families, and
sometimes a poor drunken vagabond
or worthless deadbeat has only one
thing to cheer him in his worthless
ness, and that is that his blood is blue.
SUPPLEMENTAL.
It is at first glance a very unlikely
thing that so many obscure people
could have sprung from the good fam
lilies of great Britain and so many
who are people of prominence can es-
tablish no such claim. Men are dis
posed to look doubtfully upon all
claims to any other than a very hum
BILE origin. When, however, one re-
members how many people of family
were in the old London company who
settled Virginia, and the English cor
porations who settled New England
and remembers how many of these
people made their homes in america
and how they have multiplied he need
not be surprised that in three hundred
years he should find so large a number
of descendants. The fact would be
true as you went north till you reach
ed Pennsylvania, New Jersey and
New York Here Germans, Dutch
men, Frenchmen, and Scotch-Irishmen
were in the majority, and though 1t
is probable there were many people
of good families among them 1t was
not possible to trace them back, as
their records were in an unknown
tongue across the but they could
be easily traced from the early part
of the eighteenth century to the pres
ent time. 1t is very probable that
many French HuguenOts and German
and Dutchmen and Swedes, If we knew
it, represented as good families as any
in England.
1t is simply amusing and trife dis
gushing when one sees such a tuft
hunting spirit as makes all historical
truth subservient to it, and people
have crests on their writing paper and
coats-of-arms on their carriages which
are simply forgeries-but a family
tree ought to be planted In every
household. ft,