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Archiver > ABERNATHY > 2001-07 > 0995486480


From: "Richard Evans" <>
Subject: RE: [ABERNATHY-L] John Frank and Joycy Abernathy
Date: Wed, 18 Jul 2001 16:01:20 -0400
In-Reply-To: <F17ifWoqFXfyY0QUUBP00000145@hotmail.com>


Dear Melanie:

I have done some research on your father's grandfather, John Franklin
Abernathy. Here is some of the detail that I have collected from public
documents:" John Frank" ABERNATHY was born 30 August 1843 (probably) in
North Carolina, and died 5 October 1930 in Bartow County. He married JOICY
EVELINE MCGEE 7 January 1875 in Casa, Perry County, Arkansas, the daughter
of NICHOLAS MCGEE . She was born 4 July 1856 in Arkansas and died 25 Jul
1938 in Cartersville. Both are buried in old Macedonia Cemetery near Lake
Allatoona.
During the Civil War, John enlisted in the Georgia Volunteer Infantry. He
was mustered into service on March 10, 1862, a private in Company B, 43rd
Regiment, Army of Tennessee, CSA. He was one of 143 men of the 43rd Regiment
taken prisoner at Baker's Creek (Battle of Champion's Hill), Mississippi on
May 16, 1863. According to John Frank's account of this event, he was
unarmed when he was captured and the soldier who caught him was about to
shoot John Frank, when fortunately a Union officer shot the overzealous
captor. Abernathy was sent to Fort Delaware where he was paroled in a
prisoner exchange in July 1863. Towards the end of the conflict, he returned
to Cherokee County where he pursued farming.
John Frank made his oath in the Return of Qualified Georgia Voters on August
5, 1867, when he was twenty-three years old. He stated that he was a Georgia
resident for twenty-three years (since birth) and that he had resided in the
Fairplay District of Cherokee County for the last fifteen years. However,
the first part of his statement is at odds with the 1850 Cass County census,
which states his birthplace was North Carolina.
John Frank Abernathy moved to Arkansas with his parents and siblings, where
they are recorded in the 1870 Census in Yell County. Shortly after he and
Joicy McGee were married in 1875, he came back to Georgia with his bride.
The obituary of their first child indicates that she was born in Bartow
County, which suggests that the family lived briefly in that area. However,
in 1878, John Frank appears in the Cherokee County tax digest where he was
listed as a non-resident owner of 164 acres of land in the Fair Play
District. Cherokee County deed records indicate that J. F. Abernathy
purchased 90 acres of this land on January 28, 1878 from R. T. Reeves, for
$150. The land lots that he purchased were 380, 413 and a fraction of 341,
all in the 21st district, 2nd section, in the Fair Play Militia District.
The 1880 Census tells us that John Frank and Joicy Abernathy were supporting
their family by working a farm in Cherokee County. The 1880 Cherokee County
tax digest calls John Frank a resident of Fair Play District. He purchased
from Augustus Franklin one-eighth interest of lot 341 in Cherokee County on
February 1, 1881, which increased his taxable land to 200 acres. In 1881,
the Cherokee County tax digest indicated that his acreage was valued at $400
and he had personal property valued at $141. In 1882, his land increased by
another forty acres to 240 acres, according to the tax digest for that year.
The 1888 Cherokee County tax digest for the Fair Play District lists John
Frank's lots as 341, 342, 379, 380, 381 and 413, which amounted to 240 acres
of land valued at $350. Personal property added $126 to John Frank's total
property value. In the subsequent tax digests, John Frank continued to be
assessed for the same lots. Then on December 10, 1896, John Frank sold
acreage in his land lots 341, 380 and 413 to W. O. Roberts.
On June 25, 1900, the census taker recorded John F. and Joicy E. Abernathy
in the Fair Play District of Cherokee County. Joicy had 11 of her 13
children living at the time of this census. John owned and operated a farm,
and his son Augustus Smith Abernathy, worked on the farm. Their other
younger children all were living with them at the time of the census. An
indenture was made on the 9th of September 1910 between John Frank, his sons
Wesley and Augustus Smith Abernathy, and the Etowah Development Company.
This indenture permitted the Etowah Development Company a right to build and
operate a railroad through lot numbers 379, 380 and 381 for the purposes of
cutting and hauling timber from lot 379. After the timber was removed, the
rights to these three lots were to revert to John Frank and his sons. By
1915, the Cherokee County tax digest listed John F. Abernathy with 100 acres
of land valued at $300. His remaining lots were 341, 380 and 413. He had
sold the other lots to his sons Wesley, Augustus Smith, John Willie and
Elihu Abernathy.
Joicy came to Georgia from Arkansas, shortly after her marriage to John.
From then on, she lived in the Bartow and Cherokee County area, developing a
wide scope of friends through personal contacts that endeared her to
everyone who knew her. She obtained a widows pension after her husband died.

The Old Macedonia Cemetery has been the site of a family reunion that has
been organized by the Reverend Nat Abernathy [and before him, others of the
family] for seventy years. It usually occurs in August, but I don't know if
Nat is still doing this since he is close to 88 years old now. The cemetery
if on an unpaved road that cuts off of highway 20 between Canton and
Cartersville, several miles past the Bartow County line and to the left if
you are traveling towards Cartersville.

Richard Evans


-----Original Message-----
From: Melanie Rollor [mailto:]
Sent: Tuesday, July 17, 2001 11:55 PM
To:
Subject: [ABERNATHY-L] John Frank and Joycy Abernathy

I am new at this and, so far, have only gotten all the information off the
web that I think I'm likely to get. Here is the line I've found that leads
to me.

George Abernathy de Barrie - father to
Robert A. Abernathy - married to Sarah Cubisha -
father to
Robert Abernathy II - married to Christine Tilghman -
father to
Robert Abernathy III - married Mary Harwell -
father to
Robert Abernathy IV - married to Sarah Ann Nichols -
father to
Nathan Abernathy - married to Eve Cline -
father to
Seth Abernathy - married to Elizabeth Bradshaw -
father to
John Frank Abernathy - married to Joycy McGhee -
father to
Sarah Jane Abernathy - married to Oscar Dillard McCurley - mother to
my father.

I'm looking for information on John Frank and Joycy McGhee. John was born
in 1843 in Lincoln County, NC. But by the time the Civil War began, his
family was living in Cherokee County, Georgia. After the Civil War, he went
to Arkansas for awhile. He met Joycy there and married her in 1875 in
Perry County, Arkansas. I don't know how long they lived there. They came
back to Cherokee, or possibly to Bartow, County, Georgia, and settled there.

Has anyone come across John Frank Abernathy or Joycy McGhee?

And if anyone is connected to the Abernathys in Bartow County, Georgia, do
you know where the old Macedonia Baptist Church cemetery is? It used to be
near Lake Altoona, but when they filled the lake up, they moved it and the
church...but to separate places. There were a lot of Abernathys buried
here.
I'd like to find it.

Melanie


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