Separating Genealogical Fact from Fiction



For instance, my father told me that my great grandmother’s brother, John, fought for the Confederacy, was court martialed, and sentenced to be shot. At the last minute, he inadvertently gave a secret Masonic sign, and it saved him. After the war, John became a 32nd degree Mason. Here is the true story in my own words as presented by researcher Dara Sorenson based upon James Nisbet’s book Four Years on the Firing Line:

John Countiss was raised on Sand Mountain, Alabama, and enlisted as a private in the 21st Georgia Infantry during the Civil War. He attained the rank of captain, but in 1863, just before the Battle of Gettysburg, he was court martialed for disobedience, lost his commission, and was expelled from the military. Instead of going home, John fought so bravely at Gettysburg that he regained his commission on the recommendation of every officer present. A year later, he was wounded in the second battle of Winchester when a bullet lodged beneath the skin of his forehead. After being treated, he went back into battle. As I discovered through additional research, Uncle John received a Confederate pension from the state of Alabama.


Great Grandma Lizzie 
Another interesting story that I uncovered concerns my maternal great grandmother, Lizzie, who died three weeks after her son, Russell. Most of the following account was written by a daughter-in-law, but I’ll put it in my own words and add information from other sources: 

On June 21, 1911, Lizzie looked from her sickroom window to see her thirteen-year-old son become enveloped in flames while cleaning clothes with gasoline. She rolled him on the ground, but he died on the scene, and she died thirty-two days later in the Mississippi state mental hospital. The Kosciusko, Mississippi, newspaper reported her demise as follows:

“The death of this estimable lady is painfully sad. It will be remembered that only a few weeks ago, while on the bed of affliction, she lost her youngest son in a most tragic manner and never recovered from the blow. She was taken to the Sanitarium at Jackson and placed under eminent specialists by her husband, but got no relief, and death claimed her Sunday morning."


Grandpa Jason
Eight years later, her son, my grandfather, Jason Black, shipped out from Mobile Bay on the merchant ship, Pascagoula. Researcher after researcher reports that he died at sea the same year, but I can find no evidence for the claim (amateur genealogists are notorious for their non-critical acceptance of information obtained from other genealogists). The nearest I’ve come to proof is Jason’s seaman’s certificate from August 19, 1919, and the fact that seven U.S. Navy ships went down three weeks later in a hurricane off the Florida Keys. 

Much to my surprise, Jason’s grandfather—my maternal great grandfather—owned slaves. I say “much to my surprise” not because I thought my family was better than that, but because I didn’t know they had the money. However, given that both sides of my family lived in the South for generations, I suppose I should have been more surprised if they hadn’t owned slaves. In fact, one of John Brown’s men at Harper’s Ferry was an escaped slave with my surname, although I haven’t gotten far enough in my research to know if a relative owned him.

A Respite from Outrage




I find that I can’t write about Trump without giving up writing, a state that I have never experienced and never expected to experience.

I, who used to cry so easily, cry less and less as I grow old, and when I do, it’s nearly always because I, who have no ear for music, have been touched by one of two instruments—the bagpipe or the electric guitar.

 
I sobbed today as I lay in bed with Peggy listening to Steve McDonald’s version of Loch Lomond. So much sweat poured from me that I had to change the cover. I
’ve been crying for more than an hour and see no end in sight, but even this is better than three months of powerless outrage.

Debility; A Tragic Scene at the Pharmacy; Demonstrations


I went to my internist, Kirk, yesterday with the following short-list of symptoms that have gotten so bad that it’s hard for me to stay out of bed: general unwellness, headaches, nausea, worry, anxiety, trembling, depression, fatigue, increased pain, and severe insomnia. Such symptoms could point to numerous diseases, so he ordered blood tests.

Since I was there anyway, he gave me my monthly narcotic prescription early and said that he’s going to start filling it for 90 days, which will save me going both to him and to the pharmacy every month. I already have to go to his office four times a year for a narcotic evaluation plus I have to be available on 24-hour notice for urine screens. It really pisses me off (ha) that, after eight years on narcotics, the hoops that I have to jump through just keep getting higher thanks to America’s drug cops.

As usual, I had to wait a half hour at the pharmacy during which a skinny and jittery woman name Karen came in to pick up a prescription for tranquilizers. When the pharmacy tech said insurance wouldn’t pay for it, Karen started yelling, jerking her body, and slapping the counter. She said she was desperate, that insurance fouls her up every time she tries to fill a prescription, and that, “I know I’m psychotic, but I’m all alone, and no one knows how hard it is to be me.” She said a lot more, but because she had a speech impediment I couldn’t understand it. I wanted to help, but I didn’t know what to do, and when the right words don’t come unbidden, I remain silent for fear of making the situation worse. A pharmacist told Karen that she was scaring people and needed to calm down, yet I considered it obvious that the only person anyone had cause to fear for was Karen herself. When she finally left, she seemed near collapse and kept saying, “I’m so sorry; I’m so sorry; “I’m so sorry,” but no one responded.

I looked for her when I left the store, but she was gone. I wish I had asked her on the spot how much the goddamn drug would cost and maybe paid for it. Anyone can be broken, but if you’re broken in America, you better have money.

So what’s Trump solution? As is his custom, he contradicts himself regularly, but his longest running solution is to give everyone a woefully inadequate income tax credit that they could use to buy insurance. But what if a person has no income or only makes minimum wage (and, alas, receives no benefits) at McDonalds and therefore doesn’t owe taxes? Or what if a person can
t afford to wait until the end of the year to be reimbursed and is obliged to choose between food and insurance?

Actress and activist America Ferrera told the crowd at the D.C. Women’s March this morning, “A platform of hate and division assumed power yesterday,” and I thought she was spot on. Yesterday, another demonstrator said of Trump, “I don’t care what things he was going to offer me. He was such a soulless piece of shit that I wouldn’t have voted for him anyway.”

Exactly. Even if Trump had outlined specific solutions to specific problems (something beyond, “Believe me. I’m going to fix it. Everything is going to be great”), how can his supporters deny or minimize the significance of his pettiness, immorality, vindictiveness, megalomania, and predatory dealings with anyone from whom he wants something? 


Do all of those millions of Christians who voted for Trump really believe that Jesus would have done the same? I would like to think well of Christians, yet to know that millions and millions of them claim, on the one hand, to hold love for their fellow humans beings as their chief value after love for their deity, and then, on the other, to see them turn around and vote for a man like Trump, strikes me as a case of such rank hypocrisy that I can scarcely believe what I’m seeing. Supporting Trump isn’t a choice; it’s a sickness, a depravity. It irreconcilably pits Christians against the values expressed in the Sermon on the Mount by the very man whom they claim to worship as their Savior. This election has caused me to despise with my entire being the dominant face of religion in America. All of my prior criticisms of the church are as nothing compared to the contempt I feel now.