The Long Lost Trunk |
Winnie Johns in front of the
Johns-DeRossett House, 1950.
|
Of Winnie Fitzpatrick Johns |
This is the
story of a cheerful little lady who lived in Prestonsburg's oldest house
and kept in her attic an old trunk containing some of Floyd County's
oldest documents. It is also the story of two of the town's oldest
families. Twenty-one years ago, the lady went to her reward, and six years
later, her house was damaged by fire and subsequently torn down. Until
recently, everyone assumed that the fire had destroyed the trunk. |
The lady in
question was Winnie Fitzpatrick Johns (1882-1979), known all over Eastern
Kentucky as "Prestonsburg's Happy Weaver." The house in question was the
historic Johns-DeRossett House on Front Street, which was Winnie's
residence for more than sixty years. The trunk in question is an old
wooden trunk with metal reinforcements now sitting on the front porch of
Jim Daniels's camp house in Auxier. Until recently, it was filled to the
brim with old books, letters, photographs, and rare old court documents. |
For most of her
long and productive life, Winnie Johns lived in the house which she had
inherited from her husband, the Johns-DeRossett House on Front Street. In
1985, six years after her death, the old structure was badly damaged by
fire. Afterwards, Winnie's Salisbury relatives (her daughter Evelyn had
married Herbert Salisbury, Sr.) came to town and began sorting through
what was left of her belongings. When her famous trunk turned up missing,
they decided that it had been consumed by the flames. |
Today I am happy
to report that they were wrong and that the trunk was not destroyed.
Several months ago, Jim Daniels, President of the Floyd County Historical
and Genealogical Society, was contacted by Mrs. Betty Ratliff Stallard of
Coeburn, Virginia. She reported that the trunk was in her possession and
that she wished to donate it to the society. At that point, of course, she
had no idea how important the trunk really was. |
Today the trunk
is resting safely on Jim's porch at Auxier, and its precious documents
have been sorted and placed in protective envelopes. Their survival is
entirely due to the efforts of Mrs. Stallard, who deserves our heartfelt
thanks for preserving them all these years and for having the persistence
to see that they were finally returned to us. |
By the way, I
also want to thank Jim Spencer of Martin, Kentucky for helping me sort
through the documents and place them in protective envelopes. |
The story of how
the Floyd County Historical Society acquired the trunk is an interesting
one. In 1985, Betty, a native of Johnson County, was building a house on
U. S. Route 460 near Paintsville. Arvel Nelson, the contractor hired to
do the job, was during that period tearing down the previously-mentioned
Johns House. One day Nelson mentioned to her that his men had found an old
trunk in the attic of a house he was tearing down and asked her if she
would like to have it."What about the people who own the house?," she
asked him. "Don't they want the trunk?" Nelson assured her that they had
taken everything out of the house that they wanted. |
After she agreed
to take the trunk, Nelson delivered it to her and placed it in a metal
outbuilding she had erected on her property. At one point, she opened the
trunk and looked briefly at the papers stored in it. She was saddened by
the sight, because she realized that she was looking at the history of
someone's family. |
Several years
after she acquired the trunk, Betty vacated her Johnson County home and
moved to Coeburn, Virginia, leaving the trunk in the metal outbuilding.
Before she left, she made several unsuccessful attempts to contact the
trunk's previous owners. |
In 1999, Betty
asked her brother Ray Ratliff to remove the trunk from her metal
outbuilding and move it to his garage. There it stayed until January of
this year, when she paid Ray a visit and noticed the trunk sitting in his
garage. Once again, they opened it and looked at its contents. |
"Somebody
needs this stuff," she said, and once again she began calling people who
might conceivably be able to help her track down its owner. Then someone
told her about Jim Daniels, the President of the Floyd County Historical
Society. She placed a call to Jim, and the rest is history. |
Winnie
Fitzpatrick Johns was the daughter of Jasper and Rosamund Parsons
Fitzpatrick of Prestonsburg. On April 10th, 1884, the
Ashland Independent ran this
item in its "News From Prestonsburg" column: |
|
Jasper Fitzpatrick & Co. have erected a grist
mill just opposite Prestonsburg. Good for Hopper; hope they may do well.
It was a thing much needed. |
|
We know little
about Jasper Fitzpatrick, but it is probable that he was fairly
well-to-do, because the 1900 U. S. Census shows Winnie, age 16, and her
sister Edith, age 6, living with their parents in a house on today's
Arnold Avenue. Jasper's and Rosamund's neighbors were Michael and Belle
Richmond, Greenville and Laura Davidson, and Andrew and Josie Davidson.
Josie, you may recall, was the author of Josie
M.Davidson, Her Life and Works (Prestonsburg,
1922), a charming look at life in Prestonsburg during the latter half of
the 19th Century. |
Winnie's sister
Edith grew up to become Edith Fitzpatrick James, Prestonsburg piano
teacher, director of the Jenny Wiley Chanters, founder of the Kentucky
Highlands Folk Festival, and nationally-known collector and preserver of
Appalachian folk songs. |
In 1901 Winnie
married Thomas P. Johns, son of John Graham Johns, a well-to-do
Prestonsburg merchant during the 1880s and a descendant of Judge John
Graham, land agent for Colonel John Preston and first surveyor of Floyd
County. The Johns family was one of the county's oldest, and Thomas and
his bride took up residence in the Johns-DeRossett House on Front Street,
the oldest house in Prestonsburg. |
Front View of the Johns-DeRossett House in
Prestonsburg, 1910. |
The Johns-DeRossett
House was an historic house for several reasons. For one thing, its
weatherboards enclosed the log cabin that had been erected by Prestonsburg
fur trader Solomon DeRossett in 1823. But DeRossett wasn't the only famous
person associated with the house. During their retreat from Cynthiana on
June 12th, 1864, General John Hunt Morgan and his men stopped in
Prestonsburg to rest their mounts. While they were doing so, according to
Henry Scalf, Morgan stopped at the Johns-DeRossett House to visit the
Johns family and spent half an hour resting, drinking a glass of water,
and chatting with his lady admirers. |
One of the
letters found in Winnie's trunk confirms this story. Writing to Kentucky
historian Willard Rouse Jillson on November 9th, 1963, Winnie disclosed
that her mother-in-law, Elizabeth Harkins Johns, an eyewitness of the
event, later told her mother that "John Hunt Morgan stayed in my house
during his stay in Prestonsburg. I was about 23 years old at that time."
Winnie's motive in writing the letter was to persuade Jillson to place the
John Hunt Morgan Highway Marker in front of the Johns-DeRossett House. The
marker was dedicated on May 9th, 1964, and despite Winnie's suggestion, it
was placed in West Prestonsburg along U. S. Route 23. |
|
The Thomas
Johns that Winnie married was known as Thomas P. Johns III.
The original Thomas P. Johns (b.1742) was a
native of Amherst County, Virginia and migrated to Floyd County around
1812 with his son, Thomas P. Johns, Jr. (b.1786). Thomas P. Johns, Jr.
married Nancy Layne, sister of James Shannon Layne, and farmed near
present-day Harold before moving to Lawrence County. Thomas's and Nancy's
son Thomas P. Johns (1816-1865) married Elizabeth Graham, youngest child
of Judge John Graham and Rebecca Witten Graham. This third Thomas P. Johns
was the father of John Graham Johns (1839-1921), the Prestonsburg merchant
who was the father of Winnie's husband. By the way, John Graham Johns is
buried along with his son and daughter-in-law in the Weddington Cemetery
above Trimble Branch. |
Johns family
genealogist Karen Salisbury points out that the known facts regarding
Thomas Johns, Sr. are somewhat puzzling. During the 1818-1820 period,
while he was living in Harrison County, Kentucky, he applied for a
Revolutionary War pension, stating that he was a destitute farmer whose
only property was a saddle worth 40 dollars. He also stated that he had no
children, despite the fact that his son Thomas was living in Floyd County
and his son Anderson was living in Montgomery County. By that time, both
sons were doing well. In 1820 Thomas, Sr.'s application was forwarded to
Ohio, but the record doesn't list the name of the county. |
What Karen and I
both find to be interesting about Thomas Johns, Sr. is his vitality and
his pioneer spirit. In 1820, at the age of 78, despite his physical
infirmities, he nevertheless decided to pull up stakes, move to Ohio, and
start a new life for himself. And like other men of his type, he had a bit
of the rogue in him and wasn't above falsifying an application in order to
obtain some badly-needed cash. |
When we contrast
Thomas Johns, Sr. with his descendant, Thomas Johns III, we find many
differences. Thomas, Sr. was driven by the same land-hunger and relish for
adventure that drove Daniel Boone and other early pioneers. Thomas Johns
III, son of a well-respected local merchant, was a much more rooted kind
of man. We don't know very much about the early years of Tom's and
Winnie's marriage, but we do know that on March 3rd, 1904, she gave birth
to a baby girl. The young couple decided to name their daughter Evelyn. |
John Graham Johns
(1839-1921) |
E
Herbert G. Salisbury, Sr.
(1899-1966) |
Thomas P. Johns III (1878-1922 |
Evelyn Johns Salisbury
(1904-1976) |
Evelyn grew up to
become a handsome and intelligent young woman, and on January 3rd, 1922,
she married Herbert G. Salisbury,
son of James P. and Chaddie Halbert Salisbury of Prestonsburg. One of the
county's most successful men, James Pendleton Salisbury had begun his
career as manager of the Beaver Creek Coal Company at Ligon. By the 1920s
he was one of the county's most successful coal and gas developers and
owned his own private railroad car. |
When Evelyn
married Herbert, she married "the boy next door." When she was growing up,
the Salisbury clan (there were eleven children in all) lived in the old
Ralph Booten House at the south end of Front Street, only a block away
from the Johns-DeRossett House. |
Unfortunately,
Tom's and Winnie's marriage ended in tragedy. While he was still in his
thirties, Tom developed a severe case of arthritis and lost the use of his
limbs. |
Forced to live
the life of a shut-in, he retreated to their upstairs bedroom and its old
fourposter bed, where Winnie fed him his meals and ministered to his daily
needs. One fine morning in 1922, while Winnie was downstairs rolling
biscuits, Tom got out of bed, pushed a stool over to the highboy, took a
pistol from the top drawer, got back into bed, and shot himself in the
head. |
The tragedy would
have overwhelmed a weaker person, but Winnie was endowed with a strong
mind and a strong heart. She also had many loyal friends, and with their
help she was able to triumph over her grief and overcome the consequences
of her husband's deed. |
Thirteen years
later, Winnie was tested by another ordeal. In 1935 her son-in-law,
Herbert Salisbury, Sr., an employee of the Prestonsburg branch of the
Kentucky Emergency Relief Administration, was summoned before a Federal
Grand Jury and indicted for using the U. S. mails to defraud welfare
recipients. He was subsequently convicted and sent to the Federal
Penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia. Dozens of other Floyd County men were
also convicted, including the county judge, the members of the fiscal
court, and the mayor of Prestonsburg. |
When Herbert went
to prison, he left behind his wife Evelyn and their two sons, Robert and
Herbert, Jr. His income had been their chief means of support, and now it
was gone. |
What was to be
done? Fortunately, Winnie was equal to the challenge. With Evelyn's help,
she set up shop as a seamstress and began taking in sewing. By the way, in
her trunk we found a full set of needles, dozens of spools of thread, and
other tools of the seamstress trade. |
In addition
to her sewing, Winnie also earned money in other ways. Delmas Saunders
recalls that during the late 1920s and early 1930s she was the owner and
manager of the Hotel Elizabeth, at that time the largest hotel on the Big
Sandy River. |
Winnie was forty
years old when her husband passed away. In the years that followed the
tragedy, she discovered that she had a talent for leadership and decided
to devote the rest of her life to community service. She was a charter
member of the John Graham Chapter of the DAR, joining the organization in
1925. On June 14th, 1928, with Winnie presiding as chairman, the
organization assembled in the Prestonsburg High School Auditorium and
celebrated its first flag day. |
One of the
speakers was Prestonsburg attorney A. J. May, who told the crowd about the
part which John Graham had played in the early history of Floyd County.
Later the same day, the John Graham Marker was unveiled and a photograph
was taken commemorating the event. |
|
Crowd at the
Dedication of the
John Graham Monument on First Avenue
in Prestonsburg, June 14th, 1928. |
Six DAR Ladies
in the Garfield House, 1930. Front row, left to right: Claudia Leete,
Evelyn Salisbury, Winnie Johns. Back row, left to right: Myrtie Weddington,
Bess Leete, Maggie Leete. |
|
If there
was ever a person who loved Floyd County and worked tirelessly to promote
it, it was Winnie Johns. In her later years she was active in the Big
Sandy Valley Historical Society, the Floyd County Fair Board, the
Sesquicentennial Board, the Floyd County Hall of Fame, the Kentucky
Colonels, and the Winnie Fitspatrick Johns Dogwood Trail Association. |
Winnie
founded the latter organization in 1964 for the purpose of planting
dogwoods along U. S. Route 23 from East Point to Betsy Layne. She
conceived the project as a memorial to Floyd County's war dead, and in
1965 the county's two American Legion Posts honored her for her work by
giving her a silver goblet. |
Winnie liked to
say that Floyd County was "the best place on earth and getting better
every day. |
During the
1930s, concerned about the disappearance of Appalachian native crafts,
Winnie acquired an old hand-made wooden loom and singlehandedly began
reviving the lost art of weaving. She had learned the craft from "Aunt
Lizzie" Banks of Bull Creek, a woman she had often visited during her
childhood. By the way, Winnie's loom still exists and is now owned by
David and Karen Salisbury of Gloucester Point, Virginia. David is Winnie's
great grandson. |
On February
16th, 1939, the Floyd County Times
ran an article about Prestonsburg's WPA Sewing Center and its supervisor,
Winnie Johns. Winnie told the reporter that during the center's open house
on February 24th, an old-fashioned loom, flax wheel and spinning wheel
would be on display. Fashioned by Abbott Creek pioneer settler Bill Adams,
the loom was made of yellow poplar and was estimated to be 116 years old.
Here is a picture of Winnie's WPA Sewing Class. |
|
Winnie and Tom in their rocking chairs on the
back porch of the Johns-DeRossett House, 1910. |
In 1979, the
Floyd County Times
ran an article about Winnie containing this passage: |
|
In the 1930s, when the WPA was hiring people for
what were often lampooned as "make-work" projects, Winnie Johns set
about organizing local craftswomen into a marketing cooperative, both to
foster Eastern Kentucky's native crafts and, hopefully, to turn a profit
on them. She formed another group, Mountain Crafts of the Chanters,
shortly before World War II. And she was still at it in the Sixties,
when the Kentucky Mountain Crafts and Folksong Center was established,
with Mrs. Johns heading the crafts division and her sister, Edith James,
directing the collection of folk music. |
|
Though the
marketing projects did not thrive, Winnie Johns's own handiwork did. The
weaving that she had learned from "Aunt Lizzie" Banks, on Mutton Fork of
Bull Creek, and taught to countless other women, came to win wide
recognition. Rugs, tapestries, and needle-work of hers have been exhibited
at the Metropolitan Museum and Macy's in New York City, at Gimble's in
Philadelphia, and at the Smithsonian and the National Folk Festival in
Washington, D. C. |
Whatever
happened to Winnie's rugs and tapestries? Perhaps someone reading this
article knows the answer to this question. |
It is time now
to give my readers a glimpse of the documents that Winnie kept in her
famous trunk. The most important of these are some circuit court records
dating from Floyd County's first two decades. There are, for example,
twenty-two bills and depositions relating to a lawsuit which Samuel May
filed in 1816 against John Graham, John Spurlock, and Spurlock's heirs. In
his suit Samuel claimed that Graham and Spurlock had deliberately cheated
him out of a piece of property, and that he was the rightful owner of Lot
No. 10, Long Range, in the Town of Prestonsburg. |
Here is a list
of the principal documents associated with Samuel May's "Suit in Chancery": |
-
1. Bill of Complaint filed April 10th, 1816 by
Samuel May against John Spurlock and John Graham.
-
2. Deposition of William James Mayo, Floyd County
Clerk, taken by Justice of the Peace James H. Wallace on October 5th,
1818. Samuel May and Fanny Spurlock were present when the deposition was
taken.
-
3. Deposition of William Keeton, taken by Justice
of the Peace Henry B. Mayo at the house of David P. Harris on May 18th,
1817.
-
4. Bill of Revision filed by Samuel May on April
16th, 1817 and attested by William James Mayo, Floyd County Clerk.
-
5. Amendment to the Amended Bill, filed by Samuel
May on October 20th, 1818 and attested by William James Mayo, Floyd
County Clerk.
-
6. Deposition of John Turman, taken by Justice of
the Peace J. Edward Burgess at the house of Micaja Frashier on March
19th, 1819.
-
7. Answer of Fanny Spurlock and Hiram Spurlock to
a Bill and Amended Bill in Chancery filed by Samuel May, filed October
17th, 1817 and attested by Jonathan Mayo.
-
8. Supplemental Answer of John Graham to a Bill
in Chancery exhibited against him by Samuel May, filed April 20th, 1820
and attested by William James Mayo, Clerk of Floyd County.
-
9. Deposition of William Herrell, taken by
Justice of the Peace Peter Amyx at "the House of Spurlocks in
Prestonsburg," filed October 20th, 1819.
-
10. Deposition of George Martin, taken by Justice
of the Peace Peter Amyx at the house of David P. Harris on May 18th,
1819.
-
11. Separate Answer of John Graham to a Bill in
Chancery exhibited against him and others by Samuel May, filed April
24th, 1818 and attested by William James Mayo, Clerk of Floyd County.
-
12. Deposition of Elizabeth Young, taken by
Justice of the Peace Henry B. Mayo at the house of John Havens in
Prestonsburg, filed October 26th, 1816.
|
The first
paragraph of Samuel's complaint contains some key facts about the
establishment of the Town of Prestonsburg: |
|
To the Hon. Judge of the Floyd Circuit Court in
Chancery sitting-your Orator Samuel May, humbly complaining, sheweth
unto Your Honor that in the year [?] a town was legally established upon
the lands of John Graham in the Circuit aforesaid, known by the name of
Prestonsburg. That John Graham was privy to and approbated the
establishment of said town. That Trustees were legally appointed to
superintend the sale of lots in said town and execute deeds of
conveyance to the purchasers of lots in the same. |
|
Samuel
begins his complaint by saying that sometime in the 1805-1808 period, he
purchased a half-acre lot from James Young "to wit Lot No. 10 in long
range," for which he paid thirty dollars. In return he received from Young
an order signed by Graham requesting that the town's trustees give Young a
deed for the property. With this order in hand, he says, he went to the
trustees and requested that they draw up a deed for the property. When
this was accomplished, he took the deed to the Clerk's Office so that it
could be recorded. "Afterwards, and as your Orator believes, sometime in
the year 1808, the Clerk's Office was unfortunately consumed by fire, by
which conflagration your Orator's deed and the record thereof, if any such
had been made, were entirely destroyed." |
Here is the original 1797 Survey of the Town of
Prestonsburg, showing Lot No. 10, long range. The half-acre lots are the
smallest ones. |
In his next
paragraph, Samuel points out that in the years following the fire
(1809-1816), some of the Trustees died and others moved from the county,
"so that the corporation became dissolved." Then he says that in 1811 or
1812, John Spurlock "enclosed by fencing" Lot No. 10, and "thereby
unjustly took possession of the same" without his consent. Samuel also
says that sometime in 1815, Graham gave Spurlock a deed for the lot. And
although Samuel had often asked Spurlock "in a friendly manner" to give up
possession of the lot, "yet he hath wholly refused and still doth refuse
in any manner to redress you Orator in this his enormous grievance." |
How was
Samuel's suit settled? Unfortunately, we don't know. The weight of the
evidence was in Samuel's favor, so it may have been settled out of court.
Whatever the case may be, we can be sure that it established his
reputation as a fighter, as a man who was willing to "take on the
establishment." |
The case is
an interesting one, not only because it opens a window on the land
disputes that followed the Floyd County Courthouse Fire of 1808, but
because it presents evidence that John Graham was not as honest as we have
hitherto assumed him to be. |
John Spurlock
enjoyed the distinction of being the town's original settler, having come
to the Big Sandy in 1791 with his wife Fanny and several of their
children. Tradition says that he built his cabin on a site directly east
of the recently-vacated Prestonsburg Post Office. Whether Spurlock
originally owned or claimed all of the bottom land where Prestonsburg now
stands, or if he held a deed to it, cannot be determined from the
surviving records. |
During the
early period, John Spurlock may have been an agent for Colonel John
Preston or a partner of John Graham, the surveyor and original proprietor
of the town. Records kept in Frankfort show that on May 3rd, 1797, Graham
surveyed the site on which the Town of Prestonsburg now stands. As we all
know, the town was part of Colonel John Preston's 100,000-acre land grant,
entered at the Land Office in Richmond, Virginia on March 9th, 1787. |
Was Spurlock
Graham's partner? There is some evidence that he was. Some years ago
Henry Scalf discovered John Graham's Bond to John Spurlock, dated
September 27th, 1814, which shows that on that date Graham sold to
Spurlock "all the lots in the Town of Prestonsburg" for ten thousand
dollars. As we have seen, this transaction is mentioned in Samuel May's
1816 Bill of Complaint. |
Graham's
1814 Bond is a strange document, in view of the fact that Samuel's
Complaint and other documents found in Winnie's trunk show that the
Prestonsburg lots were bought and sold several times by land speculators
during the years prior to 1808. |
One document,
for example, is a twelve-month note from Richard W. Evans to Thomas C.
Brown, Solomon Stratton, Caleb Litton and Thomas Pinson, dated July 21st,
1801, for the amount of Sixty-Eight Pounds and one penny. This was the
price Evans was obligated to pay for Lots No. 6, 8, 10, 13, and 14. By the
way, Solomon Stratton, co-founder of the Stratton Settlement at Mare
Creek, was one of the men who assisted Graham when he surveyed Preston's
Station in 1797. |
How could Graham
have sold town lots to Spurlock in 1814 that he had already sold to others
at an earlier date? Perhaps there is a logical answer to this question.
Whatever it is, the papers in Winnie's trunk show that the 1808 courthouse
fire caused Graham numerous legal difficulties. |
There is no
doubt that Winnie started collecting circuit court documents because of
her interest in Floyd County genealogy. It was evidently her habit, during
the 1930s and 1940s, to go to the Floyd County Courthouse, browse through
the files of the circuit court, and take home records that particularly
interested her. |
That she was able
to do this testifies not only to her eccentric ways but to the leniency of
Ivory Smiley, the Floyd County Clerk during that period. Delmas Saunders
says that Ivory was not an educated man, and that he probably didn't have
the foresight to realize that the documents under his care would someday
be highly valued. Interested in winning Winnie's vote, he may have
encouraged her to keep the documents which she borrowed. |
Whatever the
case may be, the fact remains that Winnie's trunk contained a veritable
treasure-trove of early court documents. Though I don't have room here for
a complete inventory, I will list the most important ones. |
There are four
receipts for the sale of Negro slaves, all of them mentioning Adam
Gearhart, son-in-law of John Spurlock and the county's principal
slave-dealer. The dates on the receipts are 1833, 1845, and 1857,
respectively. |
One receipt,
dated January 29th, 1845, says: "Received of my father Adam Gearhart one
negro man named Dinas and one tract of land on the right hand fork of
beaver creek being a part of my fathers old farm." |
Adam Gearheart Slave Receipt
dated January 29th, 1845. |
First section of Samuel May's Bill of Complaint
against John Graham and John Spurlock, 1816. |
There are also
several other documents relating to the Gearhart family, including a
complaint filed by Hetty Gearhart in 1856 against "the hairs and creditors
of Adam Garehart decest" and an 1830 deed conveyed by Adam and Esther
Gearhart to Prestonsburg attorney John Preston Martin for"the John Harris
Farm" on Bull Creek. The chief value of this document is that it allows us
to fix the precise date when Martin moved his family to Floyd County. As
many of you already know, Martin went on to become one of the town's
leading lawyers and a U. S. Congressman during the 1840s. |
Winnie's trunk
contained two documents relating to the Friend family. One is a rental
agreement dated March 10th, 1831 and signed by Charles W. Friend and
Samuel K. Friend, in which the former agreed to furnish the latter with
"one house and part of a lott in the town of Prestonsburg" for one year
in exchange for twelve dollars. |
The second is a
bond dated September 14th, 1829 and signed by Solomon DeRossett , in
which, for the sum of fifty dollars, he promised to convey to Samuel K.
Friend "a lot in the town of Prestonsburg No. 2 lying on the river side of
main street and above the publick square beginning at the crop fence
thence along said fence to a crop fence between the shop and stable thence
on a strait line to the river." The shop mentioned in this passage was
probably a blacksmith shop, and Solomon was probably the town's
blacksmith. |
In addition to
the documents that I have already mentioned, there is a document
concerning the Samuel James family of Johns Creek, one dealing with the
James P. Harris family of Middle Creek, and several relating to the Job
Martin family, the John B. Turner family, the Greenville Salisbury family,
the Robert Salisbury family, and the Lackey Salisbury family of Left
Beaver Creek. |
Another document
concerns the Johns family of Prestonsburg. Dated June 29th, 1867, it is a
deposition given by David Morgan at the home of Jonathan Mayo in Paris,
Illinois, relative to the case of George R. Burgess versus Thomas P. Johns
and Elizabeth Johns. The document mentions "one half of the Graham farm,"
a large parcel of land that Elizabeth had inherited from her father, Judge
John Graham. |
The question now
arises as to what should be done with these documents. At the present
time, as we all know, Floyd County has no museum or genealogical research
center, and our libraries are not equipped to handle old documents that
are in fragile condition. For that reason, I believe that our wisest
course of action is to donate them to the Kentucky State Archives in
Frankfort, where all the other Floyd County Circuit Court records are
kept. We should also remember that, since Floyd was the Mother County of
Eastern Kentucky, these records belong to the citizens of the entire
region. |
Jim Daniels,
President of the Floyd County Historical Society, has indicated to me that
he believes that the records should be returned to the files of the Floyd
County Circuit Court, from which they were taken some years ago.
Furthermore, he says, the question of the disposition of the records
should be decided by a vote of the society. I agree that the society
should make the final determination, and, because I have no strong
objection to returning the records to Floyd County, I will not oppose the
society if that is what they decide to do. |
Floyd
County badly needs a place to store and exhibit its old records. I am
willing to wager that we are the only county in the Commonwealth that
doesn't have such a place. We also need a place where tourists interested
in genealogy can come to do research on their Floyd County roots. Every
summer increasing numbers of tourists come to my office at PCC asking if I
have any information about their Floyd County ancestors. |
Surely it is
time for the City of Prestonsburg to make good its promise to the members
of the Floyd County Historical Society and allow us to make use of the old
Fire Station on Cemetery Lane. |
Until
another space becomes available, however, there is only one place in
Prestonsburg where Winnie's documents can be displayed, and that is the
Samuel May House. If you are interested in viewing the Winnie Johns
documents and studying them in more detail, please call me at 886-3863x290
and make an appointment. I have plenty of free time this summer, and I
will be glad to meet with you at the May House and give you an opportunity
to study the documents. |
Floyd County Times
8 December 1999
by Pam Shingler
Important documents come back to county
Some of the same
names that are prominent in Floyd County today can be found in records
from the county's early years although perhaps spelled a little
differently - Damron Spurlock, Pattons, Osburn, Stratton, Kindrack,
Thompson, Frazier and many more.
In fact, some prominent names from surrounding counties can be
found in Floyd County's early records - Stambaugh, Justice, Pinson, Ward,
Cockrell, Powell, Brown, Swearingen, Hatfield, for starters.
In 1816 and 1817, Johnson, Pike, Magoffin, Martin, Knott and
counties as far west as Powell were part of Floyd County. Records of
people from those areas were recorded in Prestonsburg at the courthouse,
including deeds, debts and other financial and social transactions.
Floyd County Clerk Chris Waugh estimates three to four people a day
come into his office to "look up stuff" - to find out information about
their families, bits and pieces of data that will answer questions about
the people they are descended from.
In addition, Waugh says he gets letters every day from people who
live far away and are tracing their lineage back to this area.
Often, they want copies of documents.
Some of the documents, which date to the early part of the 1800's,
have disappeared. "Not a lot, but some, have no doubt gotten away of
the years," says Waugh, who became clerk - or keeper of the records - just
last spring.
One such set of documents has found its way back home, thanks to a
Virginia woman who found them among belongings she and her husband
inherited from a relative.
Karen Salisbury of Gloucester, Virginia, has returned a copy of the
Floyd County Clerk's records from 183 years ago. Her husband, David
Salisbury, is the great-grandson of the late Winnie Fitzpatrick Johns, who
apparently took the record books home with her while doing genealogy
research in the late 1920's. |
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Salisbury told in correspondence with local historian and professor Dr.
Robert Perry how she came into possession of the county records. "I
just found them last October in a box in the attic," she wrote.
"When Winnie Johns died, we took home a few boxes of books and never
looked into the boxes until last fall."
It turns out that among the books were four volumes of local
records, dating from 1808 to 1817, including Prestonsburg found father
John Graham's "memorandum book in his handwriting from 1808".
Salisbury, who has worked on genealogies for the Salisburys, Johns,
Wittens and Grahams, is typing the records and expects to return the
originals to their rightful home at the Floyd County courthouse.
She made a copy of William Mayo's 1816-1817 ledgers and sent it to
Waugh at the local clerk's office. Waugh is planning to get it bound
so that it can be used intact.
May, perhaps knowing that interest would remain in his records
generations hence, made and index of the citizens who transacted business
with the county, along with the fee he exacted. Here is a list of
the surnames, as they are readable. |
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Floyd County Times
June 21, 2001
Winnies Trunk returned to her family
by Randell Reno
Descendants of a local
historian and civic leader gathered with the Floyd County Historical Society to
secure what amounts to family heirlooms. Relatives of Winnie Johns
petitioned the Historical Society for the return of a trunk that had been given
to the society for preservation.
The executive board met in a
closed session to "ascertain what is to be done," said society president Jim
Daniels.
Daniels said the board decided
to turn over the trunk to the administrator of the Winnie Johns estate while
asking for a release of any liability to the contents.
Daniels said the documents
that appeared to belong to the circuit clerk's office would be returned to the
office. But that decision was changed tot he complete return of items to
the family.
Johns had apparently named
co-executors to her will, said Daniels, Bobby Johns Salisbury and Herbert G.
Salisbury, Jr.
The family explained to the
society it would take the documents and pictures to the state archives in
Frankfort for preservation without damage being done to the originals.
From Frankfort, the family pledged to have copies made of the photos and
documents for the Historical Society, the circuit clerk's office and the family.
The society will always have
access tot he originals in Frankfort, family members said.
What they want to do is share
it with you, said a spokesman for the family.
"No one is adverse to the
idea," said Daniels of returning the trunk to the family. Daniels asked
that all the living heirs of Johns sign an agreement to release the society of
any liabilities.
We took the trunk to preserve
it," he said. "But we have no place to preserve it. The only place
we have to store the documents is in the May House and it is not set up for
that."
"The circuit clerk's office
would send them to the archives," said Doris Anderson, who has worked for the
circuit clerk's office some 34 years. Anderson said the historical
significance of the articles was important to the local researchers and that
copies should be in the clerk's office.
All parties agreed in the end
that the contents of the trunk were better off in the family's possession.
Jim Pritchard has already
agreed to accept the records, said family members. The meeting ended in a
compromise to everyone's satisfaction.
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