Willis Edgar Musgrove: Big Turnip

Waycross Journal-Herald

December 18, 1971

Big Turnip -- Willis Edgar Musgrove grew a seven and half-pound turnip in his backyard at 1817 Lamont Street in Waycross. Musgrove said it is the first turnip of such a size as he has ever grown in his 10-foot square garden. 

Ballad of Little Musgrave: Border Background

Like all the works in Child's 'border ballad' collection, number 81 - The Ballad of Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard - was written about families living in northernmost England and southernmost Scotland (blog post here).

Hadrian's Wall

The line that divided England and Scotland started as a wall.

Hadrian's Wall...was a defensive fortification in the Roman province of Britannia, begun in AD 122 in the reign of the emperor Hadrian. It ran from the banks of the River Tyne near the North Sea to the Solway Firth on the Irish Sea, and was the northern limit of the Roman Empire.-

Read more: Wikipedia

Hadrian's Wall

The Strange Story of Betsy Strange

Our fourth great-grandmother* (see relationship notes below) was Elizabeth (Apston) Edenfield. But her grandson - and our second great (or great grand) uncle - John Henry Williams knew her as Betsy (Strange) Parker (blog post Letter to Cousin).

DAR application

The 'Strange' surname was never ours. Sarah (Edenfield) Parker's niece married into their family (see Daughters of Revolution application above). But her name was, nonetheless, strange.

William Parker: Cousin's Letter

We're kin* (see relationship notes below) to the Parker family through our grandmother, Carrie 'Mae' (Merritt)  Musgrove (blog post here).

Carrie 'Mae' Merritt

We've blogged about our fifth great-grandfather, Henry Parker, the second president of the Georgia colony (blog post here). His son (or grandson) was rumored to be William Parker, Sr., who married the daughter of German immigrant Johann Michael Lastinger (blog post here). Our Parker line is included in Aurora Shaw's book, John Lastinger Family of America, published in 1960 because of this marriage (link here).

Henry Parker: President of Georgia

We last blogged about our fifth great-grandfather* (see relationship notes below), German immigrant Johann Michael Lastinger (blog post here). We used Aurora Shaw's 1960 book, John Lastinger Family of America (link here). She devoted the third section of her book to his daughter, Sarah, who married William Parker.

Aurora Shaw

Johann Michael Lastinger: German Immigrant

Our grandmother* (see relationship notes below), Carrie 'Mae' (Merritt) Musgrove, was a third great grand-daughter of Johann Lastinger, a German immigrant.

Carrie 'Mae' Merritt

The date of the birth of John Lastinger I have not been able to learn definitely, but it was probably about 1740. He was born a native of the German Empire and came to America landing Charleston, S.C, about 1760.  - Lastinger Family by William Lastinger 1909.   

Macy Carol (Williams) Musgrove: DNA Story

In our last post, we presented DNA evidence supporting an earlier post on our second great-grandmother* (see relationship notes below), Lucy Williams (link here).

Macie Carol Williams

John Williams: An Ancestry DNA Story

Waycross Journal-Herald
Dec 4, 1945 page 8

A few months back, we posted research on finding our third great grandmother* (see relationship notes below), Lucy Williams (blog post here).

We used Federal Census records and her obituary.

'Mrs. Lucy William Leverette, 78, died at her residence in Waycross. She is survived by...two brothers, John Williams of Waycross and Bill Williams of Florida....' - Waycross Journal-Herald - Dec 4, 1945 page 8

It turns out her brother, John, has a descendant who tested on Ancestry DNA. And so does Hezekiah, another sibling. My DNA test results suggest a match.

(Note: Mrs. Henry Lairsey is Idell 'Hattie' Leverett. Mrs. E C Musgrove is grandma Macy Carole Williams in the obituary above.)

Gordon Stewart: An Ancestry DNA Story

In two genealogy books -  The John Lastinger Family of America by Aurora Shaw (link here) and Jesse Greene Williams', The Prosperity of Marmaduke Williams  - the mother of George 'Henry' Merritt is given as Lydia (Pittman) Webb. But we found William Stewart, a family researcher, on ancestry.com. His family tree claimed our * (see relationship notes below) second great-grandmother.

Jesse Greene Williams
1894-1967

John David Musgrove & Eliza Cox

The Atlanta Constitution

March 31, 1894

SHE TOOK STRYCHNINE

Mrs. Musgrove Was an Invalid & Despondent

The Atlanta Constitution
March 31, 1894

Great-aunt Louise (Musgrove) Tillman* (see relationship notes below) says her grandmother, Elizabeth Arissa 'Betty' (Collins) Musgrove, got sick from a spider bite. According to the paper,

She said she wanted to die, and that death would be a relief. Mrs. Musgrove had been an invalid for eighteen months. She complained of being in the way and said she had no hopes of recovering (Find-a-Grave link here).

Cuthbert's Only Son: John Musgrove I

Cuthbert Musgrave and his son, John, are counted in the book Seventeenth Century Colonial Ancestors of Members of the National Society Colonial Dames XVII Century, page 180.

Musgrove, Cuthbert (c 1653-87) Md.: m. Dorothy ___   Landowner 

John Musgrove (1685-1746) Md.-Va. m. ___   Landowner

 

We blogged about it here. Cuthbert died in 1687, two years after John Musgrove I was born.

Cuthbert: Our First American Musgrove

Cuthbert Musgrave was born June 1, 1644, in Crookdake,  England, to William and Dorothy Musgrave. He was named after St. Cuthbert, who was...

 ...a monk, who grew in merit and in the intensity of his devotion. He was elected to the bishopric of the church of Lindisfarne. 

St Cuthbert b 634 - d 687

George Leonard Merritt: Yankee Rich Kid

The quote from Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel's fictionalized biography of Thomas Cromwell, under the family banner on this blog...

Some of these things are true and some of them lies. 

But they are all good stories.

 ...is 'tongue-in-cheek' recognition that errors and lore creep into any life story. And, early on, the first mistake crept in when we blogged about our Little Drummer Boy grandpa Merritt. That's been corrected.

George Merritt 1807-1873

John and Mary Musgrove: Before Marriage

Our last post was about the year John and Mary Musgrove were separated (link here). John spent most of 1734 in England, translating for Oglethorpe and a delegation of Indians led by Tomichichi. 

Team Musgrove: John and Mary

Previously, we blogged about John Musgrove, Jr. When James Oglethorpe arrived in what would become Savannah, Georgia, Musgrove translated his meeting with the local Indian chief, Tomichichi. (post)

George Leonard Merritt: Wounded in Action

His Civil war service record shows our second great grandfather,  George Leonard Merritt, joined Connecticut's 6th Infantry on September 5, 1861. (see relationship notes below) He was wounded on July 10, 1863, at Morris Island, South Carolina, and discharged on September 11, 1864; when his term of enlistment expired.

George Leonard Merritt: Ware County, Georgia

March 2014 Ancestry.com message:

Calvin Wesley 'Pops' Merritt

Hi David, 

"...your grandmother, Carrie, was a sister to my grandfather, Calvin Wesley Merritt. ...about the Cherokee family rumors. I heard the same thing growing up, but in my research, I found no connection and there is not one family member I've met who can answer that question."

Then she wrote about George Leonard Merritt.

Georgia/Florida Musgroves: Y-DNA Update

My father, Melvin Musgrove, took the Family Tree Y-DNA (FTDNA) test for the descendants of our great, great grandfather, John 'David' Musgrove, of Pierce County, Georgia. * (see relationship notes below)

Melvin and David Musgrove - 1959

Ballad of Little Musgrave: Minstrels

The battle started with a song. In 1066, the first fatal blow struck in William the Conqueror's take-over of England was by a minstrel.

"At the Battle of Hastings, Taillefer sang the Chanson de Roland (Song of Roland ed.) at the English troops while juggling with his sword. An English soldier ran out to challenge him and was killed by Taillefer, who then charged the English lines and was engulfed." Wikipedia

He's mostly lost to history, but the song he sang that day formed British society. It was number one in England for centuries. And it was the fuel that sent the Ballad of Little Musgrave to the Blackfriar's Theater in 1607. The vehicle? Minstrels, all the way down.

Ballad of Little Musgrave: Story

The Ballad of Little Musgrave:

"...is a Border ballad probably originating in Northern England that describes an adulterous tryst between a man and a woman that is ended when the woman's husband discovers and kills them." Wikipedia

Barnard Castle, Durham, England

An 'educated guess,' from Simon Fury on the Traditional Ballad Index website.

"Little Musgrave and Great Musgrave both still exist in Cumbria, in what used to be Westmorland... and are about 20 miles from Barnard Castle in County Durham. So what we have in the song IMHO is a simple bit of hanky-panky between the wife of the lord of Barnard Castle (the ancient seat of the de Balliol family) and a landowner in Little Musgrave."

We think he's almost right. We'll explore the historical characters and setting of this story in this post.