RSS Feed
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Straightening out the Mitchams
Sometime around 1980, Chris Beverly found and copied the following information on the proceedings establishing the boundaries, location, and the name "Mitcham"' and gave it to me. Clarke County Commissioners, on May 16, 1859, set the boundaries as "within the boundaries of Township 10, Range 2 East. The beat was to be called Mitcham Beat with the "place of voting to be located at the CHURCH NEAR GEORGE W. MITCHAM'S RESIDENCE and called Mitchams Voting Precinct.'' This is concrete proof that prior to 1859, the name Mitcham was not attached to this area. Please note that the church, certainly located in the area north of Chilton, probably was the Mitcham Meeting House spoken of in Hopewell Church's Minutes of 1857. Old Timers summised that this building was the same one that was also the school house, thus giving name to the School House field on the Scotch Game Reserve. In one place, the church was referenced as the "Meeting House" which is marked through and "church" is written above. As a note of interest, occasionally there is an "s" on the end of the word "Mitchams." In receiving queries from Texas and other places, I learned that the descendants of the Mitcham family have seen it spelled with an "s." Notice the "s" on the word Mitcham, above, in the naming of the election precinct. Also, the name "Mitcham, is spelled "Mitchum" in Ireland and "Mitcham" in England.) Now, where is the error that I made 30 years ago? Only in hindsight do I realize that all these years many people, including me, assumed that the area was named for Dr. Mitcham, who was mentioned in Ball's history as living near Choctaw Corner, which actually translated as the Forrest Dale area in my mind. This proves to be incorrect after closer observation and after gaining more information on the Mitchams who lived in Clarke County. Having only the roll of Hopewell Church and little serious research on the Mitcham family, I, and many others, made the only logical conclusion based on facts at hand. Due to Mitcham Family research by a lady in Odessa, Texas, Dorothy Homsey, her great-great-grandfather, George W. Mitcham, lived in the immediate area, was a member of Hopewell in 1857, and remained in the area for some time along with his large family. He was found in the census records until 1870, the year she thinks he died. (George W. Mitcham was born in Ireland in 1796.) Even though some of his children were on the Hopewell record and in the census in 1870 and afterwards, none of the old timers here in Chilton knew what happened to the Mitchams. It took a Mitcham relative from Texas to tell us from family history that George W. Mitcham lived here quite a few years after Hopewell was founded in 1857. We now know that the two brothers, George W. and Hezekiah, moved, along with their families, to Texas but not at the same time. The whammy is this--George's brother was Dr. Mitcham and he was named HEZEKIAH, who was never listed on Hopewell's roll and did not live in the immediate area of the church nor the original area of the first meeting place. Hezekiah lived south of Choctaw Corner, which in T. H. Ball's day was a way of describing the edge of the piney-woods area not far from Forest Dale and the Scotch Management Area. From the beginning, all of those who researched Clarke County History, including T. H. Ball, must have thought the Dr.Mitcham, who was also a preacher, was the logical person for the beat's name since later generations did not know of more Mitchams having lived here. Hopewell's membership roll held and still holds answers to the settling of this region. With more wisdom from the years, some closer reading and logic, plus some research from Texas, it is clear that the commissioners meant to name the beat for George W. Mitcham, who lived near the building where he worshipped and where the voting for the 1860 election would be held. Any way, I now know that Hezekiah, the "Dr. Hezekiah Mitcham" who was honored for so long, left Clarke County in 1845, and took his family to Texas! That's fourteen years before the beat was named and formed! At last, the truth and facts of the matter can be put to rest. That's me--if I'm wrong--I'm really wrong!
Joyce White Burrage is a retired Clarke County High School teacher living in her native Chilton community.
|
for larger version       |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
