This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: Pugh, Townsend Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/xV.2ADE/565.1.1 Message Board Post: Hello, Sue! Grandpa Townsend was a hard man. And Granny had been with him since she was about 9. She outlived him a few years but was already too old and had alzheimers, so was never able to find her family. She didn't even know the county or town she was born in. Steve's mom says she had two older brothers and Sarah ran off when she was small. Sarah Jane was supposedly fullblood Cherokee. The story Steve grew up with was that Edward's first wife and child(ren) were killed by some Cherokees so he "stole" Dora. In 1920ish he married her in San Antonio and changed her name to Genevive Townsend. She bore him 4 sons and one daughter and raised them all. But she never saw or heard from any of her own family. There are several mysteries about Edward and Dora. Edward was able to stay off census rolls except for possibly 1920. If that was him, then he lied about birth states for him and his parents. All we know of Dora Jean's family are her parents' names and that she was born where the Cherokees called it the "Big River". My guess is Arkansas or White River, maybe Sebastian county or somewhere closer to Louisiana, which is where Edward's family was from. We think Edward was Cherokee or Choctaw, too, but spent his entire life "passing for white" and demanding his wife act and look white. Papa and Steve both treat their wives like "princesses", so I feel the old ones h! ad the final word.