Hi, most folk do not realize the Delta land between Mississippi and Arkansas is some of the richest in the world- or at least the U.S. Rice is and was a common crop around Hempstead,,Ark. and was or is sewn from an airplane. A man at Church Sunday said it was strange to see Rice hitting your windshield like rain. Mom was born in Hope, Ar. & 2 of her grandparents- Sarah Copeland and Charles Hiopp, were from Clinton, S.C. During the recent flood on Miss. one local reporter said on TV that there was a time in the past that rice and cotton farmers watched each other across the River- Arrk. to Miss and Tenn. as some had been of sending bombs across the River ina flood to blow a hole in the opposite levee to save their own fields. Naw, Not in America??? Take care, Charles A, Wyly On Mon, 04 Jun 2001 09:30:34 -0400 Harold Miller <hlm@qtm.net> writes: > I have seen a pattern of TN to AL to AR. The reasons: The families > had > come into what is today TN sometime around the Rev. from either > Shenandoah > Valley of Virginia (having moved from places such as Pennsylvania) > to TN, or > the pattern of coming from North Carolina into TN (many have begun > in > Maryland). So say 1790s to 1810 they were in TN. The the War of > 1812 came > and many of the men went with Jackson on one of his expeditions, > moving thru > what is today Alabama and Mississippi. I guess they really liked > the land, > cause you see a lot of them between 1815 - 1818 moving south. Often > some of > the family stayed in Tennessee. Georgia was also an area some moved > to. > They were going for free land to a new area. > > The move to Arkansas - many people were there in 1820s, but a big > migration > began ca 1834-1835. This would be to the North Western corner of > Arkansas. > The land was owned I am told by the Cherokees Indians, but they > thought the > land was useless so did not live there. The few Indians there were > Choctaw > - seems they had been beaten by the Cherokees and their land taken > over. So > the Choctaw lived in bluff areas which no one else wanted. Anyway, > sometime > around 1834 the goverment purchased NW Arkansas from the Cherokees > and > opened it up for white settlement. Between that date into the early > 1850s, > many families made the move, although most were there by ca 1840. > Some who > had moved to Arkansas ca 1829 would also moved into the new area. > All you > had to do was pick out your land, and become a "squatter", no money > needed. > My family did not buy their land till the mid 1840s, so they lived > on it > several years before they purchased it. This of course helped young > families just starting out who had no money. > > I have found when the families coming out of VA or NC got to > Tennessee, some > stayed there, some to KY and on to Indiana and Illinois, and some > south. > But mid 1830s many of them from all the areas met again in NW > Arkansas. For > example, you find Spurlock in TN, KY, AR. Hancock, Strickland and > Reavis/Reeves in Illinois and Alabama moving to AR. And so on. So > the same > family which had split in TN, some going north and some south, would > meet up > again in Arkansas. > > Later, after the war in 1865, many southern Union families would > make the > move to NW Arkansas for a new start. Arkansas was giving away land, > it > wanted settlers. > > So it was the usual reasons, land being the major one. > > Just as later, many of these ARkansas families would move to > Oklahoma and > Texas. You know the Frencher family was I think from Boone Co > AR....(or > maybe Carroll). They were among those killed in the Mountain Meadow > Massacre - guess they were on their way to California. > > I was very surprized when I began to find the same families in > Tennessee, > Alabama, Illinois and Arkansas. The movement back and forth was > also a big > surprise. I remember the first time I found a couple of extra women > in AR > census, to later learn they were relatives from Tennessee. Also, > remember > that these men traveled all over the place. One who was born in TN > might > marry in IL and turn up in AR, then as an old man move with grown > children > to Texas and die there. > > Mary > > > ============================== > Visit Ancestry.com for a FREE 14-Day Trial and enjoy access to the > #1 > Source for Family History Online. Go to: > http://www.ancestry.com/subscribe/subscribetrial1y.asp?sourcecode=F11HB >