ELIZA SIMS AND TWO LIBRARIES

By Clinton F. Cross

18. SOURCES

The author has attempted to provide citations for most of the material quoted in this paper. However, this was not always possible. Molly Thornton, a descendant of Joseph Oliver Cross and James Fleming Cross has the other obituary, and as this paper goes to print has not been able to copy it. The author has placed copies of material (such as the pleadings in Oliver Cross’ lawsuit to recover “his” slaves) in the Appendix housed at the Nicholas P. Sims Library, but can’t “cite” it in this paper.

The author is a graduate of Pomona College, Claremont, California, and the University of Texas School of Law, Austin, Texas. He is a descendant of Joseph Oliver Cross, James Fleming Cross, Oliver Harlan Cross, and Mary Cross. The author’s mother had possession of portrait of Eliza probably painted shortly on or after Eliza’s marriage to Joseph Oliver Cross, but unfortunately she loaned the portrait to her brother and his mover’s lost it during a move.

The author hopes others will be interested in Eliza Harlan, and the two libraries that are in some sense part of her legacy. He hopes research regarding Eliza and her families will continue. He also hopes that in the years ahead Eliza’s “heirs” and/or beneficiaries will support and continue to support the Nicholas P. Sims and the Samuel M. Dunlap, Jr. libraries, both of which are privately endowed, but public, libraries.

Books

Atkinson, Dorothy Frances, Yellow Tavern and Beyond, Heritage Books, Inc., Westminster, MD, 2006.

Bennett, James R., Tannehill and the Growth of the Alabama Iron Industry, McNaughton & Gunn, Inc., Saline, MI, 1999.

Beth, Loren P., John Marshall Harlan: The Last Whig Justice, University Press of Kentucky, Lexington, KY, 1992.

Fishcher, David Hackett, Albion’s Seed: Four British Folkways in America, Oxford University Press, New York, NY, 1989.

Green, Ely, Too Black, Too White, University of Massachusetts Press, Amherst, MA, 1970.

Harlan, Alpheus, History and Genealogy of the Harlan Family, Gateway Press, Inc., Baltimore, MD, 1914.

Morris, Roy, Jr., Fraud of the Century, Simon and Schuster, New York, NY, 2003.

Norman, Darlene Johnson, The Descendants of H212 Jehu Harlan, (1746-1806), privately published on the occasion of Harlan family reunion, Chester County, PA, 2002.

Perdue, Jim M., I Remember Atticus, The State Bar of Texas, Austin, TX, 2004.

Remini, Robert, The Life of Andrew Jackson, Pengjuin Books, New York, NY, 1990.

Rice, Douglas Waltheam, The Life and Achievements of Sir John Popham (1531-1607): Leading to the Establishmenty of the First English Colony in New England, Associated University Presses, Cranbury, NJ, 2005.


Widmer, Ted, Martin Van Buren, Henry Holt and Company, New York, NY, 2005.

Articles

Harlan, M. Douglass. The Harlans of Spring Hill, privately published on the occasion of the 250th reunion of the Harlan Family in West Virginia, 1998.

Herasimchuk, Cathy. Hearsay, The Confrontation Clause, & The Trial of Sir Walter Raleigh,” The Texas Prosecutor, (Volume 29, Number 5), Texas District and County Attorneys Association, Austin, TX, September/November, 1999.

Websites

www.harlanfamily.org

http://home.inu.net/sadie/harlanancestry.htm

Supreme Court Cases

Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537; 16 S. Ct. 1138; 41 L. Ed. 256 (1896)

Brown v. Board of Education, 347 U.S. 483; 74 S. Ct. 686; 98 L. Ed. 873, (1954)

Individuals

The following individuals and many others provided information to this writer about the Harlan, Sims, Cross, and Dunlap families:

Harlan Family

C.J. King
2791 Turkey Mt. Rd.
Jamaica, Vt. 05343-9751
joking@sover.net

C.J. King is the author of Four Marys and a Jessie: The Story of the Lincoln Women, published by Friends of Hildene, Inc., P.O. Box 377, Manchester, Vermont 05254. She also writes for the Harlan Record, published by the Harlan Family in America.

Ruth Harlan Lamb
4305 S. Bryant Ct.
Independence, Mo. 65055
Harlamb@aol.com

Ruth is secretary of the Harlan Family in America.

Darlene Johnson Norman
3620 N. Calhoun Road
Brookfield, WI 53005-5236
DarNorman@aol.com

Darlene is married to one of Jehu the first (#212)’s descendants, and knows more about his distant kin than he does.

Harlan Family in America website: http://www.harlanfamily.org/

Cross Family

Anne Geddy Cross
11544 Hanover Courthouse Road
Hanover, Va. 23069
EPinewood@aol.com

Anne lives near Joseph the second’s home in Hanover, and is knowledgeable about the early history of the family.

Hugh Wayne Cross
1770 Farmland Road
Merced, CA. 95340-8621
cross@fire2wire.com

Hugh is descended from Oliver Cross, son of Joseph the second.

Mark Cross
1604 Caminito Monica
Santa Fe, N.M. 87501
Mcross7@aol.com

Mark is descended from Henry Cross, oldest son of Joseph Cross the second. In discussing the early history of the Cross family, the writer relied heavily or research and earlier writings by Mark Cross.

Harold Spradley
14339 Lost Meadow Lane
Houston, TX. 77079
lhspradley@earthlink.net

Harold Spradley is descended from Joseph Oliver Cross and Eliza Harlan, their son Jehu (Hugh) Cross; who married Sarah Shotwell; Jehu’s son Reuben (who married Annie Caroline Holingsworth); and their daughter Dorothy (who married Lewis Spradley).

Jim Tinsley
8345 Colee Cove Rd.
St. Augustine, Fl. 32092-2310
jtinsley@bellsouth.net

Jim Tinsley is descended from Joseph Oliver Cross and Eliza Harlan, their son Jehu (Hugh) Cross (who married Sarah Shotwell); their daughter Ida Belle Cross (who married Basil Manley Phifer), and their daughter Annie Belle who married Charles Homer Tinsley, Sr.

Dunlap Family

Kay Boyd
1405 S. Meadows
Austin, TX. 78758
Mkdb1405@aol.com

Kay Boyd is descended from James and Mary Dunlap and their first child, Joseph, who was the oldest sibling of nine children born to James and Mary (including Samuel, number four; and John, number five).

The aforementioned individuals all provided assistance in drafting this paper. However, the author accepts full responsibility for any and all content errors.

Nicholas P. Sims Library

Appendix: The author has provided the Nicholas P. Sims Library with an Appendix to this paper which contains additional information about the Harlan, Sims, Cross and Dunlap families.  The author hopes that in the future, the Nicholas P. Sims Library will become the repository for genealogical information about these families, and he encourages others with additional information to contribute whatever information they may have to the library so that it may be made available to others with an interest in the material.

The following letter and comments by Harold Spradley (descendant of Joseph Oliver Cross and his son Jehu Cross) are provided to illustrate the kind of material contained in this Appendix:

To Mrs. Eliza Dunlap, Dallas, P.O., Dallas City, Texas; from Margaret Rose Cross; Sunday morning, October 11, 1868.

Dear Ma, I imagine by this time you have concluded that I do not intend writing anymore but I think I have a good excuse to make at least a reasonable one. In the first place we have been sick all summer since June. There has not been a week passed without some one of us being sick and sometimes two or three at once. Estelle came very near dying once and Eulie twice, in fact we though he was dying. I never have spent such a summer in my life, sickness everywhere.

We have another boy three months old. He was born the 13th of July. He is the largest child we ever had, weighs now 30 lbs. We have named him Oliver Harlan, call him Harlan.

We have just returned from Noxubee. Uncle Jehu and Aunt Mary and families were pretty well, having slight chills occasionally. Uncle Jehu’s health is better than it was some time back. He is as cheerful and lively as I ever saw him. He was very much pleased with Johnnie’s appearance. He said he knew he was a good boy and he wanted to keep him and send him to school. We felt that we could not spare him from home all the time but left him with him to stay a few weeks.

Aunt Priscilla is as active and energetic as ever. She has got her a cooking stove. Got their kitchen burnt down a few week’s ago. They think it caught on fire from their old cook woman smoking a pipe. They cook now in the room joining the dining room.

Aunt Mary is doing very well, has paid out of debt entirely, excepting Uncle J. and will make enough to pay him up this year, and have enough left to live on.

Hunter is very attentive to business and I think deserves a great deal of credit for doing so, I think, though he has an idea of going into business himself next year.

Sallie and husband are living up near Krooksville this year but will move down to Aunt Mary’s next year. I think they and Hunter want their part of the land. Sallie has one child running about, named Willie. They all seemed so delighted to see us. Uncle J. says he and Flem and Hu are all of the family that are near enough to visit now, and he wanted them to visit every year. They promised to visit us next summer.

We went to see Hu on our round, they are having chills occasionally. He has not fully determined yet what he will do next year. He rather thinks he will remain at the same place. Stayed here night before last—on his way to Marion to see the owner of the place. I am in hope they will trade. Corn is very low over there and he would have to sacrifice a good deal to move now. Corn crops generally are turning out better than people expected. Uncle J. and Hunter are making pretty good crops. Hunter’s something better than Uncle J’s. He says he will clear about a thousand dollars this year after all expenses are paid.

Ma has been sick a great deal this summer. Nothing serious only chills. She has a fine crop. Aunt Eliza was quite sick last week, is better now. Albert Sears has lost his wife (Mellis McMillan she was) died with dropsy, left a young babe just one week old. Little Billy Pettigrew who taught school in Eutaw a great many years ago, stayed with us last night—I wouldn’t have known him, he is married and living in amborthes with him, they are beautiful girls.

The neighborhood is building a church and schoolhouse combined down at the farm place where out old schoolhouse was. We are determined to try to keep a good school here. May Webb has written on for a teacher for us, says he knows him and recommends him highly. Mrs. George and Mrs. Steve Cook have bought out Mrs. Stafford. They will be our nearest neighbors now. I like them very much.

Bell Webster has lost little Sallie, died in Shelby City, she was on a visit to her father-in-law. She died with congestion of the brain. Amanda Brown’s health is very bad.

We are making a very good crop, doing as well as anyone in the country I reckon.

Amanda and Ella sent me their photographs not long since. If I have an opportunity I want to have the children’s taken this winter and send them to you.

Flem speaks of taking Johnie and Walter and Estella to Mobile this winter.

You ought to see our big baby, everybody says he is just like me; Uncle J. praised him mightily. Eddie is the prettiest child we have, has beautiful black eyes and pretty curly hair.

Old Aunt Patsy Dunlap of Soola died two weeks ago.

Ma and Aunt Eliza send their love to you. Flem joins me in love to you and the children. The children all send their best, best love to Grandma.

Write often. From your affectionate Daughter, M.R. Cross.

A Look at a Letter

Whenever one is suddenly dropped into a strange ballpark, it is certainly true that “you can’t tell the players without a program”. In this case, the strange ball game is a letter from 148 years ago, written from a lady in Greene County, Alabama to her mother-in-law in Texas, and most of the players are glimpsed only briefly by first name reference (and those might be nicknames). With a bit of genealogical background, and some library work, I will try to provide a program.

Background

First of all, the authoress of the letter is Margaret Rose Cross, nee Dunlap, daughter of John Dunlap and wife of James Fleming (“Flem”) Cross, the son of Eliza Harlan Cross. Eliza had been born in Mt. Pleasant, Maury County, Tennessee, where she married Joseph Oliver Cross (at age 13) and bore five children prior to Joseph Oliver’s death in an epidemic in 1839. The youngest child, a daughter, also died in the same epidemic, leaving her four children to take care of.

Eliza had two younger brothers: Jehu and William Sims Harlan, who had moved from Mt. Pleasant, TN to Pickensville, AL prior to the 1840 US Census.

It is my opinion that Jehu Harlan was instrumental in getting Eliza to move to Alabama, where she married a widowed planter, William Tannehill, of Greene County, in February, 1841.

Her elder three children found Alabama spouses. Daughter Sarah Ann Cross married William Tannehill’s nephew, Joseph Carroll Calhoun in September, 1842. Son James Fleming Cross married Margaret Rose Dunlap, of Eutaw, Greene Co., AL in October, 1852. Son Jehu (“Hu”) Cross married Sarah Edith Shotwell of Pickensville, Pickens Co. AL, also in October, 1852.

Eliza and William Tannehill had no children. William was killed in the tragic explosion of a steam boat while carrying the plantation’s entire cotton crop to market in Mobile in January, 1847. This left Eliza a widow for the second time; and as the plantation had been left to Tannehill’s children from his first marriage, she was without income.

By that time, her brothers had moved to Noxubee County, Mississippi, about 40 miles northwest of Eutaw, Alabama. There, November 16, 1848, she married Samuel Meriwether Dunlap, an uncle of Margaret Rose, and the next year, Nov., 1849, she bore Oscar Elijah Dunlap, first of four sons. They had moved north of Noxubee Co., to Chickasaw Co., where Isabelle, Eliza’s youngest remaining child by Joseph Oliver Cross, died of “consumption” in June, 1850, and was buried in the cemetery in Sparta, MS.

Samuel Dunlap was 16 years older than Eliza, and following the Civil War, was almost bankrupt. In 1868, they were encouraged by Eliza’s cousin, Nick P. Sims, to move to Texas; and it was shortly after this move that Margaret Rose Cross wrote this letter to Eliza.

The Letter

Margaret begins the letter with apologies over her lapse in writing. It then describes her summer of activities with household sickness of her daughter Estelle (b. July, 1860) and son “Eulie”, (Ewell, b. May 28, 1866). She had also given birth to a son that summer, Oliver Harlan Cross (b. July 13, 1868).

Margaret then describes family members seen during a trip to Noxubee Co., MS. She mentions Uncle Jehu (Jehu Harlan, Eliza’s brother) and Aunt Mary (Mary Ann Harlan, nee Hunter, widow of William Sims Harlan, Eliza’s younger brother, who had died June 6, 1865). She describes Jehu Harlan’s interest in “Johnie’s appearance, meaning her own son, John Baskin Cross (b. July 26, 1854, age 14 at the time of the letter).

“Aunt Priscilla” refers to Jehu Harlan’s wife, Priscilla Tamer Harlan, nee Hunter, and elder sister of Mary Ann Hunter Harlan – a case where brothers married a pair of sisters. The name “Hunter” refers to William Hunter Harlan, (b. July 29, 1845, eldest child of William Sims Harlan and Mary Ann.)

I assume that the payments of debts refer to money owed following the death of Mary’s husband, William. “Sallie” is the nickname of Sarah E. Harlan (b. 1849 to William and Mary), and was married to John P. Willis (Noxubee Co. marriage records) on June 27, 1866.

The name “Krooksville” would appear to be a mis-transcription of “Brooksville”, a town in the northern part of Noxubee County.

Both Hunter and Sallie have young, growing families to support, and are described as anxious to have their parts of land inheritance from their father’s estate. (By the 1870 Census, the Willis family was shown to be living in the house adjacent to Mary.)

“Uncle J(ehu)” expressed the desire for mutual visits between his family and those of Fleming and “Hu” (Jehu Cross), Eliza’s two sons, as they are the only family living nearby. Eliza had moved to Texas, and her daughter Sarah Ann was living in Mobile. In terms of “family relations”, it must be mentioned that Hunter Harlan, Eliza’s nephew, is married to Ella Ann Calhoun (b. November 10, 1847), daughter of Sarah Ann Cross Calhoun, and Eliza’s grand-daughter. [First cousins once removed.]

Margaret mentions a visit with Jehu Cross, but does not say where he was living, only that the land was owned by someone in Marion, AL.

James F. Cross and Hugh Cross

“Ma” would appear to refer to Margaret’s own mother, Elizabeth Dunlap, who was still living in Greene County until her death the following year, October 11, 1869. Following is a discussion of various neighbors in Eutaw and Greene County that would have been known to Eliza. Albert Sears and wife Mellis McMillan, Billy Pettigrew, May Webb, Mrs. George, Mrs. Cook, Mrs. Stafford, Bell Webster, and Amanda Brown are all mentioned, but have no family relationships to the Cross or Harlan families.

Finally, the letter has a wrap-up of Cross family: “Amanda” is Amanda Abbeville Calhoun, (b. April 14, 1845, another grand-daughter of Eliza’s by Sarah Ann, and sister of Ella Ann Calhoun Harlan. It is likely that Fleming’s proposed visit to Mobile with children “Johnie” (John Baskin), Walter (b. 1856), and Estelle (b. July, 1860), would be to visit with his sister Sarah Ann and the Calhoun family. Margaret again mentions her baby, Oliver Harlan, and his brother Eddy (b. July 12, 1863). “Aunt Patsy” Dunlap was probably the wife of one of Margaret’s uncles, and the name “Aunt Eliza” is from her mother’s family.

Attached are copies of various records of marriages, cemetery data, and census pages used to dig out some of the data presented above. Final note: Jehu Harlan’s wife, Priscilla died May 6, 1876; and on January 3, 1878 he married his sister-in-law, Mary Ann. The 1880 Census shows that they have also taken in a niece, Nettie Hunter.

O.H. Cross and Ed Cross Playing Marbles

Compiled by: Harold Spradley, Great-great-grandson of Eliza by Jehu Cross, Reuben Shotwell Cross, and Dorothy Clair Cross.