The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 41, July 1937 - April, 1938 Page: 363
383 p. : maps ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Book Reviews
(Russell) Kemp, John and Hannah (Walker) Bethea,
Sterling Clack and Frances (King) Robertson, Samuel
and Sophia Ann (Parker) Dickey, their antecedents, de-
scendants, and collateral relatives, with chapter concerning
State and County records and the derivation of Counties
of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, North Carolina,
Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Vir-
ginia. Prepared and published by William Curry Harllee,
assisted by numerous collaborators. Three volumes and
index, paged continuously: I. xxxii, 968; II. 969-1950;
IlI. 1951-2964; Index 2965-3270. (New Orleans: Searcy
and Pfaff, Ltd., 1934-1937. Maps, illustrations.)
This long title indicates fairly accurately the scope and contents
of this huge work. Like most students who attempt to investigate
a subject based on records in the South, the author found his
material incomplete and scattered widely. This condition, after
all, may not be peculiar to the South; perhaps, it exists in every
new country. But when one compares conditions in the South
with those in the North and East, it is hard to escape the con-
clusion that the importance of historical records has received less
attention in the South than in the other sections. That each sec-
tion must supply the sources for its own history may not be quite
as obvious as it is that each family must supply the materials
for its own history.
A discussion of the sources of information marks the opening
chapters of the work. In the absence of public records of marriages,
births, and deaths, the author turned for this information to the
family Bible, gravestones, deeds, wills, etc. The family Bible, when
it can be found, appears to be a useful source for the period before
the War. The ruin that followed in the wake of the War put an
end to the custom of keeping a family Bible. The apartment
dwelling and migratory life caused many of the old family Bibles,
as well as the portrait albums, to be lost. Such success as attended
the search for these old Bibles is recorded for each Section (I. 468-
470 for Section 1).
The early settlers in the South buried their dead in family
cemeteries. The churchyard cemeteries are a later development.
The family cemeteries of established families were preferred to
the churchyard burial grounds. All this was changed by the War.
Families were unsettled; habits and customs changed; descendants
moved away; many old family cemeteries were neglected. The363
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 41, July 1937 - April, 1938, periodical, 1938; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101103/m1/391/: accessed April 23, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.