sent letters into Georgia but have received none. We are not satisfied
where we live but have not concluded on anything positive yet, and if we
cannot live here, I don't know where we shall move to. We have no news
at present of our own concern. Isaiah Hancock wishes to be remembered
to you. His family is in good health--they have six children, four sons
and two daughters. Jeremiah Hancock has moved to Cresy Valley was the
last account. Carter Hooper and family are all well.
Isaiah Hancock is glad to hear that you are doing well and wishes you to
remember that when a man is doing well he ought to learn to be
satisfied. We have nothing worth relating.
Remember your most affectionate Grand-father and Grand-mother till
death.
Thomas and Milly Sparks
To: Wm. and Sally Sparks, Limestone City, Alabama.
This, it seems to me, definitely proves who William Crain Sparks'
grandparents were. I have been able to prove that Thomas and Milly
Sparks lived in Franklin County, Georgia, from about 1795 to about
1818--between 1818 and 1824 they moved to Alabama. A decade earlier
they had lived in Rockingham County, N.C., and the ancestry of Thomas
Sparks goes back to Maryland. On the Franklin County., Georgia, tax
record of 1818, William C. Sparks was listed as Ill poll"; he owned no
property and had apparently just come of age. In the 1820 Land Lottery
of Georgia, William C. Sparks of Franklin County drew 57 acres in Dist.
5, Rabun County,, Georgia.
I have a good many records pertaining to Thomas and Milly Sparks in
Franklin County,, Georgia.--buying and selling land. Milly, herself,
bought land in FrankLin County, on February 12, 1795, from Wm. and
Judith Gough. It was most unusual for a woman to purchase land in her
own name in Georgia at this time., yet in 1805 Thomas and Milly sold the
exact same tract of land so I know it was the same Milly Sparks.
Unfortunately., I have no further record of Thomas and Milly after
1824., the date of their letter to William Crain Sparks. According to
family tradition, his father's name was Richard. I have not been able
to find a list of the children of Thomas and Milly Sparks.
I have tried to identify the persons mentioned in this 1824 letter. I
have corresponded with a descendant of Isaiah Hancock that they
mentioned. He lived in what is now Springville, Alabama in the
1820's--it is on U. S. about twenty miles north east of Birmingham.
I enclose a copy of an article I wrote on Jeremiah Sparks, Sr., who was
closely related to Thomas Sparks (husband of Milly)., probably a
brother. Notice that his daughter, Nancy., married Stephen Crain and
that his daughter Milly (or Emily) married Abijah Crain. I feel sure
that it was from this Crain family that William C. Sparks got his middle
name. Abijah Crain sold land in Franklin County., Georgia, to James
Sparks in 1806.
I shall be much interested to learn what records you have pertaining to
William C. Sparks and his family.
Very truly yours,
Russell E. Bidlack
Editor, Sparks Quarterly
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