William A. Trammell and William A. Hunter, same person.
My sister Frances and I had the unique pleasure of living with our grandfather Frank Paris Hunter for almost 2 years, along with our parents. Of course. During that time he taught me how to stay balanced on a bike, and other adolescent skills. He kept his “hooch” under the house. One time when he was loaded he told me he did not know our real last name, because his father was adopted and took the name of his adopted family
I remembered that. About 25 years later when Rocky, my oldest son was born, I decided to get into genealogy to find our real surname and our heritage
I knew already my grandfather William’s name on his Tombstone was William A. Hunter and born in 1842. And somehow it was common family knowledge that he was born in Franklin, Macon County, North Carolina.
The Georgia Room of the Cobb County Library had census microfilms. Censuses are taken every ten years, like the last census was 2020 and the next one will be 2030.
The census report each family member by name and age. I got the 1850 Census of Macon County and looked name by name for a William Hunter, age about 8. I couldn’t find a such name. I went through it again, it was not there.
It was common family knowledge that his wife was Emaline Ray, also a Macon County Native. I got a Macon County phone book (don’t ask me how) and saw there was about 30 to 40 Ray families listed. I wrote each Ray family telling them what I was looking for, namely Emaline Ray and enclosed a self-addressed, stamped envelope. My plan was do 10 a week. Some Rays used the self-addressed-stamped envelope to wish me luck. About half-way through it I received a letter with the letterhead RAY’S SMOKED HAMS. He said he did not know, but he thought his cousin probably would because he was into family history. He said I wouldn’t have written him because he doesn’t have a phone. He gave me his address, which was Otto, NC, which is also in Macon County. I wrote him and he replied, which said something like this:
“Your grandfather was William A. Trammell.. He and his brother Van killed a man and they were wanted for murder and escaped to Texas.”
First of all, he was my great grandfather, not my grandfather. I went back and looked at the 1850 census and sure’nuff found a William A. Trammell, age 8, living with his grandfather Jacob Trammell, and a bunch of kids, including a Jacob Van Buen Trammell. So, Van was his uncle, not his brother.
I knew William fought in the Battle of Kennesaw Mountain. His name is listed as a CSA soldier. In fact, I found his company:
William joined the Confederacy. On, 1 May 1862, he enlisted in Macon County, North Carolina, into the 39th North Carolina Infantry, Company I. He was nineteen years old. He enlisted with the name he had used since birth - William A. TRAMMELL.
The first year of his war efforts has yet been uncovered. On 19 May 1863, he was admitted to the First Mississippi C. S. A. Hospital in Jackson, Mississippi, for Febris Intermiten Quotidian. In layman terms he was having a reoccurring fever daily. He returned to duty 25 June 1863 after spending a month and six days in the hospital.
While on furlough, 19 April 1864, William A. TRAMMELL and Emaline RAY married. William was twenty-one and Emaline was eighteen just one week.
Shortly after they were married William returned to his Unit. The Unit went to be part of the "Battle of Kennesaw Mountain", near Marietta, Georgia.
Note- About one hundred to one hundred and twenty-five years later over a hundred of William and Emaline's descendants would be living within a few miles of Kennesaw Mountain.
William's unit, the 39th Regiment, Company I, was fixed on the crest between Big Kennesaw Mountain and Little Kennesaw Mountain.
His bosses:
Corps - Loring
Division - French
Brigade - Ector
William and two of his friends were at a spring kneeling down drinking water. Shots. One of his friends dropped with a bullet hole in his head. He and his remaining living friend got up to run. More shots. William was shot in the leg. He fell while his friend fled. The boys in blue ran by him in pursuit of his friend, evidently assuming he was dead.
According to the records William was shot in the knee July 18, 1864. That, incidentally, was the same day that the President of the Confederacy fired General Joseph E. Johnston of that campaign and replaced him with General Hood.
On his questionnaire for a pension a question was what date he was wounded and William replied "July 18, 1864". Another question asked where was his unit at the time he was shot and he replied "Peachtree Creek" (Atlanta) which is historically accurate. Unfortunately, the questionnaire did not ask the applicant where he was when he shot, only where his unit was, which could be two different places.
A note: There are eight active springs on Kennesaw Mountain and several dried up ones.
Peachtree Creek or Kennesaw Mountain? Or Chickamauga, Georgia?
Ms Thelma Swanson, a TRAMMELL/RAY descendent/researcher, found that the North Carolina Troops Roster, page 108, shows that he was wounded at the Battle of Chickamauga, Georgia.
The Chickamauga Battle was held in the Northwest corner of Georgia, September 19th and 20th, 1863. I personally think this
could be another William TRAMMELL listed (Mrs. Swanson later stated that it could have been William K. TRAMMELL wounded at Chicamauga).
On August 6, 1864, William appeared on a receipt roll at Marshall Hospital in Columbus, Georgia.
He was put on wounded furlough. He told his grandchildren that he recuperated in a private home in Andersonville, Georgia.
Andersonville was not far from the Marshall Hospital in Columbus (about 20 to 30 miles). The Andersonville Confederate Center had the facilities for a hospital and a prison. The cruel conditions at Andersonville Prison still shock people. Men were forced to suffer and die in painful and cruel ways just for fighting in a cause they believed in or had to fight. Some of the prisons in the North were just as bad - one that comes to mind is Camp Chase, Ohio.
Another academic question: Which Andersonville? During the Civil War times there was a Andersonville Community in Cobb County at the northern border of Cherokee County, where Highway 92 is today, only about three or four miles east of where he eventually settled in Woodstock.
He said that in that private home where he recuperated the lady that nursed him was named Amanda Jane. A few years later he would honor that lady by naming his only daughter after her.
After he got well enough he somehow gained possession of a mule and walked (or limped) back home to Macon County, North Carolina, which if the Andersonville was in Cobb-Cherokee County it would be slightly over a hundred miles away, if the Andersonville was in Southwest Georgia it would be close to three hundred miles away.
Apparently, he arrived home before November 1864 (based on the incubation period and birth date of their first born Charles). He was about twenty-two when he returned from the War.
For the next couple of years William and Emaline lived just south of Franklin, North Carolina and had two children.
Posey C. Wild was a close friend. He was the close friend who was with William at the time he was shot by Union Soldiers by the spring, and was lucky to flee with his life. After that event,
10 August 1864, Posey was promoted to Second Lieutenant.
Another close person to William was his uncle Jacob Van Buren "Van" TRAMMELL. Van was only a few years older than William and they lived in the same household during their childhood lives. With William and Van living in the same house; with the same last name; and close to the same age - some thought they were brothers.
With that, this story has been handed down through the generations in the RAY Family:
"Van TRAMMELL and his brother William were trying to collect pay for a horse that had been stolen from William. The man refused to pay. William hit the man with a gun and killed him. Van left for Arkansas and William for Georgia."
The man who William and his uncle Van Trammell killed was named Lambert. - Surname TRAMMELL from nformation submitted by Darlene Lackey. June 18, 2004, posting no. 1405.
Actually, Van went to Round Prairie Township, Benton County, Arkansas.
The William A. HUNTER family went to Texas. In Texas, William acquired "twelve or fifteen" tracts of land and tried being a cattle rancher. He had problems supplying water and had to give it up.
William Trammell and family returned to where he recuperated but changed their family name to Hunter.
Then upon more research over court records I found that in 1842 Rebecca Trammell sued the city of Franklin’s town Constable for Bastardy. The judge said Jason Henderson Hunter would have to pay $100 a year in child support.
Jason and his family left town rather hurriedly.
I’m quiet sure Jason Henderson Hunter and Rebecca Trammell are Willilam Hunter/Trammell’s parents.
Jason Henderson Hunter had an interesting life. He was a Federal Soldier during the infamous “Trail of Tears” in about 1838. Franklin, NC; Cape Giraldo, Ms, and Greene Co., Ak were all big gathering places for the Native Americans. Strangely, Jason moved to Macon County, NC, Cape Giraldo, Mo, and Greene County . Ak
In the Civil War Jason Henderson Hunter formed his on company which he commissioned himself “Colonel” His expertise was battling Yankee Gunships on the Mississippi River. His immediate officer over him was “Swamp Fox” Thompson who organized she short lived Poney Express.
He was a state representative of Greene County, Arkansas and another time Bolinger County, Mo.
Probably what will ad up mostly in his heritage is his fertilization He had 3 wives, at least 4 mistresses and over 20 Children
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