TN Research Trip 2009
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Rig all loaded up. Under the blankets are tools - shovel, rake, hoe, metal detector, pick axe, grave poker. The rest is like a camping trip but with a laptop computer instead of a tent. The first day will be a LOT of driving (500+ miles).
I also have a bucket of flour to help read grave markers, so if I get pulled over by the police,
someone will have to bail me out, and it will cost millions! |
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XM radio had the Roger Hedgecock talk show playing and I couldn't resist taking this picture.
I drove straight through to Hope Arkansas (Happy birthday Bill) where I stopped to make a nature call, then headed on to Little Rock. |
 | My first date stood me up (Just kiddin Tammy), so I went on to the Sumner cemetery near Cabot where Frank Arick might be buried. My DNA test proves that Frank is a descendant of the Orrick family, as are we Texas Arricks. I called one of the trustees (Toney) who is listed on the sign. He came out and brought the cemtery documentation. In typical Orrick tradition, Frank's grave is not to be found. But Toney did point me to where Don Arick lives down the road and had other interesting information. |
 | This is Adolphus Boyd's grave. He wrote a diary where he mentions Frank Arick's death in 1911, and that he dug the grave. Since he dug other graves at Sumner, it's a good guess that Frank is buried there. But there are other nearby cemeteries too so who knows. |
 | I wouldn't normally do this, but I had a sudden onset of courage and decided to drive by Don Arick's house. The result was a wonderful visit with Don and his wife Caroyln. This meeting alone was worth the entire trip. |
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Don Arick and Roger Arrick.
Next time, I'm going to bring him an extra "R" as a gift! :) |
 | This land is near where the Arick's lived, and do live to this day. At one time it was upwards of 1000 acres according to Don. It is beautiful there. |
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Memphis Skyline. It's getting dark, but if I stay focused, I can get to Jackson TN which will make tomorrow's drive easier. |
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Memphis bridge. Looking up while driving under this makes me feel like I'm flying. |
 | The Pyramid Arena and random sunset. |
Yep, I made it to Jackson TN at 9:00pm. Found a hotel, requested a quiet room, and got a good night sleep.
Day 2 - Easter Sunday, Apr 12
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Sleep last night was fantastic.
Breakfast of genealogy champions (cold Ravioli and apple juice) started the day. Then off from Jackson TN to Parsons to meet Margaret and go to the Denson's landing cemetery. |
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Here's me and Margaret at Denson's Landing cemetery.
It's a great location overlooking the water.
It's great to finally meet Margaret in person after all the help she's been. |
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Here's Fannie Arrick Baugus.
(See her research page).
Her mom is Margaret Qualls (my 2ggrandmother,
wife of John Orrick shot at Shiloh).
Her father is (probably) William B. Nunley.
For some strange reason, Fannie used the Arrick name, just like the other kids. Another question is why did Fannie and 2 of her brothers (James and John) move westward to Hardin county in the 1870/80's? I think it might have been because there were Qualls family there, but not sure. |
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After an hour of Baugus chat with Margaret, I let her have her Easter sunday back and
headed off for Manchester where I will stay for the night.
I admit to being lonely, but I guess that's the price of doing something strange like this. So, I'm considering hiring a driving buddy next time. All the potato chips you can eat, and all the satellite radio you can stomach. Send your application to Roger at Arrick dot com :). |
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On the way to Manchester, I swung by Murfreesboro which took the brunt of a tornado a few days ago.
From the hwy I could see a bunch of trees torn down.
See the Video someone made about it. This is a bit strange because last year when I visited for the first time, I noticed billboards torn down and barns half gone - I thought it was NORMAL! But they just had a tornado the week before. I pulled into Manchester TN with exactly 800 miles on the tripometer. |
Day 3 - Monday, Apr 13
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I'm staying in Manchester in Coffee county.
Warren county TN is where the Orricks settled around 1825 and where the Orrick cemetery is,
that's about 20 min down the road.
There are storms headed our way, so we'll see what happens. The goal today is to find deeds for the property and see if a plat exists that shows the cemetery and house location. It will be helpful to have an official document stating this instead of relying soley on witnesses. Sorry for the bug guts. |
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The offices where the deeds are kept are in McMinnville.
This picture is looking south towards town with the mountain in the background.
I didn't take pictures of the records room, but it looks kinda like this. The books weigh about 15 pounds each and go back to the early 1800s. As about 2 hours, they weigh about 100 pounds :) I did find the chain of owners for the property, but then I went through the index of 85 books one by one and had 32 pages copied. It will take a while to sift through all of these records. I don't see anything earth-shaking yet. |
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I spend the morning and part of the afternoon at the deed office.
My feet are zapped.
Martha (Hardin) Orrick is my 3ggrandmother. She outlived husband Allen and several children. I thought she might have died around 1885, but I think this document is showing me that she lived until 1898. If that's the case, she is well over 100! See that little 'x' there, Martha made that on the piece of paper more than 100 years ago. Apparently no plat drawing for the property exists. I'm finding this hard to believe and am going to keep asking. Maybe my stubborness will pay off. |
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I had lunch with a fellow researcher then decided to visit the office handling the
auction of the Orrick property on May 2nd.
They had a map showing how the property has been split up for auction. Buyers have the option of putting the pieces back together again. The farm is 76 acres with a modern house, and a couple of barns. Click on the image for a giant version where I've indicated where the cemetery was, and the cistern was. It's possible, according to stories, that the cistern contains headstones with markings. See the satellite images. |
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We started out to go see the property but the rain was so strong we had to turn back.
I went back to the hotel in Manchester to get something to eat and rest my feet.
While talking to Sandra on the phone, I got struck by a brilliant rainbow out my hotel window. This was the most intense rainbow I've ever seen. Who knows, maybe it's from the Orricks of yesteryear sending a colorful message of support. The front office called my room about 9:30pm and said there was a tornado warning and would call if there were more instructions. The Fun just never stops around here! |
If this doesn't work, who will go with me to knock on the door of a newly-placed trailer house and deliver the news: "Excuse me sir, your master bedroom is on top of my greatgrandma." Send your application today!
Day 4 - Tuesday, Apr 14
This is difficult. On one hand, I don't want to interfere with the sale, but on the other hand, I don't want a mobile home parked on my 3ggrandpa. Economic times have hit this area very hard and businesses and jobs are being lost right and left. But buyers need to know there is a cemetery there BEFORE they buy it, not AFTER. Most of the people here are good, honest, reasonable people, and my chances of being able to work something out seems excellent in spite of the bizarre and difficult situation.
 Roger and Ladye Jane |
After gabbing on the phone with Sandra so long she missed an appointment, the executive committee
proposed a binding resolution: Today I will go to the auction house handling the land sale
and tell them about the hidden cemetery, and let the chips fall where they may.
I headed over to the auctioneer's office first thing, but he was gone. I piddled around town for another hour but he still wasn't there. Layde Jane took me and Sandra to a local cafe for lunch. I had meatloaf and okra. That's the first real meal I've had since Friday. |
 Cemetery Spot |
Then we went out to the cemetery location. This was my first visit to it on this trip.
We got out of the car and started looking for the old house and cistern location.
Then a man came out to greet us. He called my name, I thought it
was the owner (who I talked to last year on the phone), but instead it was a cousin on my Qualls side.
What a surprise! We had a great conversation.
He had read this blog and just happened to come out at the exact same time we did.
This is all kinda spooky isn't it?.
Come to find out, he is friends of the owner.
There is no visible sign of the cemetery, we knew that, but there are signs of the cistern and the old dog-trot house removed years ago. The old house spot and cistern are together on one section of the property that will be auctioned off. The cemetery is up next to the modern house on another section and they will be sold together, unless something changes. |
Then we went back to town and meet up with a Davenport lady who use to live next door to the Orrick farm. She didn't have much info about the farm, but she brought out all the original records from the church that some of the Orricks attended. Most of the records have it spelled ORICK.
Then we went back to the auctioneer who was back in the office. We had a good talk and I told him about the whole situation. He was understanding and suggested I see if there is a legal record map at the tax office. I'll do that first thing tomorrow morning!
 Sandra and Roger |
We had mexican food (my 2nd real meal of the trip) then looked through 1887 newspapers
at the library till 8pm. Back at the hotel at 9pm, 1 hour to create this web page,
then I'm off to bed. I'm beat but very excited.
I've received several donation offers to help save the property already. It's very nice to know people care. There's little chance to have enough money to buy the whole property which on the tax rolls currently at $270k, but I can probably swing enough to buy the plot where the old house and cistern is. If I can pull that off, I will excavate the cistern looking for markers and preserve the home spot. Wouldn't it be amazing to own the property where your ancestors lived almost 200 years ago! |
There is no way to thank my new found friends and cousins: Ladye Jane, Sandra, and JQ.
This is like an Indiana Jones movie, but without snakes! (So far anyway)
Hey, if anything is mispelled, it's because I'm running on fumes at this point.
Day 5 - Wednesday, Apr 15
Today was very taxing in 2 ways. First, I turned 1000 miles on the tripometer, my backside is sore, and I miss home. Second, with the taxes I paid in 2008, I could purchase the property section that contains the old Orrick homestead and cistern, with enough left over to make payroll for my 10 employees for at least 3 months. Instead, my grandkids will be born into debt.
The goal today is to find a map that can identify the cemetery's postion on the property. Without that, I will have to get witnesses to make a legal case. I have 2 witnesses already and think I can get several more.
 Tax map Giant Version |
First I headed to the tax accessors office to see if they have a map.
I asked "Is there a really old map of properties in that area?".
She said "Yes, all the way back to 68". I said "Great!....Wait, 1868 or 1968?".
She answered: "1968".
By then the cemetery and the house had long been distroyed.
Thanks to cousin Larry for his councel. Cheers with a cup of tea to you! |
 Farm map Giant Version |
Running out of options, I went to the local farm services office.
They have real old maps, "back to the 1970's" they said. I smiled :)
This map is interesting because it's before the barn was built behind the modern house. And it shows some sort of building by where the old house sat. Interesting, but not much help. The lady who helped me was real nice and we chatted for about 15 min. She has come to Texas many times to show cows with her sons. It's amazing how many people say they have been to Tyler. |
 Grundy Courthouse |
My next task was to find another living member of the Orrick family to see
if they could identify the cemetery location, but I could not get anyone to answer the phones.
So I stopped into Sonic to avoid real food, and headed to the Altamont courthouse in neighboring Grundy county. There I meet Sandra and they gave us free access to the old records. The goal was to find what happened to Margaret Arrick and her second husband William B. Nunley. The old record room could use some help. There are 2 walls full of old books, including taxes, marriages, probate, court, etc. Some are in terrible shape and need to be scanned. Nothing previously unknown was found there. The deed office however is the greatest thing I've ever seen. All the good documents have been scanned and are indexed. Apparently Nunley sold off his land to his kids and others before he died, leaving Margaret with nothing. I printed out several and will research them in my "Spare" time :)
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 Grundy County |
Grundy county is just beautiful.
We petering out on a local cafe and the Coffee county library, but got a good dinner at Cracker Barrel. While leaving I realized my wallet was missing creating an exciting momemnt (as if I need one), but eventually found it in my truck. |
I've got plenty of hope, now we just need some change!
Day 6 - Thursday, Apr 16
The plan for thursday is to show the auctioneer the maps, and to continue looking for witnesses. And might try to find the surveyor. And will try to get the TN archeology society to return my emails. I'll also try to meet up with Bettye and get a tour of Hubbard's cove where Margaret and Nunley might have lived.
Is anyone eating popcorn while watching this adventure? I brought some but there's no microwave in this room.
Stay tuned for tomorrow's update, and thanks for all the support and emails!
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