Genealogy- Newsletter- July 12, 2025

20 Jul Genealogy- Newsletter- July 12, 2025

GENEALOGY- MORE ON THE SMITHERS

My Great-Great Grandfather Gabriel Neil Smither served in the Confederate Army. He enlisted at age 17 on March 10, 1862, at Oxford, Mississippi for one year. Less than a month later he reenlisted for three years or the duration of the war. He served with the 11th Mississippi Infantry Regiment, Co G. Lamar Rifles (pictured below in Oxford). His regiment was involved in both Confederate excursions into the North with Antietam and Gettysburg.

He participated in Lee’s Virginia Peninsula campaign and during 1862 was present at Seven Pines (May 31-June1), Gaine’s Farm (June 27th), White Oak Swamp (June 30th), Malvern Hill (July 1st), Freeman’s Ford (August 22-25th), Thoroughfare Gap (August 28th), Second Bull Run (August 28-30th), Sharpsburg/Antietam (September 17th), where he was wounded the second day.

During July 1-3, 1863, as the army engaged at Gettysburg, the 11th Mississippi was part of Pickett and Pettigrew’s ill-fated charge up Cemetery Ridge, being one of the only units to breach the Union lines. The 11th Mississippi had the highest casualty rate of any regiment, north or south, with 87% of the men. Fortunately, for my eventual descent, he was sick with dysentery that day. Genealogy.

There is a story of him “that after the Gettysburg campaign the army was worn out and exhausted from continual marching and fighting, with spirits at a correspondingly low ebb, Gabe brushed up by the side of our band leader and said, “Stewart by blood, play Dixie.” This was done and spirit’s rising started a cheer which did the whole army good.”

The Lamar Rifles and Gabe then fought at Williamsport \ Falling Waters \ and Boonsboro in Washington Co., Maryland (July 6-16th), and Bristow Station (October 14th).

In 1864 he fought in The Wilderness (May 5-7th), Tally’s Mills (where the Lamar Rifles had 120 of their 150 men killed or wounded), Spotsylvania (May 8th-21st), then went into the hospital in Richmond for a month while again suffering from dysentery, then returned to fight at Weldon Railroad (August 19th-29th), where the second day he was again wounded, then Davis’ Farm (October 1st), and Jones’ Farm (October 3rd).

On March 22, 1865, the 11th was part of the skirmish line at Petersburg, they were only 64 men strong to start and lost many when attacked. During the night of April 1st, they moved to Hatcher’s Run and on April 2nd the Federal Army attacked, the regiment was surrounded, disbanded, the colors shredded and tossed into a stream (to prevent capture), and most surrendered while others escaped by swimming. Records indicate that Gabe was on furlough at war’s end, so I am not sure if he was given furlough right prior to capture or if he escaped and was presumed furloughed.

Gabriel Smither was paroled on May 18, 1865, in Grenada, Mississippi, after the surrender of the CSA.

Gabe and his wife Sarah moved to Arkansas, where due to being on the losing side in the war, went from a privileged young life in Oxford, MS to being “barefoot in the Ozarks” according to my grandma.

Gabe is pictured here with his family, with my Great Grandmother Lily Jane in her mother’s lap.

According to MS Copilot he’s the bearded man standing directly behind the drummer. Keep in mind that AI is comparing a picture of bearded man who may not have had a beard at the beginning of the Civil War, when he was 17 years old.

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GENEALOGY- DON’T FORGET TO LEAVE YOUR SECRET DECODER

One of our earlier projects involved organizing and scanning 12 banker’s boxes worth of genealogical records and family photographs for a client whose father had recently passed away and had assembled the collection. Our goal was to compile family history books.

As we worked our way through it, we noticed that most of the pictures did not have names but instead had a code on the back of the image, sometimes crossed out and replaced with another number.

The client had no idea what the numbers represented and was unable to identify the old family photos. We then tried to break the code, thinking of birth or death dates, sometimes it seemed to translate, most of the time it did not.

The client’s father was an engineer and had lots of information on grid paper that included numbers, but nothing made sense to us.

Meanwhile, we had scanned and saved the pictures using the codes as the file name. We continued to develop the narrative, but the images took a backseat, preventing us from completing an essential part of the process. Genealogy.

Finally, about six months into the process, the client found the code book at the bottom of the fire safe. It turned out his original code was insufficient as the number of people in a family would exceed the available digits, so he had to develop a new code and renumber the pictures.

We were then able to identify the pictures and complete the process. Of course, most of us don’t know when our time will come but try to put the secret decoder book on top of the papers in the safe!

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GENEALOGY- CAPTAIN JOHN HARPER AND HIS WHARF

My 6th Great Grandfather John Harper was born on March 3, 1728, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was apprenticed in 1740 to Richard Boyley. After his father’s death, he overheard his uncle and a family friend urging his mother to bind him out to a trade. He was unwilling to do this, so he ran away to the sea. The captain of the vessel died during the voyage, and being of sufficient education, he was the only member of the crew who understood navigation. He was chosen as captain, despite not even being twenty-one years of age at the time.

On one voyage, he was shipwrecked on the Coast of France and swam ashore, holding his father’s watch in his mouth. Eventually, he became a large shipowner and accumulated a substantial fortune. He suffered losses due to French naval depredations, and his claims remain in abeyance under the French Spoliation Act.

John married Sarah Wells on October 20, 1750, the daughter of Joseph Wells of Pennsylvania. Sarah was a Quaker and was disowned for marrying out of unity. They joined the Second Presbyterian Church. They lived on Front St. in Philadelphia. They had 14 children. She died around 1780. John was remarried on November 25, 1782, to Mary Reynolds Cunningham, a widow and daughter of John Reynolds of Winchester, Virginia. She was born in Londonderry, Ireland, on June 4, 1756. They had eight more children, bringing their total to twenty-two. The youngest and oldest are 45 years apart in age. Several of their children married into prominent families, including the Washingtons, Biddles, and Vowells.

John was a ship’s captain and later a merchant in Philadelphia. He ventured to the West Indies, Ireland, Portugal, and Nova Scotia. In 1773, he was introduced to Colonel George Washington by a mutual acquaintance about relocating his mercantile firm, Harper and Hartshorne, to Alexandria, Virginia. He stayed overnight several times at Mt. Vernon. He purchased George Washington’s townhome in Fairfax. Around 1774, they moved to Alexandria, where they engaged in business as wheat purchasers. In 1775, he ended his partnership with William Hartshorne and John went on to become a prosperous shipping merchant and a respected citizen of Alexandria. Genealogy.

His shipping business was conducted from Harper’s Wharf on the Potomac, at the foot of Prince Street (see the map above). He owned a fleet of sailing ships, which he used to export grain, flour, tobacco, and other commodities primarily to the islands of the Caribbean and South America. His warehouse still stands at the corner of Prince and Union. The grain shaft still runs from the 3rd through the 5th floor. In 1779, he was elected as a member of the first Alexandria City Council.

During the Revolution, he sympathized with the colonies and procured ammunition, powder, drums, and colors from Philadelphia to equip the local regiments. He was a Presbyterian who worshiped first in Philadelphia and later joined the First Presbyterian Church in Alexandria.

As a Federalist, he was appointed as a Justice of the Peace on President John Adams’ last day in office. Jefferson challenged the appointments of himself and four others, which were brought before the Supreme Court in Marbury v. Madison, a landmark case.

He purchased a substantial amount of real estate in Alexandria and the greater Fairfax County area. He owned several homes on Prince Street, where his sea captains lived. This is now known as “Captain’s Row”. Today, you can see his homes at 207, 209, 211, 213, and 215 Prince St. (all on the North side of the street, odd addresses). His Prince St. homes are most famous for being the residence of Dr. James Craik, Surgeon General of the Continental Army, who attended to George Washington at his death. He also purchased an estate for himself in Fairfax County, known as “Walnut Hill.” It was situated very near Ash Grove, the home of Bryan, Lord Fairfax, a close friend of his, and whose estate he managed. He also owned a country estate called Mt. Airy. He later built two brick homes on Washington Street in Alexandria. In 1797, he became ill and had to scale back his business pursuits. He was supposedly chagrined over his last nine children, as Mary was a childless widow, and he had not anticipated a much larger family. Tradition says that she also convinced him to leave the bulk of his estate to his last nine children. Mary died in September 1800. He died in Alexandria on May 7, 1804, at the age of 75. He is buried in Alexandria. His will consisted of eleven pages, leaving legacies to all his living children and the children of his deceased children.

I visited John Harper’s warehouse in 1996; according to the tenants, Captain John Harper is said to haunt the 5th floor.

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GENEALOGY- WHERE DID OUR SHIPS END UP?

I receive interesting calls from time to time, from individuals seeking fortune from or justice for their ancestors.

Recently, I received a call from someone claiming to be descended from the original owners of the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria. They were looking to set the record straight and to ensure that the proceeds from the voyages were properly distributed to the rightful heirs.

I told them that if they were looking for recovery, their only hope was to pursue a government, as any private party’s funds would have been long distributed and would be impossible to follow. In contrast, the Spanish government could choose to reconcile past wrongs. They needed first to find a Spanish lawyer willing to take on the case before a genealogist would become involved.

They did send me a pedigree chart. However, either I am not reading it correctly, or there are some significant gaps in the descendants of Adam and Eve. They did indicate that they were only nine generations removed from the victims of the theft, which is too few for approximately 550 years.

The chart shows a descent from King David to Jesus Christ, to Islamic (is that a person?). It also portrays Charles the Lion as a brother of Charlemagne (which he was not), and depicts a rapid descent from Charles to Ferdinand III, spanning three generations in 344 years. I believe Ferdinand III (1452-1516) is Ferdinand II, King of Aragon, and not Ferdinand II, King of Spain, who was the sponsor of Christopher Columbus. Genealogy.

Meanwhile, Jesus Christ appears again on the chart with a son named Louis. I’ve always believed that Christ did not have children, and I’ve no issue with folks named Louis, but ‘Lou, the grandson of God’ doesn’t resonate with me.

Then, from Lou, we cover three generations, 313 years before reaching Miguel Fernandez Caballero, a well-known figure (pictured) who lived from 1495 to 1575 and was sometimes recorded as the son of Ferdinand II. However, the four generations now span 607 years.

The inclusion of the House of Ishmael, Aixa, and Boabdil (pictured below, leaving Granada) is about the Nasrid Dynasty, the Islamic rulers of Spain, and I believe they’re part of the story.

So, I’ll wait to see if they find a Spanish lawyer willing to take the case.

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GENEALOGY- MORE ON THE J. ADDISON SMITH FAMILY’S DOINGS

Thomas Dudley’s wife, Matilda Brooks (pictured to the right) married Englishman Francis George Ryan on November 22, 1885, in Brattleboro, VT.

Ryan came to CA, where he was a land developer and became the silent partner of Abbot Kinney, a cigarette manufacturer and the visionary developer of Ocean Park and later Venice. “In September 1891, Kinney & Ryan purchased a 1-1/2 mile long, narrow strip of dunes along the shoreline south of Santa Monica extending from Strand Street to Brooks Avenue, and a 275-acre tract of partially marshy beachfront land.

At this time, investors in beach properties favored bluffs, but Kinney & Ryan believed that the time would come when the sand close to the ocean would be eagerly sought after. The property was purchased with a long-term view to the future, and it was decided not to put any of it on the market. To encourage building, water was brought in, the tract was sewered, boardwalks were laid, and lots were leased to people who desired to put up small cottages. Kinney & Ryan (Ocean Park Development Company) built a pier, golf course, horse-racing track, boardwalk, and other resort amenities on the northernmost edge of their holdings.”

Matilda divorced Ryan on December 18, 1895, over his drunkenness and failure to provide. She married him a second time in April 1897. Ryan died in 1898 at age 43 from a heart attack. His estate was worth $9500. In the 1900 census, Matilda lists herself as a “capitalist.”

Matilda Ryan, as of 1895, was working on land deals with Abbot Kinney. After marrying Dudley, Matilda took her two daughters, Alice Brooks and Elizabeth Montague Ryan, who had kept their father’s name of Ryan, to England following the break-up of her marriage. They first arrived in England on May 8, 1910, when their ship, “Cedric”, docked in the north-eastern port of Liverpool.

Once they settled in England, both sisters began to take part in lawn tennis tournaments there, although only Elizabeth, the more talented player, continued to do so regularly. (They had both previously taken part in tournaments from their early teens, playing up and down the western coast of the United States and Canada.) Their holiday turned into a permanent stay. Genealogy.

Meanwhile, Dudley became Abbot Kinney’s partner. The real estate firm Kinney & Ryan, owners and promoters of the Ocean Park Beach Tract, was succeeded by the firm Kinney & Dudley. Dudley and Kinney did not get along, so Dudley sold his half interest in the Ocean Park Improvement Company.

In 1900, Dudley was elected a member of the Santa Monica City Board of Trustees, serving as chairman of the Board until 1907. Upon the reorganization of the city government under a Freeholders Charter in 1907, Dudley was elected mayor. Dudley was ousted from office for using taxpayer money to build the first tennis courts in Santa Monica.

Matilda Dudley’s marriage to Thomas Dudley did not work out, and they separated, likely around 1910 (she is listed in the 1910 and 1920 censuses with him; however, this doesn’t necessarily mean she was living in the same household). They divorced on July 11, 1921, after she expressed concern that he was attending poker parties with Louise Williams. Dudley remarried in July 1922, his third wife, 27-year-old Louise Riddell-Williams of Santa Monica. Likely, Dudley met Louise on the tennis circuit, as she was famous for winning the U.S. National Championship in Women’s Doubles three times: in 1913, 1914, and 1921, with Mary Kendall Browne. Dudley lived with his mother-in-law in Santa Monica as of 1930 and worked as a stockbroker. Louise Riddell Dudley died June 27, 1958, in Los Angeles at age 73.

More on the daughters in the next edition.

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GENEALOGY- REMIND ME HOW WE’RE RELATED

Rolling Stone’s bassist Bill Wyman, at 52, married 18-year-old Mandy Smith on June 2, 1989, whom he had “fallen in love with” when she was 13. Smith had by this time developed health issues, which she blamed on being on birth control pills since the age of 14, when she said her relationship with Wyman was illegally consummated; not long after the wedding, she weighed only 80 pounds. Wyman reportedly grew impatient with her health problems, and she moved out only weeks after they wed; the marriage officially ended in divorce after 23 months. Smith won a settlement then worth a reported US$880,000.

The story took another surprising turn in 1993, when Wyman’s son, Stephen Wyman, married Patsy Smith, the 46-year-old mother of Bill’s ex-wife, Mandy Smith. Stephen was 30 years old at the time. Consequently, the ex-Rolling Stone became his own son’s ex-son-in-law, the father-in-law of his ex-mother-in-law, as well as the step-grandfather of his ex-wife. Likewise, Patsy Smith would be Mandy’s daughter-in-law as well as her mother. Genealogy.

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GENEALOGY- PRESERVE YOUR FAMILY HISTORY, TODAY

Reach out to Dancestors Genealogy. Our genealogists will research, discover, and preserve your family history. No one is getting any younger, and stories disappear from memory every year, eventually fading from our ability to find them.

Preserve your legacy and the heritage of your ancestors.

Paper gets thrown in the trash; books survive!

Ready to embark on your family history journey? Don’t hesitate. Call Dan Nelson and get your project started!