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Since John seemed not to want this discussion derailing his "Webb's New Militarism" thread, I am copying the content over to a new thread.

As to my family history, there was a Captain Thomas Fuller, an ancestor, on the Mayflower but he didn't take kindly to the Puritan way in Massachusetts so he moved south. He was in Maryland at the time of the Cromwell Protectorate and helped set up a Protestant government to replace the Roman Catholic government of the Calvert family. But, the Restoration led to his moving on further south and he wound up on the Sea Islands of Georgia raising cotton, indigo, and sugar. Another ancestor was Pastor John Robinson, the pastor for the Pilgrim community who did not sail on the Mayflower but who remained in England to organize future expeditions. My family history has him in Plimouth goal for a while as a dissenter. A third ancestral line was the Parsons line, also Mayflower passengers, but it has a more interesting later person, Goody Parsons. She was accused of witchcraft during the Salem Witch Hysteria but was found to be "Not Guilty" so she then turned and sued her accusers of libel! There are a number of web sites devoted to her case. Here is one: http://ccbit.cs.umass.edu/parsons/goody ... /home.html

I also have Van Antwerp ancestors dating back to Dutch New Amsterdam. Then we get to the Chesapeake Bay area. I have ancestors at Jamestown in 1607 and at St. Mary's City, Maryland in March of 1634. One of my ancestors, Alexander Magruder, was apparently taken prisoner at the Battle of Dunbar in 1650 and sent in chains to Maryland in 1651. He served out his indenture and then married well, siring a number of children who intermarried on both sides of the Potomac River.

The Thomas Fuller who moved to the Sea Islands became very involved in the life and society of Charleston, South Carolina and of Savannah, Georgia.

In all of these family lines, the men have stood up and been counted when the call has come for volunteers for combat, right down to the current generation. I tried but was not able to serve due to an eye injury when I was twelve, but my cousin, VMI class of 1958, spent a bunch of time spookng around in North VietNam in mid and late 1960s. Given that he is a round-eye and some 6'3 or 4" tall, that must have taken some doing.

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Trying to Walk in the Light, Hugh
1 John 1:5

I have certain ancestors whom I cherish more than the others. One is my Great Grandfather Junius Jay Wilson MacMurray. He was a son of slave-holding plantation owneers in southern Missouri, at Carondalet. At the age of 16, he was enrolled at Washington College, now Washington University, in St. Louis, MO, in the 1860-1861 academic year and was approached by a group of pro-secessionsists who were planning to take control of the St. Louis Arsenal and hand out the powder and ball therein to their side so that they could take Missouri out of the Union. They had assumed that Junius was in favor since he came from a slave-holding family. They were wrong. He played along with them to get the details of their plot and carried the information to a pro-Union group who got to the arsenal first and held it until Federal troops could come to their relief from Jefferson Barracks outside of town. For his efforts, Junius was given a commission as a 1st Lieutenant in the Missouri Volunteer Artillery. He served under Grant, McPherson, and Sherman all of the way from Vicksburg to Columbia, S.C. At Vicksburg, his battery was so noted for its efficiency that Grant chose that place to take Pendleton's surrender of the city. General McPherson, who was killed outside Atlanta, gave Junius a telescope to honor his service in the siege of Atlanta.

When the War was over, he tried to go home but they ran him off at the point of a loaded shotgun, so he applied for a commission in the Regular Army. That was in 1866, not a good time to make such an application. But he had some good references such as U. S. Grant and W. T. Sherman who backed his request and he was duly commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant in the 1st Regiment of Artillery. He served in that regiment throughout the Indian Wars and my maternal grandmother was raised, in large part, on the frontier Army posts of the period and when he would go out to talk peace with an Indian tribe, she would ride along on her little white circus pony as a sign that he came in peace. She told some WONDERFUL stories.

His last post was Fort Barrancas, Florida, one of the Coast Artillery forts guarding Pensacola Bay during the Spanish-American War. You may know that Pensacola was a major point of embarkation for troops going to Cuba and Puerto Rico, so protection of the port was most important. A yellow fever epidemic broke out during this period and, while he could send his family north to his Van Antwerp in-laws in Albany, N.Y., he had to remain at Pensacola. He died of complications from the yellow jack.


Another favorite ancestor from that time was William Albert Smoot of Alexandria, Virginia. His family lived in what was, then, a bustling seaport town and had no need for slaves. But, when Lincoln sent Federal troops to occupy the town BEFORE Virginia had seceded, he took offense and rode out to Warrenton, VA, and enlisted in the 4th Virginia Cavalry. He served the entire War in that unit, rising to become the Color Sergeant by the end. Along the way, he was awarded a saber by Robert E. Lee and another by Thomas J. (Stonewall) Jackson for gallantry in action. He was wounded three times and I have a .52 caliber carbine bullet that was taken out of him on one occasion. The 4th Virginia was with Fitzhugh Lee when he broke out of the Appomatox encirclement and headed south to link up with Joseph E. Johnson in North Carolina. But Johnson surrendered to Sherman before they ever got out of Virginia, so they surrendered down around Danville and Lynchburg, near the state line. As Color Sergeant, GGF Smoot was not ready to surrender his regiment's standard to the damnyankees so he rolled it up and tucked it under his tunic, carrying it off of the surrender field. It spent the next several decades sewn up inside of a pillow as possession of such a flag of insurrection by a Confederate veteran was highly illegal, especially since this veteran had NOT signed an oath of allegiance and regained his citizenship. I now have that flag at home and, when I hold it, I feel in touch with the flow of history.

The third of my favorites is, of course, Goody Parsons. How could I not love such an irascible old gal?

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Trying to Walk in the Light, Hugh
1 John 1:5

I believe I visited that fort in Pensacola.
Not too far from the large naval base.

I have tons of ancestors who fought and were killed by the Indians but these all took place in the Worcester and Lancaster areas of Massachusetts through the 1600's.

F.

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Sans Peur Ne Obliviscaris
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