For decades a crudely typed one-page letter was the sum total of our family history passed down from my grandfather, Thomas F. Adams. If one were to assume this document to be accurate, our U.S. ancestry began with Henry Adams who arrived at Braintree, Massachusetts, from England, around 1632. The letter, written by my grandfather’s sister, Betty, notes that through Henry’s lineage came John and John Quincy, early presidents of our country. The document goes on to state that our most distant recorded ancestor, George Adams of Guilford County, North Carolina, is “a near relative” of John and John Quincy.

But through a distant relative, Linda Lamb Monticelli, and the documents she shared recently, we now believe that not only is the connection with America’s past presidents inaccurate, but our relationship with Henry Adams is nonexistent. Even more interesting, our Adams lineage does not originate in England as assumed for generations. Linda has done extensive research and uncovered a heritage that would have surely surprised Betty Adams and all her Adams contemporaries.

Linda’s document, “The Story of Our Adams Family,” begins with this paragraph:

“Our first Adams ancestors who came to America were Nicholas Adams and his wife Juliana. On November 23, 1719, at the Lutheran Church in the small village of Eichtersheim, Baden-Wurttemberg, in what later became Germany, Nicholas Adams and Juliana Schweikhardt were married.”

It’s speculated that Nicholas Adam (later changed to Adams) was born around 1695. Approximately eight years after their marriage he, his wife and their two-year-old son, Jonas Paul, boarded the ship William & Sarah in Germany bound for the new world. Records show they arrived at the port in Philadelphia on September 18, 1727.

After arriving in Pennsylvania the German immigrants moved inland searching for a better life. Linda Lamb Monticelli goes on to write, “It took folks like the Germans and the Scotch-Irish to put their backs to the ocean and see home in front of them. Escaping devastating wars, religious persecution, economic disasters, and all of those other things that still cause people to come to these shores, the Germans and the Scotch-Irish had no intention of returning to their native lands. They were here to stay. They didn’t look east but to the south and west toward land. They didn’t see wolves and Indians, what they saw were opportunities.”

About 70 miles inland Nicholas, his family and others settled in the “western wilderness” area of Pennsylvania in what would become Lancaster County. Records from 1734 show that Nicholas purchased 200 acres of land. Their religion being of utmost importance, the Germans quickly established churches from which a fair amount of genealogical information comes. Nicholas and his family were members of Muddy Creek Lutheran Church whose records date back as early as 1728. Early church documents list the birth and baptism of Nicholas and Juliana’s American-born children. It was on September 29, 1729, that our lineage continued with their son John.

Records show that John married Eve Smith, daughter of Peter and Barbara, on April 8, 1751. This German family had immigrated to Pennsylvania in September 1733. The Smiths followed the trail of previous German immigrants and settled on 100 acres of land in the same area as the Adams. The Smiths soon became members of Muddy Creek Lutheran Church thus providing more records of family members and significant dates.

It was sometime between 1752 and 1755 that Peter Smith and John Adams moved their families to Rowan County, North Carolina. It might be assumed that one of the reasons for this move was the French and Indian War (1754-1763). During this period Pennsylvania was the worst sufferer of all the thirteen colonies. And it was not the Quakers and the Anglicans in Philadelphia who suffered most; it was the Pennsylvania Dutch (Germans) and the Scotch-Irish on the frontier. These two peoples formed a protecting band and were the first line of defense for the people living in the easternmost counties of Pennsylvania.

Another reason might be that, as more and more German and Scotch-Irish immigrants settled throughout the western counties, specifically Lancaster, York, and Adams counties in Pennsylvania and into Maryland, land became scarce, especially for the younger sons who did not inherit the family farm. It was about this time when land was being offered at a much lower price by Lord Granville in North Carolina and by the South Carolina government.

Records show that John and Eve’s first son, John Jr., was born in Pennsylvania on January 29, 1752. Then in 1755 both Peter Smith and John Adams show up on the Taxpayers List in Rowan County, North Carolina.

John and Eve Smith Adams’ second child, Barbara, was born around 1754 either in Pennsylvania or along the trail to North Carolina. Three more children were born in Rowan County; George Adams, born about 1756, Peter Adams, born March 11, 1759, and Susanna Adams born about 1761. It’s this George Adams, John and Eve’s second son, who eventually moved to St. Clair County, Alabama.

Linda Lamb Monticelli shares some fascinating background information about John Adams:

“Most likely it was Nicholas Adams who taught his son John the skills he needed to learn to be a potter. When John Adams, his wife Eve, their son John and possibly their daughter Barbara moved to Salisbury in Rowan County, North Carolina in May 1755, our John Adams was the first documented potter in the state of North Carolina.”

The young couple arrived in Rowan County by May 29, 1755. It was on this date when John Adams, the potter, purchased one of the first lots in the town of Salisbury, the county seat for Rowan County, North Carolina. His lot was on the northwest corner of Liberty Street and Long Street in Salisbury and is where the family home and John’s pottery shop were located.

On August 23, 1759, Peter and Barbara Smith received a grant for 584 acres of land on Cane Creek in Rowan County, North Carolina. Another 658 acres were granted on April 4, 1761. And, according to Linda Lamb Monticelli, by this time all of George’s family, including John Adams, were “settled on land adjacent or near” Peter.

On January 20, 1762, Eve’s brother, George Smith, deeded to John Adams 229 acres of land on the north fork of Cain Creek. Soon after, at the age of 32, John died suddenly, attested to by the fact that he had no will. On July 12, 1762, the Rowan County Court appointed John’s widow Eve and her brother George Smith administrators of John’s estate. Three years later, on July 12, 1765, George Smith was appointed guardian of John and Eve’s five children. According to laws at this time, when a man died his children were considered orphans even though his wife was still alive.

This turn of events must have been difficult for young George Adams who was only 6 years old when his father died. But to further add to his misfortune, inheritance laws during the colonial era dictated that land be passed down to the oldest son when there was no will to specify differently. George’s mother Eve remarried sometime the following year, in 1766, to George Knortzer.

George Adams would have been about 9 years old when George Smith became his guardian. He is mentioned again in the will of Peter Smith, his grandfather, probated in Guilford County in 1767. George would have been 15 years old. The will mentions grandchildren of Peter by his daughter, Eve, and her deceased husband John. The grandchildren listed are John, George, Peter, Barbara, and Susanna.

On November 3, 1774, in Rowan County, North Carolina, a 22-year-old George Adams was bound to James Hendrix to learn the trade of wheelwright and turner. (A wheelwright built and repaired wheels for carts and wagons. A turner was a wood lathe operator.)

Further records show that in 1779, at the age of 27, George, along with his older brother John, enlisted in the North Carolina militia to fight in the Revolutionary War. George volunteered on three occasions, once in 1779 and twice in 1781, serving a total of 15 months. Engagements he fought in include the Battle of Brier Creek and the Battle of Guilford County Courthouse in which he was captured and taken prisoner. He was eventually released and returned to Guilford County where he lived until moving to Laurens County, South Carolina, in 1785. He owned farmland in Laurens County, just north of the Saluda River.

It was while living in Laurens County that George’s only recorded child, Thomas Robert Adams, was born. (One source notes George’s wife as Rachael Reed, but she’s not listed in any official records.) George’s estate papers at the time of his death mention that he had “one son of legal age.” Thomas was born in 1794. He was reportedly a teacher while in South Carolina but the first actual records of Thomas show that in 1813, at the age of 19, he moved to Franklin County, Tennessee. The following year he enlisted in the Tennessee Militia and served six months before being honorably discharged in May of 1815. In August of 1822, Thomas married Lavina Box, also from South Carolina, in Winchester, Tennessee. Their first two children, George John and Mahala (spelled Mahaila in some documents), were born in Tennessee in 1817 and 1821, respectively. Sometime between the birth of Mahala and the birth of their third child, Nathan, in 1825, Thomas and Lavina, along with several other families, moved to St. Clair County, Alabama and helped establish the settlement of Trout Creek.

Apparently Thomas and Lavina relied on his father, still living in South Carolina, to obtain the land in Alabama on which they settled. The elderly George “entered” 80 acres of land in St. Clair County on November 22, 1826, and eventually moved to Alabama in 1835. According to my father, his father spoke of the 78-year-old George making the treacherous journey in a straight-back chair, in the back of a horse-drawn wagon. Ironically this land grant was made by then president John Quincy Adams.

In reading between the lines, one would have to assume that George’s life was one of numerous hardships. His childhood struggles and war experiences were alluded to earlier. After George moved to Alabama, on two occasions his house was destroyed by fire. After reapplying for his war pension check that was destroyed in one of the fires, he was informed that the annual amount was to be reduced from $67.50 to $33.66. George reportedly died a very poor man on November 25, 1845, at the age of 89, having lived in Alabama for 10 years. According to one source George “kept house by himself after his wife Rachael died, and was cared for by a relative who lived nearby. She would cook his meals and do chores at his home. One day he failed to greet her and upon entering the home he was discovered in his bed. He died a few days later.”

In the meantime, his son Thomas had two more children, Margaret, born in 1827, and Martin Van, born in 1836. Thomas “claimed bounty land” of 80 acres in 1852 on what is now the greater business district of Ragland. He later sold this land and applied for additional land. This application was approved in 1856 and Thomas was granted an additional 100 acres.

It was about this time that Thomas’ wife, Lavina, died. She and Thomas were listed on the census of 1850 but the census of 1860 shows Thomas living with his daughter, Mahala, and her husband, William D. Floyd, in Broken Arrow, Alabama. These same census records indicate that Thomas was a farmer, a stone cutter, and a hatter. At the time of his death on March 6, 1876, he owned a hat shop in Trout Creek (later named Ragland) that he left to his grandson, Asberry Floyd, Mahala and William’s son.

Thomas is reportedly buried near the Broken Arrow cemetery in Coal City, Alabama. His will, dated Dec. 12, 1862 attest to his devotion to Christ: “...I resign my soul with the utmost humility into the hands of Almighty God my Creator humbly hoping for a blessed resurrection ... my blessed savior and redeemer Jesus Christ.”

Our lineage continues with Thomas’ oldest son, George John Adams, born in Tennessee. It is this chapter of our family’s history that records one of the most unusual yet tragic events.

In 1839, at the age of 22, George married for the first time. No records give his wife’s name. St. Clair county census records of 1840, which list only heads of households by name, notes a wife one son (William) as members of the household. A second son, John Milton, was born in 1841 and it’s assumed George’s wife died soon thereafter (if not in childbirth) because records indicate George remarried in 1842. By his second wife, Louisa Floyd, George had five more children; Margaret, Zacharia Taylor, Nathan, Robert Freeman and Mary Ann (Mollie).

As the Civil War between the states began to escalate, George and his family were living in Greensport, Alabama in St. Clair County. (This land is presently under the waters of Lake Neely Henry.) While there, in 1863, a Sgt. John F. Green, home on leave from the Civil War, paid George $400 to “substitute” in his place, a common practice at the time.

On July 1, 1863, at the age of 46 George enlisted in Company A, 10th Alabama Infantry at Fredricksburg, Virginia. Within days he found himself engaged in one of the Civil War’s most notable events, the Battle of Gettysburg. On the second day of fighting, July 2, he was captured and sent to Fort Delaware. Ironically, two days later, July 4, Louisa used the $400 paid to George to purchase 114 acres in Greensport, Alabama.

George remained at Fort Delaware from July 7 until July 31 when a prisoner exchange took him to Petersburg, Virginia. It was there, on August 22, that he died of chronic diarrhea. He was buried in a mass grave at the Old Blanford Church in Petersburg marked simply “Alabama”.

It could be assumed that because of George’s death, Louisa could not maintain the farm. The census seven years later, in 1870, lists her and her two youngest children living with her 27-year-old daughter, Margaret, and Margaret’s two children.

Louisa applied for widow’s pension on May 16, 1887. Further pension records, for which she had to reapply every year, indicate she was living in Fairview in 1896-97, Coal City in 1898 and Pell City in 1915. Her sole possessions were listed in a document dated May 30, 1899 as consisting of four sheep valued at $4.00 and “household goods” valued at $15.00 for a grand total of $19.00.

She lived with numerous other relatives until her death in July 1922 at the age of 98. She’s buried in an unmarked grave at Harkey’s Chapel next to her son-in-law, James Singleton.

Louisa and George’s son Robert Freeman married Mary Elizabeth Wyatt on Christmas Day, 1870. This couple has the largest single family on our Adams family tree. Their 10 children include Albert Thomas, Henry Erwin, Rosa Ella, Minnie Ann, Stella Bell, Richard Virgil, Oscar Hendon, Julius Benson, Nora and my great grandfather, George Corbin.

Little is known of Robert and Mary Elizabeth, but one of the oldest photos in my Adams Family photo collection records them, their children and grandchildren around 1898. Though records indicate Robert was born in Trout Creek, some records show that he and Mary Elizabeth raised their family on a farm in the Coal City community of St. Clair County.

According to notes from my grandfather, Robert “was a farmer all his life.” He lived to the ripe old age of 87, passing away in 1940. Consequently my father had some vague memories of time spent with him. Dad’s most vivid memory of his great grandfather revolved around his extended visits. Dad, being the only son at the time was the natural choice for sharing a bed with Robert. The memory of sleeping with a tall, lanky Robert, squeezed in a single bed, was not pleasant but always brought a chuckle to dad as he’d reminisce.

Robert’s oldest child, George Corbin Adams, born November 26, 1871, married Mary Eliza Harmon on April 28, 1892. Their children include five daughters; Claudia Lee, Nelle Gray, Winnie Jane, Elizabeth Christine and a daughter who died at birth. Their only son was Thomas Freeman Adams, my grandfather.

Mary Eliza Harmon was one of two daughters born to Charles Thomas and Martha Jane Harmon. Charles was the local blacksmith in the Coal City community. Of interest is the fact that their older daughter, Missouri Caledonia “Dona”, married a a professional photographer by the name of Will Martin. Consequently a substantial photographic record of that portion of our family was passed down.

For 18 of his younger years George Corbin served as a school teacher in several small St. Clair county towns. According to his granddaughter, Jnell Pleasant, during this teaching career George attended college at Jacksonville State Normal School (later named Jacksonville State University), in Jacksonville, Alabama. His name does not appear on the University’s archived documents that record only students who graduated so it can be assumed that George did not complete his education. (School records indicate that his youngest daughter, Elizabeth, graduated in 1925.)

George’s first recorded teaching assignment was at New Port School, a one-room shack in the Woods Bend community just south of downtown Ragland. It was in front of this school that a group picture was made February 25, 1898, with a 27-year-old George and 32 students. He eventually taught at a larger school in Coal City, and according to oral history he served in several more St. Clair County schools. It was in Coal City that George’s first child, Claudia, was born in 1894.

George’s daughter Nelle shared with her daughter, Jnell, that his teaching profession caused he and his family to move from town to town across St. Clair County. Then, while teaching and living in the community of Sand Mountain, Mary Eliza took it upon herself to establish the first U.S. Post to this small town and served as it’s first postmaster.

According to some notes found recently, George eventually left the teaching profession to work in the lumber business. Jnell Pleasant recalled her mother speaking of this transition. George reportedly loved teaching but health problems that doctor assumed were related to breathing chalk dust forced George to pursue another career.

It was in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s that St. Clair County was receiving regional recognition for its mining and lumber industries. In an article about the St. Clair community of Broken Arrow, the September 5, 1883, edition of the Southern Aegis, states: “Broken Arrow is on a great big boom. There is no use to cavil about it. This is the coming town of St. Clair county. It is built on wealth. Its hills are filled with coal and covered with timber.”

According to Jnell, George and a business partner opened a lumber mill in the Coal City area. The family settled into a house near Mary Eliza’s parents. According to Jnell, it was about this time, when her mother, Nelle, was 12 years old, that the Adams’ house burned. Jnell recalls hearing her mother tell that George felt the fire was no accident. He had refused a job for a local young man whom George was certain was seeking revenge.

There’s no known record of when his lumber business opened or closed, but on March 15, 1911, George was appointed postmaster of the Ragland post office after the acting postmaster resigned. He held that position until October 4, 1913. The government publication Postal Laws and Regulations of 1913 indicates George’s annual salary would have been between $1000 and $1900 depending on the gross receipts taken in by the Ragland post office.

Records indicate that the following year, December 30, 1914, George and Eliza purchased real estate in Ragland. Oddly, though, only Mary Eliza’s name appeared on the deed. The deed was satisfied June 22, 1921. In January, 1923, George and Eliza mortgaged the property for $310 with The Bank of Ragland. That mortgage was satisfied in April, 1926.

The following year, on March 2, 1922, George was again named postmaster. The next year, 1923, George and Mary Eliza purchased another house in Ragland. Mortgage papers were filed in March with the Bank of Ragland for $310. Tragically Mary Eliza passed away the following June, after 31 years of marriage and just days before her 48th birthday.

Though I’ve not found records of the marriage, my father often spoke of George taking a second wife soon after Eliza’s death. It was said this new wife was a most unpleasant woman, who brought two children from a previous marriage into the relationship. According to Jnell Pleasant, when George died suddenly on September 14, 1930, after as many as seven years of marriage, this second wife did not allow George’s children to receive any of his meager estate. Notably she refused them access to a sizeable, cherished book collection that he had managed to acquire. And according to my father she destroyed a lot of old family records and memorabilia simply to spite George’s children. An unbiased, but admittedly uninformed, reflection of the circumstances surrounding George’s second marriage might conclude that there were issues with all parties involved. It could be assumed that George’s children were not very welcoming of a new woman into the family, causing problems for all concerned.

Seven years earlier George had buried Eliza alongside her parents and sister in Harkey’s Chapel Cemetery. George was laid to rest in the cemetery at Ragland’s First Methodist Church.

Records show that George’s assistant postmaster for the last eight years of his tenure, his daughter Nelle G. Adams, served as “acting postmaster” upon his death. It’s unsure why Nelle did not pursue the postmaster job, but in the following November two of her siblings, Tom and Claudia, began testing and applying for the Ragland postmaster position.

George and Elizabeth’s only son, Thomas ‘Tom’ Freeman Adams, my grandfather, was born in 1898 in Coal City. It was around 1907 when Tom’s family moved a few miles down the dirt road to the small mining town of Ragland. According to a 1978 interview printed in the St. Clair County paper News-Aegis, Tom found his first job in 1911. “My daddy walked down to the stave mill with me and met Mr. Perry Hagan, the superintendent. My daddy said, ‘Mr. Hagan, this boy wants a job.’ I don’t remember what Mr. Hagan replied, but a few days later they called me to come work. I went to work for 50 cents a day for 10 hours a day. I was later raised to 75 cents a day, $3.75 a week; that was more money than I knew how to handle.”

It was about this same time that Tom met Naomi Prince, the daughter of a Methodist circuit-riding preacher. According to History of Ragland United Methodist Church, John Cabell Prince, originally from northwest Alabama, moved his wife and only daughter into the superannuated home in Ragland:

“In 1908, W. T. Brown (Pres. Ragland Coal Co.) donated a Superannuated Home for Brother Prince and his family. It was located southwest of the cement plant. It was dedicated by Brother J. W. Norton who was Superintendent of Superannuated Homes at the time. The home was named Lelah Kathryn Brown Home in honor of the donor. In 1911 Brother Prince passed on to his Heavenly Home. The superannuated home was then sold and a new one built in town on Kathryn Street where Mrs. Prince and her daughter, Naomi Prince (Adams) lived until her death in 1920.”3

Tom and Naomi married on Christmas Day, 1918. Almost a year later, December 22, 1919, their first child, Mary Frances, was born.

According to my father, at the time of Mary Frances’ birth, Tom and Naomi were living in the small community of Tate’s Gap near Oneonta. Tom had found employment at a local drug store.

But the young marriage was less than stable. When asked years later, Mary Frances confessed, “On the day I was born, my father was not living with my mother.” Mary Frances’ son, Tom Bennett wrote, “I recall a conversation with my mom Mary Frances about how Granddad as a young man was sort of ... the fun-loving town hellraiser.”

It could be speculated that Tom Adams’ propensity for fun, Naomi living away from her widowed mother, parenting their first child and then the death of her mother in 1920 contributed to compounding the stress on a young marriage. But Tom and Naomi persevered. He found employment back in Ragland at the cement plant in 1922 as a supply clerk. That same year their first son was born on April 25, but died May 20. The following years ushered in five more children; George Prince born in 1924, Martha Jane in 1926, Sarah Tom in 1929, Madge Elizabeth in 1932 and Robert Freeman in 1935. It was during this period, on January 2, 1925 to be exact, that Tom and Naomi purchased the house that they would call “home” for the rest of their life for $450.

As mentioned earlier, after his father’s death in September of 1930, Tom “had a little inklin’”5 that he’d like to be postmaster of Ragland. He passed the Civil Service exam in November with a score of 95 in “Accounts and arithmetic”, 75 in “Penmanship”, 73 in “Letter writing” and 80 in “Business training, experience, and fitness”. In the meantime, his oldest sister, Claudia Adams Box, was making plans to apply for the same position. She had worked in various positions at the post office since 1911, and applied for the exam in November. Their older sister, Nelle, the official postmaster assistant at the time of George’s death, made application with the government to hire Claudia in an official capacity. Apparently George had subsidized Claudia’s $30 per month salary up until that time. In a letter dated October 23, 1930, Nelle requested bond for Claudia, a necessary requirement for employment with the post office.

We can only speculate, but I believe the family conversations during these few months must have been quite lively. In the final analysis, on February 2, 1931, Tom, confessing years later to some “political pull”, was officially appointed postmaster by Republican President Herbert Hoover.

Four years later to the day, February 2, 1935, Tom submitted his letter of resignation. It can comfortably be assumed that Democratic President Franklin Roosevelt was quick to replace Hoover’s appointees.

Tom immediately went back to work in the supply department at the cement plant. His dedication and hard work paid off when he was promoted to purchasing agent. According to Tom, “I had to work hard since I didn’t have a college degree. But Mr. Bayer liked me and had confidence in me and I couldn’t let him down.” The certificate attesting to his promotion, hung proudly on the living room wall for many years, was dated March 2, 1945.

Soon after, Tom decided to try his hand in the political arena. He was appointed mayor in 1951 when the presiding mayor died unexpectedly. The next year he ran for and was elected to that position. He managed to hold the office just one term and in 1956 was voted out. During his tenure he was jokingly referred to as the only Republican mayor in the state of Alabama.

Many years later he attempted another stab at politics but on a higher level. He was the Republican candidate for Judge Inferior Court Northern Judicial Division, St. Clair County, in November 1968, but lost the election.

Tom and Naomi, as most small town residents in their era, were very involved with the local church. As noted earlier, Naomi’s father was a Methodist preacher so understandably she was raised in that denomination. But in the small town of Ragland the lines between Ragland First Baptist and First Methodist were unusually blurred. According to my father it was not uncommon to attend one church’s Sunday morning service and then the others evening service. But Tom and Naomi’s name were firmly planted on the records of First Baptist of Ragland. Church records show that during his lifetime Tom served as deacon, clerk and treasure.

It was the fall of 1978 when Naomi‘s failing health required her to be moved to a local nursing home. She passed away in August of 1979. Within months, Tom walked the same path. He was moved to the same nursing home and passed away in August of 1980.