Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Computer classes lead to family search

When J.R. Williams began teaching computer classes to other seniors in a retirement community in Texas, he got lots of questions from people who were searching for their past. For the most part, he brushed the questions aside and moved on to other topics of more interest to him.

Then a woman asked him to help her do a computer search for an ancestor and Williams said he was surprised at how easy it was.

So he did a search for a name from his own past, and came up with nothing.

"That got my attention," he admitted.

A few months later, Williams' search for his own ancestry brought him to Gurdon to attend services at the church where his great-great-grandfather was a charter member, visit the known graves of some and to look for the gravesites of his great-great-grandfather's two wives. Part of the visit was successful, but Williams did not find the unknown graves.

Williams and his wife, Katherine, parked their camper at Caddo Valley and spent several days roaming around the county and surrounding area. Destinations included Jenkins Ferry where an ancestor is believed to have died. His body was never recovered.

"He was buried in the mud there at Jenkins Ferry," Williams said.

Williams great-great-grandfather arrived in Clark County in the 1850s. The family established a plantation at the site of the current Red Martin Country Club and were charter members of Bethlehem Baptist Church. Williams said he is the fifth generation of his family to attend services at the church and several of his ancestors are buried at the Bethlehem Cemetery.

The family moved to the Okolona area at some point around the Civil War. Williams' great-great-grandmother, Marilda Young Williams, is believed to have died around 1861, but it's unknown where she was buried. During their research in Clark County, Williams located information about the family from the library at Ouachita Baptist Universty. Another of Marilda's descendents had submitted a summary of the family's stay in Clark County that indicated Marilda was buried just outside Gurdon and that the railroad tracks now cover the grave site.

"So we'll probably never know for sure," Williams said after locating the disheartening news.

Williams said he and his wife have spent time in the area before, always sightseeing and camping and never giving a thought to their roots. Now he's working on writing his family's history, and on Katherine's.

Katehrine said she hasn't been bitten by the research bug. She does tag along and help clean tombstones, read through historical documents and keep him company.

"I like to read it after he gets it written," she said.

The couple planned to go on to Northeast Arkansas next, working on Katherine's lines.

Williams said he was pleased with the results of their efforts in the county, which included obtaining copies of the chuch's original roll, including the signature of his great-great-grandfather, Alexander S. Williams.

"There'll always be some mysteries," he said. "But that's part of the reason to keep looking."

Williams said he is happy to share information about his family with anyone who believes they might have a link. He can be reached by phone at 806-883-6071, or by e-mail at rwkw@cableone.net.