Lest We Forget, Furry, Button, Bates

Along the way of searching for our ancestors The Three Sisters have made many discoveries about our family.  We often advise those searching for family history that one of the most effective research tools is finding an older family connection that has already done much work on our shared family history.  Two of our most useful bits of Powell history came to us from Furry, Button, and Bates.


James Furry passed on to us his copy of information from our  Charles Powell Bible.  James received this from William Garland Button.  The list of names and dates from this Bible has been one of the most useful tools in tracking down our early American Powell family history.

The Three Sisters have, I believe, more than paid this forward by sharing this and our other family discoveries with hundreds of other interested amateur historians.  We often see something on the net that seems to be a hint of something new only to find ourselves as the originator.

Hazel Bates had been researching her family before some of us were even born.  She shared generously and freely with us and others. One small copy of one piece of paper among the many she sent us that has proven most valuable in establishing our Charles Powell military history was a list of deserters from the Halifax County, Virginia Revolutionary Militia.  This is actually the only Revolutionary War document that we can definitively say is our own Charles Powell.  And, the DAR agrees because we have found DAR membership papers for Charles Powell descendants citing this Halifax County Militia service as proof of Revolutionary service.  However, we have yet to find any DAR document that in any way mentions this is actually documentation of desertion from that Militia.  Just the same, Hazel was a really big help to us in finding our Kentucky Powell family.

We remember.

Freedom

by Fleta

Shackled and Chained,

Yoked and Bound,

Dreaming of Freedom,

New Worlds, New Ground.

Give him just one glance,

He'll never again be found,

Shackled and Chained,

Yoked and Bound.

 

Lilly Hazel Brown Bates 1914-2003

Hazel Lilly Brown Bates was born January 28, 1914 and died April 8, 2003.  She is buried in Greenwood Cemetery, Palmyra, Marion County, Missouri.

Below is an article about our Cousin Hazel by Sister Patsy.

 Hazel Brown Bates was born January 28, 1914 to Matilda Gibson and Francis Brown.  She married James Bates in 1932 and they are blessed with one child, Mary Lu.  Hazel does research on the Cyrus Powell line.  Cyrus was a son of Charles and Leah Goldman Powell.  When we were novices in research, Hazel was our first lead in placing our Powells in this Charles Powell family.  This is her story as she told it.

 

In our younger days we operated a grade A dairy.  We raised registered quarter horses, producing seven or eight colts a year.  My husband showed our horses in horse shows.  Mary Lu and I rode in the Hannibal, Missouri parade several years ago, taking first place on our matched Arabian mounts.  We had a well known golden palomino named Golden Nip Ranch.  We had a red truck and trailer with this logo on the side.  We milked 22 Jersey cows by hand at the start.  Then we built a grade A dairy and our milk was trucked to St. Louis.  Jim was busy in our fields and Mary Lu and I did much of the milking with the help of the milking machines.  I worked for ten years in a shoe factory in Quincy, Illinois.  Later I worked for George Irwin, an art director.  My employment for Mr. Irwin lasted twenty years.  My duties included caring for his art work, keeping a sixteen-room mansion in order, and helping with parties.  Mr. Irwin entertained a lot.  One time Lady Bird Johnson was his guest.  I started researching my family in 1965 and have written twelve books on my heritage.

 

Hazel Brown Bates’ descent from Cyrus Powell is:

 

1. Cyrus Powell / Matilda Porter Crane
2. John Carpenter Gibson / Susan E. Powell
3. Francis Augustus Brown / Cynthia Matilda Gibson
4. Lilly Hazel Bates