How to Research A Local Historical Hub Or Article

I love American history, especially when the events happened in my area of the country or involved subjects near to my heart. A recent hub--an article, for those not acquainted with HubPages--required quite a bit of research to make it into a story with not only historical facts intact, but concise as to the times and values exhibited in this particular area of the south.

I suppose all writers have their own methods of doing research for different types of articles, and indeed, individual subjects do require such. While definitely not recommending my methods for your subject research, I think my recent experience may aid others if they run into a dead end.

I do realize this hub will not help those writers who had rather put out short, terse articles with little research other than using well known information easily found on the net, but for those who love to research little known history, this method worked well for me and was also quite an enjoyable task..

The Hub I finally published was originally not much more than a story passed down from mouth to mouth with very little in the way of actual facts one could actually document.

I knew chasing down the truth when the event happened back 4 generations before my birth could be quite a challenge, especially in this particular part of the world.

The origins of the family legend took place in 1874 and concerned a double murder in one of the most isolated parts of Georgia, the vast and sparsely settled Okefenokee Swamp. The times and wilderness of this area enabled wanted men to hide and elude the law, sometimes forever.

I began with family hearsay, as that’s all I really had at first. But what with the marvels of modern science and the internet it didn’t take me long to make a start on the quest for facts.

Imagine my chagrin when one of the first things I found when searching for the name of my great-great-grandfather was my BROTHER’S short genealogical entry giving me a bit more information to go on.

He had researched this side of the family a few years ago in his quest for information because of his participation in the Sons of Confederate Veterans--Civil War re-enactors who’ve appeared in some of the movies made recently about this sad and painful conflict.

Even though the entry was brief, it did give me the county and place of residence along with the full names of my ancestors, as well as their occupations, both of which had been confused over the course of over 140 years of family members retelling the horrendous tale.

Like any other type of gossip, family gossip tends to get a bit romantic and even more dramatic as the time of the event fades further into the past. And this family legend was no different as it turned out. But surprises and twists were not lacking, as I indeed discovered.

Having armed myself with the previously gained information, I now had actual names and dates to assist me in my online research. I had also learned a bit more about my ancestors as the murders had indeed taken place as reported in the family legend.

After entering the name of the county in which the murders had occurred in a Google search, I eventually found a short entry listed in the Clinch County history, albeit as I eventually discovered, this information too was not completely accurate. But every little bit of info helps in getting to the truth.

To show how each research step adds a bit more information to the quest, I discovered the writings of a gentleman--a judge in the county of the murders-- who apparently loved learning as much of the local history as he had access to at the time.

Judge Folks Huxford has contributed much to recording the local history of, not only his own county of Clinch, but to other surrounding counties in Southeastern Georgia.

Some of his earliest notes were made not long after the turn of the 20th century when he would scour the area querying elderly citizens as to what they knew and remembered about the county’s history.

His collection of notes, interviews, and genealogical references, eventually was the basis for founding the Huxford Genealogical Library also located in Homerville, Georgia.

This fine establishment is one of the best in the area for those looking to find their roots among the fascinating people who tamed the wonderful and mysterious wilderness comprising the famous Okefenokee Swamp.

I highly recommend the Huxford library to anyone wishing to do research on family history or other historical events in Southern Georgia and Northern Florida.

Judge Huxford had another account of the murders. Although the dates and names he mentioned were correct, other aspects of the event did not jibe with my previously gained information. Also, neither the previous info learned from my brother’s entry nor that of the Judge gave all of the names of the accused murderers.

So while in Homerville we dropped by the Huxford Genealogical Society library and picked up some great past issues of their quarterly digest and it was only after I returned home did I find some very good information on the murders. More about this later.

So okay, I had made a bit more progress, but now I had different slants on the same story and almost nothing about the aftermath of the murders.

Back to the computer I go because I don’t give up that easily! Besides, I am further intrigued by the lack of closure, and I do love a real life historical mystery. And in this I was not to be disappointed.

This story had become a mission for me at this point as I wished to leave a factual record for my family descendants to enjoy. One’s roots can sometimes be an inspiration when times are tough. Or so I believe.

I decided, even though the events were 138 years old, to check the archives of Georgia newspapers to see if perhaps they had carried the story of the murders, but how to do this I didn’t know.

I suppose I got lucky, because when I searched for old Georgia newspaper articles on Google it referred me to a Wikipedia article which listed those newspapers in my area and some even further away which I could access freely. Eureka! At last I was getting somewhere.

Since one of the main characters in my story was a county sheriff I entered his name into the archive database and sure enough, up popped an article in a Columbus, Georgia newspaper with the names of the accused, the original cause of the incident, and complete description of the horrible crime.

From this information I also discovered several other reports in different newspapers around the state. I did find out the search keywords were very important, as well as the particular year in which to search,

But even though I had made great progress in my quest, the case suddenly ran cold. I could find out nothing further about what happened after the horrendous crime. Search after search came up empty and I because frustrated because of the time I’d spent on this search with no apparent ending to the tale. What to do next?

Okay, it was a beautiful day and I had nothing else better to do so I loaded my wife, computer, and camera of course, into the car and we headed cross country through the sparsely populated, but wonderfully picturesque back roads to the little town of Homerville, Georgia.

My wife and I (she assisted me greatly in both genealogical and legal research) were making a visit to the courthouse and the Huxford Genealogical Society library to see what else I could find. The trip had a twofold purpose, as there is always inspiration for other articles when traversing this part of the state, and this time was no different.

Not long above the ocean in geological years, the trip took us through wilderness the state of Georgia is famous for. We passed right by a few of the mysterious circular Carolina Bays and many old farm houses and outbuildings which are slowly vanishing from the countryside.

I can’t resist stopping occasionally to photograph these rapidly fading scenes for posterity. I’m afraid no one else will. One thing research will teach you is to leave something for the future writers to discover in their own way. You never know which piece of history only you have saved. I consider it well worth my time.

When we arrived at the courthouse--a splendid old structure as you can tell from the photo--we wandered down the old halls until we found the Clerk of Court’s office and explained to the nice ladies there what we were trying to find out. I really didn’t know where to begin, nor how I would be received by the courthouse officials, but they quickly allayed any fears I'd had of being discouraged in my quest.

After relating my tale about the onetime sheriff being murdered, I was taken into a vault of sorts, apparently a fireproof room where there were stacks of old records and ledgers piled on every shelf.

One of the ladies--I wish I had gotten her name--called a man who told her how some courthouse records were lost when the original courthouse burned long ago.

I was obviously dismayed until I asked the date of the fire. “He said the courthouse burned to the ground in 1860,” she replied. Immediately I felt better. The date of the murders was Nov. 20, 1874. The hunt for the court records was still alive.

After the lady found out the records were indeed there somewhere, she quickly found several index books with the names of the accused entered along with their charges for murder. But the court records pertaining to anything past the dates in the index were missing. We were looking for a ledger marked A and the information on page 265 as was indicated in the indexes.

Finally, the lady said “Well, the Criminal Index must be across the street in one of the other storage buildings”. So off we went accompanied by a very nice young lady who led us to an upstairs room in a old storage building The packed room was apparently used for storing much of the old courthouse memorabilia gathered since the late 19th century.

After moving several stacks of huge record books-- the young lady helped immensely in this task--we finally found a the very last record of the court proceedings concerning this case. Apparently, the murders were never brought to justice in this county.

But if you read the article which resulted from this research entitled, Taming the Wild Okefenokee : Murder in the Great Morass, you will discover that often the old saying is true. Crime does not pay!

I hope my experience with researching this article may help you in some way in your attempts at factually recording your own family myths and legends. Do it for your children and their own future progeny. Some of them will be glad you did