Loved Ones Long Gone

          I grew up not knowing who my Grandparents were because they were all dead before I was born.  This saddened me greatly and I had this unnatural (bordering on obsessive) desire to know them.   Through the years I have come to learn a lot about them, some things that even my mother and father did not know.   I became obsessed with genealogy (the study of one’s family history) when I was in my very early 20’s and now have tens of thousands of relatives (and yes, I have that many) in a database with their dates of birth, marriage and deaths, places and photos of their graves, and photos and stories of their lives.

          My intent has always been to publish a story about what I find, but it is an overwhelming task.  I can not tell you just how many hours of my life I have spent doing family history research, but it is far too many to count.   One day I hope to make my book a reality, but until then, I’ll keep on digging for the stories that make the loved ones I never knew real to me.

          I love old cemeteries, old stories and most of all, old pictures.   Pictures capture a moment in time that would all but be lost, especially for those who never knew the people in them.  Below are a few of my family members that I love to look at and share.

          On the left is my Grandmother and Grandfather, Elijah Albright “Lige” Veal and Carrie Elizabeth Edna Frances Sarratt Veal.  In the middle is my father, Joe Dorsey “J.D.” Petty when he looked like a little girl, haha!  And then my mother, Martha Frances Veal when she was 3 years old.

 

          On the left is (from left to right), my great-grandfather,  Green Berry Sarratt, my grandfather, Elijah Albright Veal, Sr., Bobby Davis, my uncle, E. A. “Bub” Veal, Jr. and my great-grandmother Alice Miller Turner Sarratt.  Bobby Davis was the grandson of Alice’s sister Ella Sarratt Mitchell and Bub Veal is the brother of Martha and Eloise Veal.      The next picture is of my great aunt, Lucy Hope Sarratt (sister of Carrie) and a friend sometime around 1914 or so when she was about 20.    And the picture on the right is of my mother and her sister, Martha Frances Veal and Alice Eloise Veal.

          My mother and her mother shortly before Grandmother died in 1938.   My mother in about 1935 at about age 25 and then my dad when he was in the service, somewhere around 1943.

 

          My mother’s grandmother, Alice Miller Turner Sarratt and then her daughter, Ella Sarratt Mitchell.   One of the only pictures we have of my mother and both of her siblings, E. A. “Bub” Veal, Jr., my mother, Martha Frances Veal Petty and their sister, Alice Eloise Veal Mitchell.

          I know that they are now all together and happy again, but it still doesn’t make it any easier on those of us left behind.  I miss each and every one of them more than I can express and long for the days when we will all be together again.  In the meantime, I will try to make them proud of those of us who carry on the legacy they left behind.

          Remember to honor those you love and make them proud, whether they are still here or “Long Gone”.

Selling Moonshine

My father’s father was a moonshiner from the hills of North Georgia. Mind you, I do not consider this a bad thing for the times that they lived in. Times were hard for the family, which was a large one consisting of Granddaddy, grandmother and 10 children.   One of the ways that they earned extra money was to make moonshine from the sugar cane and corn that they grew.

Daddy with 3 of his sisters and 2 of his cousins

Unfortunately, many of my aunts and uncles were alcoholics as adults, having grown up drinking shine all of their lives. I must admit though that I do not remember any of them ever missing a day of work or not taking care of their families because of their drinking.

As a child, I remember Daddy having mason jars with “water” in them that I was not allowed to touch, and it never occurred to me that it was anything but water. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I realized it was moonshine. I’m not even sure that I would have known what liquor was when I was a child.  My father was also an alcoholic but until I was in high school, he kept it hidden from me. 

Long after my grandfather was dead, I remember that sometimes on the weekends, daddy would drive to Cabbage Town in Atlanta and would get out of the car, open the trunk and then lots of people would come to the car to talk to him. He always made me stay in the car so I could never see exactly what they were doing. As an adult, when the memory came back, I realized that he was selling moonshine out of the trunk.

It’s funny to me now to think that I helped my Daddy run moonshine (I guess it gave more credibility to him – after all, what kind of man would take his little girl with him to sell moonshine?).

Lucky for me I had a mother who was a “teetotaler” and taught me to never become addicted to alcohol. Not that I was an angel growing up…. I had my “younger, more stupid” days just like most of us have had. I just figured out at an early age that I enjoyed watching drunks rather than being one.

My Aunt Eula

Before I married Bobby, I was married to another man named Steve. The marriage only lasted for a little over 3 years and was a learning experience for me. I don’t regret it, I just wish that I had waited a while longer before getting married.

After Bobby and I married, when I found out that I was pregnant, Bobby told me that he wanted a little boy. We already had a daughter (April – by Bobby’s first wife). If it was a boy, Bobby wanted to know whether or not I would mind if we named him Robert Steven (Bobby, his Dad and Brother-in-law are all named Robert). I really didn’t mind so when the time came and it was a boy, we named him Robert Steven. Bobby was so proud, he said he’d always dreamed of having a little boy named Steve and he was tickled to death.

When we finally got Steve out of the house and started showing him off to other family members, we took him to see my Dad’s sister, Eula. I loved Aunt Eula dearly, she was as country as they come and somewhere along the road of life she had lost a card or two out of her deck. When we told her what Steve’s name was, she got so mad at us. She was appalled that we would name our son after my first husband. How dare we?!? We tried to explain to her that this was not the case, that Bobby had always wanted a son named Steve, but she didn’t believe us. Through the years, she would fuss at us over and over for what we did to Steve and I truly believe that she went to her grave thinking that we had named him after my first husband! God love her, this story still makes me laugh when I think of it!

We all have family members like Aunt Eula, but just think of how boring life would be without them! Remember them fondly and with love, because you know they’ve made you smile more than once. And just think, you come from the same gene pool!