Finding Your Folks: Seeking Crawfords in the Line Creek area

I was delighted to hear from an old high school classmate this week. Neal Cobb of Rabun Gap who attended Russell High with me back in the 1950s, is looking for his Crawford family who lived in the Line Creek area back in the 1800s.

Neal says he has run into a brick wall on his maternal line. He writes:

" … My Mother was Frances Virginia Leach before she married. Members of our Leach family, as well as many allied families, are from the tri-county area of Spalding, Fayette and Coweta Counties. I am literally kin to almost everyone in the cemetery at the little County Line Christian Church in the Digby Community south of Brooks and just north of Highway 16. My maternal family lines are primarily Leach, Bridges, Cobb, Crawford, Manard, Cole, Biles, Harper, Ison and Lynch. By way of marriage, I am also distantly related to the Mask, Moody, Hasting and King families from this area of the state. My Dad's Cobb line was from Jackson and Hall Counties, though there is a common line of descent from several much earlier generations.

"My mother's parents were Frank James Leach and Sybil Gertrude Bridges. Grandpa Frank's parents were James Larkin Leach and Eugenia Clementine Crawford. It is this Crawford line that has baffled me for so many years. No one in the family ever talked much about the Crawfords, and I have spent more time trying to find the origins of this line than almost any other.

"Here's what I know:

"My great-grandmother was Eugenia Clementine Crawford, and her mother was Sarah C. Crawford. Eugenia (Gina) Clementine Crawford Leach was the wife of James Larkin Leach. Gina and Larkin lived on what is now called Tri-County Road, just east of County Line Christian Church in Digby. They raised the following children: George C. Leach, Walter E. Leach, Frank James Leach (my grandfather), Lawrence Gibson Leach, and Roy Hugh Leach. Many Leach family members, as well as members of other related families, are buried at the County Line Christian Church. I have been pretty successful in documenting the Leach family lineage except for the parentage of my great-grandmother, Eugenia (Gina) Clementine Crawford (Leach). Her mother, Sarah C. Crawford, appears to have been born between 1842 and 1844. Sarah continues to be something of an enigma. I don't know if Crawford is her married name or her maiden name, since I have been unable to document a marriage for her.

"A Sarah C. Crawford appears in the 1860 Coweta County census [Haralson District] in the following household (all born in Georgia): McCommie or McCommic Crawford, 28, a 'mechanic'; Sarah C. Crawford, 17; and Mary S. Douglass, 11.

"A Sarah C. Crawford next appears in the 1870 census of Spalding County, Line Creek District, (all born in Georgia): Sarah Crawford, 28, a homemaker; Lilly Elgivan Crawford, 4, a female; Eugenia Clementine Crawford, 3, a female; and Joe Crawford, 1, a female."

"Finally, in the 1880 Spalding County census, Line Creek District, are: Sarah C. Crawford, 38, head of household; Lilly E. Crawford, 14, (born Feb. 1866); Eugenia C. Crawford, 13, (born Oct. 1867); Archie Burton Crawford, born ca. 1872; and Mary Emma Crawford, born 1878; Apparently Joe, died between 1869 and 1880.

"Sarah C. Crawford had at least six children from 1860-1880, all named Crawford, and the only adult male found in that 20-year period was McCommie or McCommic Crawford in Coweta County in 1860. Of course there is no way that I can determine if the Sarah in 1860 Coweta is the same Sarah C. Crawford that is later found in the Line Creek District of Spalding County (the latter Sarah is undoubtedly the mother of Lilly and Gena Crawford, as well as Joe, Archie, and Emma.) Strangely, no one that I have contacted knew of any of the siblings other than Lilly and Gena.

"I did learn that Gena and Lilly grew up in the Fairview community of Spalding County, near the Fairview Baptist Church. Their home place was off State Hwy. 16 on Poplar Road. This tallies with a deed I found where Langford Sanford Leach and Franklin Sansom witnessed the purchase of land by Sarah C. Crawford. Langford Sanford Leach, a Baptist minister, and his wife Milla Manard are reportedly buried in unmarked graves at the Fairview Baptist Church. Sarah Crawford's daughter, Eugenia (Gina) Clementine Crawford, married their son.

"My family, of course, knew our direct ancestor, Eugenia Crawford (Leach) and also her sister, Lillie Crawford (Lynch). However, nothing was known of the other three Crawford children. I have since learned that a younger sister, Mary Emma Crawford, ended up in Arkansas married to a Loiuis Philipp Prieur. Sarah C. Crawford may have also moved to Arkansas. Eugenia and her sister Lillie lived out their lives in the Line Creek District of Spalding County. Eugenia, her husband, James Larkin Leach, and many of their Leach descendents are buried at the County Line Christian Church.

"The Leach family (James Leach and wife Mary, parents to Langford Sanford Leach) came from Virginia to Pike County via Abbeville, S.C. about 1830, as did the descendents of a Robert Crawford and Hulda Logan. Sarah Crawford raised her children in the Fairview community of Spalding County. She was closely associated to the Leach, Sansom, Allison, Dingler, Biles, and Ison families. I feel that she was likely associated with the Pike County Crawford family that came from Abbeville to Pike County, many of whom went on to Texas, but I can't document that connection."

Neal says he has exhausted his resources and would love to hear from anyone who can add to his information. You can write to him at ncobb681@windstream.net.

This will be the next to last genealogy column published in The Citizen (Oct. 17, 2008). The final column will appear Oct. 31, 2008. I have really enjoyed learning about your south side families and will give you more of an explanation next week.