Sunday, September 27, 2009

Odds 'n Ends - Evansville, IN















Since I am now semi-retired, I've had more time to pursue some of the leads that always are on the back burner of any family genealogist's plate. My niece, Julie Jones, has graciously agreed to accompany me on some of these adventures.

Two weeks ago, we traveled to Evansville to try to research the Ryans, another Irish part of my heritage that I will eventually write about in a separate blog. We visited the Willard Library, a great old library in Evansville that is said to be haunted and has 24 hour a day "ghost cams" on their website.

The next day we visited the Indiana Room in the Evansville Main Library. They had a great picture of the Evansville riverfront as it would have appeared at the time our ancestors lived there.


On the way back to Cincinnati we stopped in Corydon, IN to see the Civil War battlefield where Morgan and his Raiders first fought as they crossed into the "North". Britton Wainright died of heat stroke on his march to confront Morgan. Corydon is about 14 miles from New Albany where Britton lived.

I was surprised what a small area is preserved. There is a small monument acknowledging the northerners who died in the skirmish and the southerners who died on the reverse side. A sign tells us that the cabin on the property was moved from a nearby location to give a feel for the type of cabins that people called home at the time. They also had a typical cannon of the time. Julie humored me and agreed to be photographed near it.





We traveled on to New Albany and the area where Britton's blacksmith shop had once been located. It is now an area of charming stores located a couple of blocks from the city's farmers' market.

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