I wrote on this blog about this generation in Oct and Sept 2023 and now ready to take the research further with what I have. In order to make my great great grandfather, Ira, come alive, I needed to find someone who could give me more information. I located such a man name Robert Quillin. I have some of this documentation on the blog already in 2023.
I corresponded quite a bit with Robert and he even made a trip to Texas to see the Hill Country and to meet me. What a DELIGHTFUL man with a beautiful wife, Barbara. Oh how I wish now that I had embraced him more.
Robert lived in Bristol Tennessee (on the line with Virginia) and was the caretaker of the Ira Quillin Cemetery, which only has a few graves.
He was adamant that a man named Joel Shelley had said that Ira D Quillin feel ill on a battlefield in the Civil War and passed away. Joel was a reporter and had written some articles about the soldiers of the area that had fought in the Civil War. Robert was told that there was nothing others could do for Ira and so they covered him with a coat and left him there. (see the articles posted in Sept 2023)
Robert also pursued going to the courthouse archives to find a few news articles written by Joel Shelly and sent me copies of said articles. But to his amazement there was no mention of Ira D Quillin on the list of soldiers.
Now all these many years ago since the early 1990s, I have tested with DNA and I find that others claim to be descendants of a son name Henry born in 1868. I cannot find proof of that, and it is not my line, so I haven't been diligent to trace it down.
But here is the documentation from the graveyard that Robert tended.
Ira Quillin Cemetery in Hiltons, Virginia - Find a Grave Cemetery
Ira is not buried there and a man named Donald Lane makes a comment. Donald was a longtime researcher and respected for his work.
Maybe someday I will solve the mystery of a son of Ira and Edna named Henry.
Here is what is written on the Find-A Grave page:
The Ira Quillin Cemetery
This cemetery is located slightly to the west and due north
of Herman Chap Methodists Church, on the old QUILLIN farm on Fowlers Branch. It
is located on the hillside a few hundred yards past the end of the maintained
Route 697. The cemetery is unfenced and clean. It is marked by two large cedar
trees which were placed at the head and foot of CICERO QUILLIN's grave. TROY
DORAN took GUY SANDERS and me to the cemetery and gave us a list of six of the
eleven or more persons buried there. Troy made the list by discussing it with
his mother, AUDREY QUILLEN DORAN. TROY presently leases the farm from his
uncle, ROBERT QUILLEN, who owns it. ROBERT said that his father gave him a list
of eleven people who were buried there, but the list was lost long ago. IRA
QUILLIN SR died during the Civil War and is thought to have been buried near
Manassas, VA. [From Donald W. Lane, Jan 2003]
https://www.findagrave.com/cemetery/2679389/ira-quillin-cemetery?
see post September 14,2023
