Month: October 2022

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Ain’t Nothing But A Hound Dog

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Life aboard the vessel “Fame” was anything but easy for the Palantine refugees looking to start a new life in a new world. Life in Germany (Palatinate) in the 1700s was difficult enough (famine, war, religious persecution) to spur people to seek a better life elsewhere. But the journey to America was, in and of itself, not without certain peril. Ten ships departed London on June 14, 1710 carrying 3,000 displaced Palantines to their new home. The trip would take six months. A total of 480 passengers did not survive the journey. Another 250 people died during their five month quarantine on Governor’s Island.  All in all, nearly one quarter of the passengers on this voyage never lived to see the promise of America.

One of the survivor families listed on the passenger manifest was Johann Valentin Bressler, his wife Mary, and their five children. Their Palantine name was actually Pressler but the Germanic P and B sounded very similar so the mistake on the ship’s manifest was understandable. Johann and Mary settled in the Hudson Bay area but, in time, the descendants of the Pressler line began to branch out into other locations. Some in Maryland, some in North Carolina, and others even further south.

Along the way, some descendants chose to alter their last name from Pressler to Presley. It was to this line that a king was born. The king of Rock and Roll. Johann Valentin Bressler was the eighth great grandfather of Elvis Aaron Presley. He was also the eighth great grandfather of my niece’s husband. They also share 7th and 6th great grandfathers. It was just five generations ago that their ancestral lines separated as they stem from two different brothers of that generation.

Michael Ondrasik and Home Video Studio specialize in the preservation of family memories through the digitalization of film, videotapes, audio recordings, photos, negatives and slides. For more information, call 352-735-8550 or visit our website. And be sure to take a look at our 2022 TedXEustis talk on YouTube.

The Battle of Rutherford’s Farm

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In July of 1864, Union and Confederate forces clashed in a little remembered skirmish outside of Rutherford’s Farm in Virginia. Noted mainly due to the morale boost it gave to the embattled Union army, who had been handed a series of defeats leading up to this moment, it has a greater significance for my family.

As related by Lee Sherrill in his book “The 21st NC Infantry,” Andrew J. Nunn, my third cousin (three times removed) was serving as a second lieutenant of F Company, 21st North Carolina. After the battle, which resulted in a full retreat of the Confederate forces, “the dead and wounded littered the grounds and house of Rutherford Farm. Such wounded that could be moved had been cared for and removed to Winchester, but this core battlefield lay far behind Union lines and with dark, most nurses retired to town.

When the ladies returned to the area the next day, 21 year old Miss Kate McVicar came upon Lieutenant Nunn lying paralyzed with a ball through his lower spine. Nunn complained painfully about the radiation shooting up and down his body from the awkward position in which he lay. Without hesitation, Kate took young Nunn into her arms and held him in a position to relieve most of his suffering until well after midnight.

In the bright moonlight the young nurse managed to steal away from time to time to soothe other Tar Heel soldiers, each time returning to help Lieutenant Nunn.” Unlike many others, with Nurse McVicar’s care, he survived the night, and would spend the rest of the war as a prisoner confined at Fort McHenry. Upon his release, he returned home to Stokes County where he married and resumed his life as a citizen farmer.

Michael Ondrasik and Home Video Studio specialize in the preservation of family memories through the digitalization of film, videotapes, audio recordings, photos, negatives, and slides. For more information, call 352-735-8550 or visit our website. And please watch our TEDxEustis Talk on YouTube at https://youtu.be/uYlTTHp_CO8.

Mayberry, R.F.D.

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My wife, who identifies as Italian (understandably, as three of her four grandparents were born in that sun-dappled country), is sometimes baffled as to how she ended up with someone as unabashedly all-American as me. The family joke is that of all the men in the world, she managed to marry Opie. As it turns out, I actually do have a connection to the sit-com world of Mayberry.

Andy Griffith, who played the folksy sheriff of the fictional town, happens to be my cousin (5th cousin, once removed to be exact). It’s nice to know that my small-town nature and homespun charm have a genetic explanation.

Griffith started out his career in entertainment as a comedic monologist. His routine “What It Was Was Football”, released by Columbia Records, became an instant classic. He followed that up with the starring role in “No Time For Sergeants” which began as a teleplay. He would reprise the role on Broadway and again in the 1958 film adaptation. He made his film debut in 1957 as an ambitious and power-hungry country boy with political aspirations in Elia Kazan’s “A Face In The Crowd.”

In 1960, when Griffith expressed interest in returning to television, Sheldon Leonard, producer of the Danny Thomas Show had an episode written for especially for him. Griffith played a country sheriff who arrested Thomas’ character for running a stop sign. The episode was intended to be a back door pilot for a new show and it worked. Sponsors immediately committed to the concept and on October 3, 1960, the Andy Griffith Show made its debut. It would run for 8 years, and never once fell lower than 7th in the Nielsen ratings.

Michael Ondrasik and Home Video Studio specialize in the preservation of family memories through the digitalization of film, videotapes, audio recordings, photos, negatives and slides. For more information, call 352-735-8550 or visit our website. And be sure to take a look at our 2022 TedXEustis talk on YouTube.

Hudson’s Bay Colony

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When  two French adventurers (Groseilliers and Radisson) heard from a Cree source that the best fur country could be found northwest of Lake Superior bordering a “frozen sea,” they sought permission to explore the area and establish a fur trading post. They were denied permission from the French governor who wanted to keep the trade along the St Lawrence River.

Undeterred, the two Frenchmen reached out to colonial Boston merchants for help in financing their expedition to the frozen sea which turned out to be Canada’s Hudson Bay. Their speculative voyage failed when their ship ran into pack ice in Hudson Strait. They were encouraged to go to England for further financing and eventually gained the support of Prince Rupert who introduced them to his cousin, the reigning King Charles II.

With English support, two ships were acquired: the Nonesuch, captained by Zachariah Gillam (a 6th great-grand uncle of my niece’s husband) and the Eaglet. They both left port from Deptford, England but the Eaglet was forced to turn back just past Ireland. The Nonesuch continued alone and was successful in reaching Hudson Bay where, in 1668 the first fort (named after King Charles) was constructed on Hudson Bay from which the expedition initiated the fur trade.   It was Captain Gillam who reportedly made the treaty with the Indians and purchased the land (to be known as Rupert’s Land). 

The Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) was incorporated in 1670 and functioned for the next 200 years as a kind of de facto government in parts of North American until it sold the land it owned to Canada as part of the Deed of Surrender. While a fur trading business for most of its existence, HBC now owns and operates retail stores in Canada including Saks Fifth Avenue and Saks Off 5th.

As for Captain Gillam, he continued his seagoing experiences until 1682 until, while aboard the Prince Rupert, a severe storm caused his ship to drag anchor and drift out to sea. She was crushed by the ice and sank. All nine men aboard, including the captain, were drowned.

Michael Ondrasik and Home Video Studio specialize in the preservation of family memories through the digitalization of film, videotapes, audio recordings, photos, negatives and slides. For more information, call 352-735-8550 or visit our website. And please watch our TEDxEustis Talk on YouTube at https://youtu.be/uYlTTHp_CO8.

John the Herald

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 My niece’s husband has an 8th generational great grandfather who is noted for his work in the ancient practice of heraldry. John “The Herald” Guillim published the definitive work, “A Display of Heraldry” in 1610. It has been reprinted many times since and was widely considered at the time to be the “best book extant on the subject.”

Its cover page quotes Samuel Pepys in describing the contents as “manifesting a more easy access to the knowledge thereof than has been hitherto published by any, through the benefit of method: where it is now reduced by the study and industry of John Guillim, late pursuivant at arms.”

This monumental work displays and explains hundreds of the family crests and coat of arms that helped identify one’s heritage, lineage, and legacy. While his was not the first book on the subject (the practice of which predates him by a few centuries), it was and continues to be a work recognized for its historical importance. Though some may disagree.

An entry in the online Encyclopedia Britannica states that Guillim’s work not only perpetuates the nonsensical natural history of olden days but is largely responsible for erroneous beliefs about heraldic charges having definite symbolic meanings and their being granted as rewards for valorous deeds—beliefs that today are perpetuated by the vendors of mail-order and shopping mall “family coats of arms.”

Furthermore, there are many who insist that the credit for the book belongs to a chaplain named Barkham who handed the manuscript to Guillim and allowed for him to publish it under his name as he did not want to use his own. This is a claim still in dispute. The truth may be lost to history.

Michael Ondrasik and Home Video Studio specialize in the preservation of family memories through the digitalization of film, videotapes, audio recordings, photos, negatives, and slides. For more information, call 352-735-8550 or visit our website. And please watch our TEDxEustis Talk on YouTube at https://youtu.be/uYlTTHp_CO8.