Letter from G. E. Valley Jr. to Professor Harold Hancock about the Ringgolds after the Civil War, the death of Genevieve Frazer Cockey, and Benjamin Cummins's line (first page; the second is not in the notebook).

[Notebook p. 13. GEV's typed reply to Professor Hancock, page 1, pasted in. The second page is not pasted here; only show-through from the back of the sheet is visible.] GEORGE E. VALLEY, JR. 607 MAIN STREET, CONCORD, MA 01742 617 369 5692

July 5, 1986

Professor Harold Hancock 3205 Falcon Lane 217 Wilmington Delaware 19808

Dear Professor Hancock:

Your letter was welcome, the more so because of the praise.

I am now getting myself psyched up to do the Ringgolds. My big lack of knowledge about them is what they did immediately after the Civil War, when most of them were ruined. It is now practically certain that John Holliday Cummins was more a Ringgold than a Cummins in his behavior and beliefs. Like most of the Ringgolds, he and his family disappear from the census in 1870, although they were all very prominent with their slaves and vast land holdings in 1860. I have been corresponding with the Genevieve Frazer Cockey who wrote that short historical romance about the blockade runner; she proved to be my third cousin--her grandmother was my grandfather's first cousin, and she had told her grand daughter stories of how they played together as children. The dear lady up and died last week, and so my inquiries are temporarily halted. Someday I shall write down the procedure by which I located her--it will set a new standard for genealogical investigators.

I now correspond with her daughter's friend, Mrs. Benjamin Cummins, a widow. Apparently Benjamin Cummins was convinced that he came from the Smyrna branch. Benjamin was born in 1916, the son of Otho Perc. Cummins, son of Harry Cummins, son of Alexander Cummins. This Alexander, if a member of our tribe of Cummins's, must have been either the son of Timothy Cummins, III, or of George Cummins, or of Daniel Cummins, Jr., all brothers of John Cummins. I have a few pages of Benjamin's notes, which show that he was confused. I also have an early, i.e. 1960, letter to him from Frances Cummins; this letter shows that she had a copy of the document that I call the Cavender papers, which gives the names of all the descendants of John Cummins. If you'd [the rest is on the letter's second page, not in the notebook]