Marriage Record for John McVicker and Mary Brown

This is the marriage record for my 3X great-grandparents on my biological mother's maternal line: John McVicker and Mary Brown. They were married in Henry County, Georgia, on October 20, 1842.

From Keeper of the Records

SOURCE: Marriage Record Book 1837-1851 Henry County, Georgia Page 206 Photo taken with permission at the Henry County Probate Records Office, McDonough, Georgia. Digitized version of original - copyright 2009 Joanne Schleier.

Now do you want to know why this is so awesome to me? This record is held at the Henry County Probate Records Office in McDonough, Georgia. This is about an hour drive from where I currently live. 

Back story: I was born in Texas and then was officially adopted. My new family moved to New Hampshire where I was raised. After my adopted parents divorced, my father moved to Georgia. Beginning when I was about seven years old, my brother and I spent our summers with our father. Finally, the week of my 13th birthday, our mother moved the family down to Georgia so we could be closer to our father. 

It was not until I was 26 years old that I was reunited with my birth family: father, mother and half siblings, aunts, cousins, my paternal grandparents and my maternal grandmother. They all still lived in the western United States. Nanny, as my grandmother is called, spoke of her ancestors being descended from Tennessee and North Carolina as far as she knew and with some Cherokee lineage. 

Forever the inquisitive one about both family trees, I began to take my quest for answers about my families seriously and began learning more about genealogy, joined my local genealogical society, and finally admitted my new-found obsession. My biological sister, Jennifer, got me started on our mothers maternal line. All of the information she gave me was well documented and some lines very well developed. In this particular case, the McVicker line was very well developed; yet, John's wife, Mary, remained elusive and we only knew the couple to have lived in Texas. 

My further research on this line found them earlier in Louisiana and earlier than that in, none other than, Henry County, Georgia! So, my biological line, which I didn't grow up knowing about, had lived very close to where I live now because my adopted Dad ended up moving here! Now, I do not believe in coincidence. There are no accidents. God has a plan and everything is laid out in perfect order. And so, I have come full circle back to the place of my family's origins. I am home.

Blogged with the Flock Browser