This is my home. I was born here in 1951. I've left many times only to return. This time I'm here to stay.

This is St. Augustine - our nation's oldest city.

It was a good day to stay inside and play with photos. This was taken several years ago from the gun deck at the Castillo where I had a great view of the schooner Lynx as she sailed in the inlet and into the bay. She was quite a beauty.

This is a photo of William James Barrett, Jr., Elizabeth Carswell Barrett, his wife, and William Henry Barrett. It was taken at Wilson’s Studio on Bull Street in Savannah, Georgia about 1897 – probably to celebrate Elizabeth and William’s wedding.

William James’ life is full of tragedy. He was only two years old when his father was killed in December 1864 during a skirmish with Union troops near Concord Church outside their hometown of Yazoo City, Mississippi. His mother wasn’t quite 40 when she died in 1878. He later moved to Savannah where he met and married Rhoda Henry in 1892. Their son, William Henry Barrett, was born July 29, 1894. Rhoda died a week later.

Elizabeth and William were married April 15, 1897 and would have eight more children between 1897 and 1910. The 1900 census shows that the growing Barrett family was living in the household of Isaac Henry, William’s former father-in-law. According to the census record, there were 16 people living in the house at 424 State Street.

As the family grew, they moved several times. William also held a number of different jobs. He went from being a clerk at an iron works business to a salesman for a beef processor before settling into a job as a butcher with Cudahy Packing Company. In 1910 William left the family in Savannah and went to Birmingham to take a job with the Jacob Dodd Company. His half-brother, Lewis Link, was living in Atlanta at the time and may have encouraged the move.

Not long after taking the job, William contracted malaria and died in Birmingham on October 9th. According to the obituary, Lewis Link was with him when he died. His body was returned to Savannah for burial in the Carswell family plot at Laurel Grove Cemetery. Elizabeth wrote in the Family Bible:

“We miss thee more and more the longer the time the more I miss my darling husband. Our Papa was a devoted husband and devoted father and we all loved him so much we will never feel right without his presence.”

His youngest daughter, Ethel, was born after his death and only lived a few weeks. She was buried with him. After his father’s death, William Henry went to live with his mother’s Henry family. Elizabeth’s Carswell family did all they could to help Elizabeth and the other children. It was a tough childhood for them all. Elizabeth died in 1945 and is also buried in the Carswell plot in Laurel Grove.

Today descendants of both the Henry and Carswell sides of this Barrett family are spread across Georgia and Florida, but Savannah remains a special place in all our hearts.

William Henry Barrett (1894-1964) was my grandfather.