Sale of Sinking Fund Lands.1851 Garrard Morgan

James Tanner's post last week, Plumbing the depths of the Library of Congress for Genealogy, provided a link to a treasure chest.

The Chronicling America, Historic American Newspapers project

There I found 1851 newspaper articles listing Great Great Grandfather Garrard Morgan  property in Indiana's weekly "Sale of Sinking Funds Land." And I found the reason he may have packed up his family and moved west from Decatur, Indiana to Mattoon, Illinois soon afterwards.

The Sale of Sinking Land Funds was listed weekly. Garrard Morgan's land was listed in four issues just as it is seen above. 

October 9, 1851

October 16, 1851

October 24, 1851

November 20, 1851

Laws of the State of Indiana 1851, Chapter CLXX – An Act for the relief of the owners of lands mortgaged to the sinking fund, February 14, 1851, offers an explanation as found in this google book.

Among the three land parcels named in Decatur County land mortgaged to the Sinking Fund is that of James Eward who may be part of the Hamilton family.

Note: The Links to Garrard Morgan and his move to Mattoon, Illinois are from Amy's Garrard Morgan histories at  The Ancestor Files blog. 

Rev. John C. McCoy carried Hamilton family news between Kentucky and Indiana.

Daniel Boone National Forest, Kentucky,

from Wikipedia.

From the Hamilton Family plot,

Kingston Cemetery, Decatur, Indiana

The McCoy sisters who married the Hamilton brothers, here, are either sister or cousin to Elizabeth S. McCoy, who married Capt. James Morgan, here. And so the McCoys tied the Hamiltons and the Morgans together in an additional way.

This picture of an early Mormon missionary

looks like I envision Rev. John C. McCoy.

Lycurgus McCoy, nephew of Rev. John C. McCoy, recalled sixty years later, his Uncle, as "a remarkable man in many ways," who frequently visited his father's home. "They usually spent the greater part of the night talking over reminiscences of former days. Uncle John McCoy, as he was familiarly called, was greatly beloved by all. This man of God was a true missionary, a lover of humanity, a house-to-house evangelist. Traveled on horseback from place to place, and found a welcome everywhere. Once a year he made a trip to Kentucky from Decatur Co., Indiana, on horseback carrying letters and messages both ways. The McCoys, Hamiltons, Donnells, and others were originally from Kentucky, and they all had relatives in Kentucky, and his coming was hailed with delight, on both sides of the Ohio River. It is my candid opinion that no better man has ever lived than John C. McCoy, and should I meet him in the home of the saved, on the earth made new, and I sincerely hope to, I shall expect to see him on his white pony. He never married."

Rev. John C. McCoy

b. May 30, 1782, Washington Co., Pa.

d. 1865 in Decatur Co., Indiana, and buried at Kingston.

William McCoy and his Descendants, compiled and written by Lycurgus McCoy, published and copyrighted 1904 by author. On line here.