Three amateur, but dedicated genealogy researchers worked a collective eighty years, searching for the Òmissing linkÓ to their branch of the Kirkland Family Tree. It was the chance discovery of a name in the transcribed minutes of Hebron Primitive Baptist Church in Bulloch County Georgia, that matched a name in a 1958 letter written by Walter Wright Kirkland to researcher Betty Kirkland Schladensky, that resulted in linking Henry T. Kirkland to his ancestors.
In addition to finding HenryÕs missing ancestors, the researchers also untangled some long-standing mix-ups in the family history. It is the hope of Catherine and Cora that this book will provide researchers and family alike, a more accurate picture of the Kirklands who settled in South Carolina and Georgia in the late 18th and early 19th century.
The Kirkland family has a long history of persevering through the hardships of early Colonial life and fighting in the American Revolution, the Civil War and the War of 1812. They were pioneers, farmers, ranchers, nurserymen, lawyers, preachers and businessmen who survived poverty, disease and the aftermath of horrific domestic wars, to carry on the family line through the generations.