Jeff Ball’s Editor’s Notes & Acknowledgments

Research notes, acknowledgments, and thanks from the editor of A Chronology of William Ball.

Editor’s Notes

For the past three years, I have traveled throughout South Carolina and spoken with members of the Godbold family about places connected to our history, including Lynches Creek, Black Mingo, Berkeley County, St. John’s Parish, Cheraw, and Society Hill.

I also contacted the family of Thomas I. “Tom” Ball, who generously shared the information in their possession. Tom accepted the Brown family tradition, although he once believed that Edward Ball had first married Sarah Brown. He also believed that the William Ball named in Edward Ball’s will was a Revolutionary War soldier. On that point, he was correct: the man was William Bartholomew Ball.

Our family also participated in the Ball Family Y-DNA Study. The results show a genetic match between the William Bartholomew Ball line and the Sampson–Edward Ball family line.

Acknowledgments and Thanks

I am especially grateful to my father, Lamar O. Ball, who taught me to love God, country, and family. I have too many cousins and family members to thank individually, but I would like to recognize the following:

Alpha Turner Stanford of Gautier, Mississippi
Frances Ball, J.D., of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, President of the William Ball Family Association
Mary Helms of Chattanooga, Tennessee
Ruth Cattles Cottrell of the Dallas–Fort Worth, Texas, area
Stephanie Lyle of Nashville, Tennessee
Edvardas “Ed” Missavage, M.D.
Dr. Carroll R. Ball, Past Governor of the First Families of Mississippi
Dr. H. Brooks Ball, my co-editor

The family will always be grateful to Dr. Robert Scott Davis Jr. for permitting the family to use The True and Interesting Travels of William Lee. His research answered many questions about William Lee’s remarkable journey.

Susan Sloan is a rising star in our family’s genealogical research. She holds a B.S. in Psychology and an M.Ed., both from Georgia State University. She is a member of Georgia Professional Genealogists, the Association of Professional Genealogists, and several state and local genealogical and lineage societies. She serves on the Board of the Georgia Genealogical Society and on the Advisory Committee of the R. J. Taylor Foundation, which provides funding for publications valuable to Georgia genealogists.

To everyone who shared records, memories, research, encouragement, and family knowledge, I offer my sincere gratitude. This work could not have been completed without you.

— Jeff Ball, Editor