Interesting find concerning my Confederate ancestor

[Chainfire]

4. My father's folks came before the revolution.

A father, his wife, and three sons got off the boat in Philadelphia, from Scotland via Ireland. One brother fought, and was killed, in Washington's unit during French and Indian wars, one brother and entire family but one 15 year old daughter and a small son, were killed in their homestead, outside of Philadelphia by French and Indian raiders. The same band also killed some of their neighbors on the raid. The daughter and son were taken prisoner and survived living the life of a Native Americans and at least she lived to an old age. Her story is widely circulated with many books written about her.

The surviving son (my direct ancestor) and the Father were both revolutionary veterans, serving the rebels. They had left the North, before the revolution to settle first in Georgia where they began to amass wealth, and then Son and Father moved on to Alabama where they became quite wealthy. It is amazing to me that the Father, born in the mid 1700s, lived to be 100 years old, and his wife lived to be 99! I have seen his will and the contents were quite interesting. Clothes must have been an expensive commodity at the time because, among other items, there is a detailed description as to who got what article of clothing! Apparently they just didn't take everything to Goodwill when someone died.

My paternal grandmother's family was dirt poor, farm laborers apparently, and so I know little about them beyond the fact that my Grandmother's only sibling was killed in WWI at Croix Rouge Farm; something my Granny grieved over all of her life. My mother's family, German Mennonites, also came from Pa. but went West to California in the late 1880s. My Grandmother was born in a wagon traveling through Wyoming. My Grandmother identified as Pennsylvania Dutch, rather than expressing her German roots. ( I suppose that came from living through both WWI and WWII where being a German would not have been popular.) The German families kept the old language and my Grandmother learned to speak English in school.

I have always been a history buff but my interest in genealogy came late in life and it has been a fun ride. What I do know is that I can take no pride in my ancestor's accomplishments, or no shame in their failures; I had nothing to do with any of it. In the future my existence will prove to have been very boring to future students, no great achievements or failures; nothing to write home about. I will just be an uninteresting twig on the family tree.