Introduction from a new cousin

Never knew there were so many Duttons in the world until I started this
family history.  Didn't start until my father had died, but he had spoken of
Dutton Hill in Jasper, Alabama several times.  Thank goodness I had the sense
to ask him a couple of years before he died where this Dutton Hill was, but I
could have found it by getting to Jasper because the librarian there directed
me exactly as he had.  My father was Robert Lee Dutton, Sr., son of Samuel B.
Dutton and Mahala Ellen Moreland; grandson of William Dutton and Merriam
Maria(h) Keeton; ggson of James Dutton and Mary Polly Irwin who received a
government grant in 1845 southwest of Jasper.  That is the land that became
known as Dutton Hill.  There is a Dutton Hill Cemetery and Dutton Hill
Missionary Baptist Church at the edge of that land now.  The church came much
later than the cemetery, which dates as least as far back as 1869 which is the
oldest date for a headstone I have found recorded.  On vacation from Ohio to
Mobile, Alabama in the summer of 1990 or 1991, I saw Jasper on the map and on
impulse my husband and I stayed in a camp resort of Smith Lake in that county
in our motor home.  I made a trip into Jasper the next day to find out about
Dutton Hill.  I found the cemetery and copied  all the Dutton names into a
notebook.  My dad's aunts and uncles names were familiar because I had asked
him for a birth order of his father's siblings at the same time I asked about
Dutton Hill.   William and Maria are buried there, but I had to do some
checking with some of my dad's cousins by mail to realize he was my ggf.  
	I found the History of Walker County, Alabama book by Dombhart in the library
and found that it was for sale.  It was one of the best purchases I have made.
Its "people" section had the estate summary of James Dutton and I found from
that that he was my ancestor.  I did a few census records that day, but that
was the only day I could spare in this vacation as we were on a time schedule.
But that was the day my interest in genealogy was born.  THE BUG BIT ME!!  
	It had become an interest of two of my first cousins in Oklahoma as well.
They were mostly interested in getting down all the current descendants of Sam
B.  One of the OK cousins has now moved to Chattanooga and seems to be doing
less research.. .life's busy claims.  That has kept me from doing as much of
this as I would like as  we have had some health problems, surgeries, etc.  My
husband is to be 78 in November and I am almost 64, so any of you out there of
these ages are aware that with time the "maintenance" increases.  Also we sold
our home of 17 years and moved into a condo less than half the size with no
basement for storage.  
	In March 1996 I retired with 31 years of service teaching in inner city
schools in Columbus, OH.  On breaks and summers that I wasn't doing graduate
work etc.  our time was spent traveling or whatever, so the basement just had
more shelves added.  OH MY!!  Take it from me.. . . be generous with what you
discard and keep the "treasures" to minimum.  Since we spend five months in
Florida every winter, we are still "sorting and discarding".  It seems to be
our life's work!
	In any case I have fairly complete files on all of William Dutton's
descendants and some things that are available in Walker County on his
siblings.  It seems my grandpa Dutton was the only one who left the county
with his family so that clustering of people was helpful.  He didn't want to
work in the mines and apparently didn't have the resources to buy enough land
to farm so we took his young wife and infant daughter and migrated to Hill
County near Covington in about 1891 or 92.  There his oldest daughter died as
a toddler and he "begat" nine more children.  Then in January of 1911, he
moved to  Greer County, Oklahoma with his family.  His wife was ill when they
arrived with measles and was in the later months of pregnancy.  She contracted
pnemonia and died.  I was born in Greer Co. OK where we lived until I was
eight, moved to California until I was 13, back to OK.  I came to Ohio with my
husband and family in 1961, began teaching and here I still remain.  
	When I was forwarded Joseph Richardson's letter from a cousin who had sent
some of the Sam B. Dutton data to the Family Tree Program people, I was
thrilled to find out how some of the censuses we had copied from Alabama and
North Carolina fit with out family.  I had always had a suspicion that the
marriage record of John Dutton fit as being the parent of James if James were
the oldest child, but I have never heard of Zachariah Sr.
	So far as my connection with Alice Dutton Freeman, Zachariah, Jr.'s
descendant, I had sent one of my dad's cousins a list of all the Duttons in
the Jasper phone book and asked which she could identify.  She pointed out one
and said they were not kin to our family.  I feel fairly sure all the Walker
Co. Duttons are related so I wrote to them and asked.  That letter was passed
>from her double cousin (named Dutton) to her.  She wrote me that her ggf had
been killed in the Civil War and the family were unsure of his first name.
Later when I wrote the Civil War Descendants Society in Athens, AL I paid for
some information and they found that the only Walker County Dutton killed was
Zachariah and his widow was named Mary E. so we were sure. Alice said her
father Luther Dutton had spent a great deal of his adult life visiting Civil
War cemeteries in Atlanta and Macon looking for a Dutton grave, but he died
without knowing where he was.  They told me where he had died and that
connection was made.  She knew there was a connection because her great aunt
told her they had lived at Dutton Hill and she was 12 when Wilson's Raiders
came through Jasper and she saw the  fires when they burned the court house, a
church, etc.  Alice sent me the story she wrote for the Walker County Heritage
book that will be published soon.  I will copy it in a day or two and send it
along.  It is a great slice of that night, as the soldiers also came to Zac's
home.  She sent me all the family descendants she has of Zachariah's children,
and they are fairly complete in many respects.  
	The summer we stopped in Jasper on impulse I was surprised to see a large
sign on Route 69 from Smith Lake into Jasper reading "Luther Dutton Road".  I
have a cousin also name Luther Dutton and took a picture of it to send to him.
That road was named for Alice's father. Her address is 47 Luther Dutton Road
and her mother, Luther's widow, lives also on that road next door to Alice.  
	I just signed on to the Internet a few weeks ago--a real neophyte.  I have a
new computer and have a few quirks in the hard drive mostly because I
installed the programs and did some "funny" things and I am not very
knowledgeable about those kinds of things so I have contacted the son of a
friend to hire him to help me straighten this out.  Also I have not
transferred files from the net etc. but am willing to learn.  Right now is not
a good time to spend much time doing these things as we have some oral
surgeries, and some other medical fun things likes lots of lab tests, etc. and
it is summer for grandchildren's visits.  But soon!
	I am unable to write anything in a concise fashion and this letter will give
you a good idea of that!  I am excited to be getting all these messages.!!!
	I had a phone call from a Dutton descendant in California who was looking for
the Thomas Dutton who married Catherine Bates.  She knew he was born in
Alabama (I guess from census records) and she was anxious to be able to find
out his roots and parentage.  I have her address and phone buried somewhere,
but will have to dig since we have moved and we migrate back and forth to
Florida so I am always trying to figure out where I put anything.  She would
be a good contact for his later descendants.  Will share that when I get time
to dig.
	Time to get off here.  Will answer the inquiries about Jarrard's son Zach in
a day or two.
	Glad to have found this group!  It is like an explosion of information when
we had sort of come to a standstill.  The net really is the information
highway.  Genealogy is the only reason I was interested in signing on.

Love, 
Cousin Eula (not many of this first name in the Dutton line).