Andrew McBrayer

Andrew Erwin McBrayer moved to GA with his father and mother about 1821. It is said they left North Carolina, perhaps went into South Carolina, then traveled by way of Huntsville, AL, where they supposedly spent about a year. They then
moved over the line into Tennessee where they spent a couple of years on a farm "in sight of Winchester, Tennessee". The next year they moved east to Gilmer Co., GA (Hall Co.), where his father settled on an Indian Claim, land
that had just recently opened to settlement. Andrew remained here with his parents until about 1827, when he moved on the old Villa Rica, Carroll Co., GA area, where he met and married the daughter of the farmer for whom he was
working as a farm hand.

They are both buried in the Draketown Baptist Church Cemetery.

An annual family reunion was begun in Jul 1889 by the children and relatives of Nancy Leathers McBrayer to commemorate and celebrate her birthday. This reunion has been held every year since, with the exception of one year during WW II. It is still held at the original site - the Draketown Baptist Church - the third Sunday of July each year. Draketown is located to the southwest of Dallas, GA, on Highway 120.

(ED NOTE: Data supplied by Terrell McBrayer, which was supposed to have been taken from an old family dictionary, indicates that Andrew had two sons, Andrew and George, and a daughter, Susannah, who died in infancy. This information was supposed to have been compiled by William Clark McBrayer and was recorded on a blank page of an old dictionary now in the possession of his daughter Mrs. Tessa McBrayer Gray.)

From 'Memoirs of Georgia, Vol II, published by The Southern Historical Association, Atlanta, GA' in 1895 .... "was born in Buncombe County, NC, whence the family migrated to GA in 1817, making the journey in an ox-cart, and settled in what is now Campbell and Paulding Counties - living in a tent until land could be cleared and a house built. Three months schooling, under serious disadvantages, was all received out by reading and studying by a pine- knot light he acquired a fair practical education at home. In 1831 he moved to what is now Paulding County, where he accumulated a fortune and died in 1891."
(provided by Jimmie Sue Blaylock - 1999)

Andy and Nancy stories and facts from my grandmother's notebook are as follows:

When Andy and Nancy Leathers McBrayer were married they settled near Villa Rica. They lived on one hill and the Candlers (coca Cola Candlers) lived on another (close neighbors).

Their homes, as were all the pioneer homes, were built of big logs chinked with mud. The mud would fall out leaving cracks. Andy would be away on business at Court at Dallas, leaving Nancy at home with the children. Almost all the land was full of Cherokee Indians. She said at night she could hear them prowling around, see their eyes shining in the cracks as they peeped
through. She said she was so scared, almost afraid to breathe. Their boys and the Candlers played together. Her son Joe and Billy Candler were pals. One morning they were going down the road. No stock law at this time. At this particular place the fence ran along each side of the road making a lane of the road. A yealing jumped up in from of them. Joe threw a rock at him, hit him on the head and killed him. Some scared boys.

Nancy said the Paulding and Carroll County line was an old Indian trail.

Andy was a home guard during the Civil War.