This seven-generation portrait begins with three photos taken in the 1860s. Those pictured are (from upper right going to lower left and then to lower right) William Allen McNeal, his daughter Louisa McNeal DeGarmo, her daughter Jessie DeGarmo Mills, her daughter Beulah Mills Cochran, my daughter Hillary, and my mother Lois Cochran Pearson and me. The photo of Beulah Cochran was taken on her wedding day in 1917. The photo of my mother and me was taken in the mid-1940s. The photo of my daughter was taken in 1996.This portrait provides only a hint of our family genealogy, of course. William Allen McNeal is only one of Hillary's 32 great-great-great-great-grandfathers. Alexander McColley is another. His daughter Lydia is one of Hillary's great-great-great grandmothers. Lydia married Joseph Henry Cooper. One of their daughters, Mary Ellen Cooper, married Edwin Cochran. One of their sons, Paul Cochran, married my grandmother, Beulah Mills Cochran.
Other relatives who fought in the Civil War include a son and three grandsons of Samuel Cochran, one of Hillary's great-great-great-great-great grandfathers, who fought in an earlier war. Samuel Cochran was wounded at Buffalo, New York, on Dec. 31, 1813, when it was burned by the British in the War of 1812.
Samuel's son Augustus G., who was born July 1, 1825, served three years in the Civil War. According to a book published in 1883 that contained references to the Cochran family, Augustus "was with Sherman in his grand march through Georgia, returned from the hospital in poor health and is now living on a farm in the Town of Great Valley, Cattaraugus county."
The grandsons, three brothers, were: Samuel Cochran (1839-1865), adjutant, 18th Regiment, New York S.N.G.; William H. Cochran, Company A, 144th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment, also known as the Ellsworth A Avengers; and Joseph Wilber Cochran, Company A, 188th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment. They were the sons of Samuel's oldest son, Orson.
-- Larry Pearson
Comments may be addressed to Larry Pearson, lpearson@pobox.alaska.net
