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A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
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Our Genealogy Helper

Introduction ...

We have a couple of goals for our Gazetteer:

  • That it be a tool which helps us with planning our trips.
  • We're trying to shape our Gazetteer as a tool to help us understand the community in which our ancestors lived, the community that was part of their daily lives.
  • On our trips, we try to visit those places where our ancestors left their footprints.

By learning about Pocahontas (and the surrounding area) during the time that our ancestors lived, we hope to have a better understanding of both their community and its relationship to their lifes. We hope that this tool helps to give us an insight into their world.

As we add data and organize our Gazetteer to help with our family research, we will be adding to this our Genealogical Helper for Pocahontas. While we don't have information that is specific to any given person or family, we intend to expand our understanding about where and how people lived.

Name Variations for Pocahontas ...

When searching records, keep in mind that names and their spelling can change over time. Our sources include documents like maps, railroad schedules, Travel, Express and Shipping Guides. Many of these documents date from the 1800's and it's common to find spelling differences.

Past names for Pocahontas include: Bettis Bluff, Betts Bluff and Pokakhontas.

In past government published Postal Guides, Pocahontas was referred to as Pocahontas Courthouse.

You might be interested in other communities that are also named Pocahontas. More information can be found on our Tidbits & Trivia Page for Pocahontas.

If you have information about these names (such as the reason for the change, date of change, the origin of the name), please Contact Us.

For more information about how community names might have been affected by the Board of Geographic Names (BGN), see our page about Placename Rules.

Neighboring Counties ...

When searching for family records, we have frequently made the mistake of not checking the neighboring counties.

For example, we have great-grandparents who lived in the southwest corner of their home county. During their lives, most hospitals and doctors were in the next county to the west. Almost all of the nearby churches and cemeteries were in the county to the south.

So when searching for records, we had our best success by looking in neighboring counties instead of the county in which they lived:  their home county contained property and probate records; the county to the west contained birth and death records; the county to the south contained their burial records. If we hadn't included the neighboring counties, we would have missed many valuable sources of information.

If you're in a similar situation, we hope that the following information helps.

Pocahontas is located in Randolph County and is the County Seat.

To see how the shape of Arkansas' counties may have changed over time, we recommend the Atlas of Historical County Boundaries.

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Randolph County: Clay, Greene, Lawrence, Sharp, Oregon (MO) & Ripley (MO).

Below are the counties that are near Pocahontas. For each of these counties, we show a sample of those communities that are closest to Pocahontas:

  • Randolph County     (The home county of Pocahontas)
  • Clay County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Pocahontas, with the one closest to Pocahontas listed first.
    • Datto
      (16 miles [25.7 km] to the northeast)
      • Datto is located in Clay County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Datto
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 89 people
    • Peach Orchard
      (17 miles [27.4 km] to the east)
    • Current View
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Success
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northeast)
      • Success is located in Clay County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Success
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 132 people
    • Knobel
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
      • Knobel is located in Clay County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Knobel
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 257 people
    • Corning
      (23 miles [37 km] to the northeast)
    • Moark
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the northeast)
  • Craighead County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Pocahontas, with the one closest to Pocahontas listed first.
    • Bono
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the south)
      • Bono is located in Craighead County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bono
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 2,595 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Bono <1>
    • Egypt
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the south)
      • Egypt is located in Craighead County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Egypt
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 111 people
      • Jump to TripAdvisor's Tourism page for Egypt <1>
    • Philadelphia
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Greene County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Pocahontas, with the one closest to Pocahontas listed first.
    • Delaplaine
      (13 miles [20.9 km] to the east)
      • Delaplaine is located in Greene County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Delaplaine
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 116 people
    • Light
      (18 miles [29 km] to the southeast)
      • Light is located in Greene County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Light
    • Beech Grove
      (20 miles [32.2 km] to the east)
      • Beech Grove is located in Greene County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Beech Grove
    • Walcott
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the southeast)
    • Stonewall
      (23 miles [37 km] to the east)
    • Crowley
      (23 miles [37 km] to the southeast)
    • Finch
      (25 miles [40.2 km] to the southeast)
    • Lafe
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the east)
      • Lafe is located in Greene County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Lafe
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 458 people
    • Pine Knot
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Oak Grove Heights
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the east)
      • Oak Grove Heights is located in Greene County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Oak Grove Heights
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 1,095 people
    • Paragould
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the southeast)
  • Lawrence County
  • Sharp County
    • The following are listed by their distance from Pocahontas, with the one closest to Pocahontas listed first.
    • Williford
      (21 miles [33.8 km] to the west)
      • Williford is located in Sharp County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Williford
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 80 people
    • Wirth
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the northwest)
    • Hardy
      (28 miles [45.1 km] to the west)
    • Highland
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the west)
      • Highland is located in Sharp County
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Highland
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 1,105 people
  • Oregon County (MO)
  • Ripley County (MO)
    • The following are listed by their distance from Pocahontas, with the one closest to Pocahontas listed first.
    • Current View
      (19 miles [30.6 km] to the northeast)
    • Gatewood
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the north)
      • Gatewood is located in Ripley County (MO)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Gatewood
    • Ponder
      (22 miles [35.4 km] to the north)
    • Briar
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the north)
      • Briar is located in Ripley County (MO)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Briar
    • Doniphan
      (26 miles [41.8 km] to the north)
    • Oxly
      (27 miles [43.5 km] to the northeast)
      • Oxly is located in Ripley County (MO)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Oxly
    • Naylor
      (29 miles [46.7 km] to the northeast)
      • Naylor is located in Ripley County (MO)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Naylor
      • Population from the 2020 Census: 585 people
    • Bardley
      (30 miles [48.3 km] to the north)
      • Bardley is located in Ripley County (MO)
      • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Bardley

For an expanded list of the communities that are closest to Pocahontas, see our County-by-County Page for Pocahontas.

Cemeteries Near Pocahontas ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Pocahontas.

This is a new section and is likely to have errors. If you find an error, such as a missing cemetery or we have the wrong name, please let us know. If you know of them, we would also appreciate learning about previous or alternate names.

Although we don't have the information ourselves, if you need information about a burial or interment, photos, transcripts, how to contact the cemetery or local authorities, please visit our list of websites on our Genealogy Helper Page for Pocahontas - one of the links might be able to help.

If not found below, our Cemetery List for Pocahontas covers a larger area, with the cemeteries listed in alphabetical order.

The following cemeteries are listed based on their distance from Pocahontas, with the one closest to Pocahontas listed first.

Nearby Communities in 1895 ...

We've built the following list with information that came from an Atlas published by Rand McNally in 1895. The Atlas had details such as the population of the community (which appears to have come from the 1890 Census) and whether there was a post office and/or railroad service available. We also indicate if the community no longer exists and is now historic.<4>

The Rand McNally Atlas shows that Pocahontas had a population of 507 people in 1895 with a post office and no railroad service. In 2020, Pocahontas had a population of 7,371 people.

These communities are listed based on their distance from Pocahontas, with the one closest to Pocahontas listed first.

We've also created an expanded list of communities that existed in the 1890's and were located in the area around Pocahontas. See our List of 1890's Communities around Pocahontas.

Newspapers Published in the Vicinity of Pocahontas ...

An ongoing effort between the Library of Congress and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) has resulted in the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP).

To share their results, the partnership has created the Chronicling America website. The goal of this partnership is to assemble a database about the current and historic newspapers of the United States. This includes a growing collection of scanned images from selected papers. All of it available to the public on their website.

Using information that we've taken from the Chronicling America website, we've identified 29 newspapers that have been published in the area around Pocahontas.

We have organized these newspapers into two lists:

  • A Local Newspaper List - focusing on the papers published in the immediate area of Pocahontas. There are actually two parts to this list - papers printed in the immediate area of Pocahontas and those printed in the larger area surrounding Pocahontas.
  • An Extended Newspaper List - a longer list, sorted by paper name and containing those papers published within 23 miles [37 km]<3> of Pocahontas.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we begin with the websites from Cyndi's List, FamilySearch and Genealogy Trails. These professional and volunteer websites offer the information directly or else point to where you can find it. Their information is open to everyone.

To help you get started, the following links will take you to the pages that are relevant to Pocahontas:

Footnotes ...

<1>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<2>The Find-a-Grave website is an excellent research tool with information about a cemetery's location and interments. They also offer a forum for their members which can provide additional help. More information about Find-a-Grave can be found on their website: findagrave.com.
<3>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' (or point-to-point) distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Pocahontas) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<4>We use the term 'Historic' broadly and it generally means that the community no longer exists. However, it can also mean that the community might still exist, but was significantly larger or had a more 'official' existence in the past than it does now. Unfortunately our sources of data have proven to be unreliable. If you can provide us with more specific information about Pocahontas, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.