RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Tennessee >> Overton County >> Free Communion >> Genealogy HelperIndex...

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 Free Communion (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 Free Communion. 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.

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 southeast corner of their home county. During their lives, most hospitals and doctors were in the next county to the east. 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 east 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.

Free Communion is located in Overton County.

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

The following counties adjoin and form the boundaries of Overton County: Clay, Cumberland, Fentress, Jackson, Pickett & Putnam.

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

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

Cemeteries Near Free Communion ...

Below are cemeteries that are in the vicinity of Free Communion.

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 Free Communion - one of the links might be able to help.

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

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

  • Stover Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the southwest)
  • Richardson Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the northeast)
  • Sells Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the north)
  • White Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the southwest)
  • Nelson Cemetery
    (Less than 2 miles to the northeast)
  • Smiths Chapel Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the southeast)
  • Cole Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the east)
  • Regan Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the east)
  • Antioch Cemetery
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the north)
  • Hunter Cove Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the west)
  • Old Bethel Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the north)
  • Monroe Cemetery
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the south)
  • Continue List   (576 more) ...
    • Red Hill Cemetery
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
    • Story Cemetery
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the east)
    • Flowers Cemetery
      (3 miles [4.8 km] to the northeast)

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.<2>

While we didn't find Free Communion in the Atlas, the following 1895 communities would have been found near the current location of Free Communion.

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

  • Eagle Creek ‑ Historic
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the northeast)
    • Eagle Creek is located in Overton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Eagle Creek
  • Oakley
    (2 miles [3.2 km] to the northwest)
  • Monroe
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the southeast)
  • Wirmingham
    (4 miles [6.4 km] to the east)
    • Wirmingham is located in Overton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Wirmingham
  • Ward ‑ Historic
    (5 miles [8 km] to the west)
    • Ward is located in Overton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Ward
  • Livingston
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the southwest)
  • Grey ‑ Historic
    (6 miles [9.7 km] to the west)
    • Grey is located in Overton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Grey
  • Nettle Carrier ‑ Historic
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southeast)
    • Nettle Carrier is located in Overton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Nettle Carrier
  • Willow Grove
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Willow Grove is located in Clay County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Willow Grove
  • Fox Springs ‑ Historic
    (8 miles [12.9 km] to the northwest)
    • Fox Springs is located in Clay County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Fox Springs
  • Henard ‑ Historic
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the south)
    • Henard is located in Overton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Henard
  • Poteet ‑ Historic
    (9 miles [14.5 km] to the southeast)
    • Poteet is located in Overton County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Poteet
  • Continue List   (15 more) ...

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

Newspapers Published in Free Communion ...

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 24 newspapers that have been published in the area around Free Communion.

Although we're unaware of any newspapers that were published in the immediate area of Free Communion, there are papers which were published within 16 miles [25.7 km]<3>. A list of those papers, sorted by paper name, can be found on the Extended Newspaper List for Free Communion.

Websites to Help With Your Genealogy Research ...

When we do our genealogical research, we like to start 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 Free Communion:

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>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 Free Communion, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<3>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'point-to-point' distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Free Communion) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.