​

 

​

​

The following narrative was crafted by WFC Historian Lynita Mitchell-Blackwell and presented at the July 2025 Reunion.  During that Reunion, the Family voted to establish a standing Historian Committee open to all family members.  If you would like to serve, contact Lynita at lynitamb[at]gmail.com.

​

​

​

​

 

 

 

 

Part I - The Roots - John, Jennie, Patsy, Liza, and Alex

 

In 1850, the six year old West African boy-child who would become John Williams endured the unimaginable and survived the “middle passage”.  

 

Out gathering wood for his village, the boy-child was observed to be strong, intelligent, and possessed the foundational knowledge of farming.  These were the “crimes” that led to his abduction from his native land, and a forced two month voyage by sea chained to brothers and sisters who shared his hue and horror.  

 

The boy-child was sold at auction to the Brockett plantation located in South Georgia, not too far from what is now Thomasville.  He was named John, and as was the custom of the time, was assigned the last name of the plantation owner - Brockett.   John worked the fields, enduring the forced bondage of slavery in the United States until he turned 21 in 1865.  On May 29, 1865, a Union Soldier came to the Brockett Plantation with the news John and almost every enslaved person prayed to hear:  you are free!  

 

John asked the soldier his name, he replied "Lieutenant Williams,” and from that point on, John was known as John Williams.

 

At 31, John met and married Patsy Murray on March 14, 1875.  Patsy’s mother was Comfort, a Cherokee Indian, and her birth father is most probably one of the owners of the Murray Plantation.  However, when Comfort married John Robinson, he raised Patsy as his own and gave her his name, Robinson.  

 

John and Patsy had nine children between 1871 and 1891:  

• Colonel Williams

• General Williams

• Chestina Williams Robinson Hayes

• Mary Jane Williams Hunter Livingston

• Judge Williams

• Arthur Williams (died young)

• Rev. Samuel “Lovelace” Williams

• Callie Williams (died at five years old)

 

Patsy had a brother with whom she was close - Alex Farmer.  Alex married Jennie Patton March 5, 1880.  Jennie was born in 1856 to Silva Patton of Tennessee; her father is unknown.  

 

Alex and Jennie had seven children between 1872 and 1892 (yes they were having children before and during their marriage!):  

• Eddie Farmer

• Cicero Farmer

• Homer Farmer

• Ellis Farmer

• Victoria Farmer Hadley

• Idella Farmer

• Dr. Alexander Alphonso Farmer

 

The families were close, having established households as farmers near one another.  John was never a sharecropper, he leased his land from the Neel brothers in Thomasville, Georgia.  He was a very successful farmer and also a horse breeder.  At some point in his life, John stepped on a rusty nail, developed gangrene poisoning, and lost his leg.  

 

Sadly, Patsy died in 1894 of unknown causes, and her brother Alex died not too long after she did, also cause unknown.  It is possible that they were the victims of a Yellow Fever outbreak that occurred in 1894, or the plague which followed through US trade routes in the 1890s. 

 

Times were hard, and it was paramount to survival to keep the family together.  So John and Jennie married the following year (December 18, 1895) in Thomas County, Georgia.  This made Alex and Jennie’s children John’s nieces and nephews as well as his step-sons and daughters.  This is what is meant when we say that John and Patsy and Alex and Jennie’s children are “double kin” - they have dual kinship.

 

To this new union between John and Jennie were born three additional children:

• Lula Williams Hardy

• Beatrice “Tiny” Williams Dunaway

• Deacon John “Bud” Wesley Williams

 

During his marriages to both Patsy and Jennie, John maintained a relationship with his neighbor Liza Baker which produced two children:

• Pinky Williams Peterman in 1880

• Queen Ann Belle Williams March 27, 1886

 

At some point John separated from Jennie and never filed for divorce, yet there is a record noting he married Liza January 4, 1898. (Yes, he was a bigamist!) However, John and Jennie most likely reconciled by 1890, as the census of that year (1890) listed them as living together.

 

Jennie was a midwife for 20 years, a proud member of Mt. Herman Lodge No. 3517 Grand United Order of Odd Fellows in Bartow Florida, and known as a strict disciplinarian.   

 

John died in 1929 at the age of 85.  Upon his death, Jennie went to live with her daughter Victoria Farmer Hadley, and there she remained until she passed October 11, 1938.  Interestingly, Jennie wanted to live with her son, Dr. Alexander Alphonso Farmer, but his wife was adamantly opposed to it:  she believed Jennie’s dark skin would be an impediment to their rise in black bourgeois society.  So our family is no stranger to the negative influence of colorism.

 

Part II - The Fruit: the Founding of the Williams Family Club and

Founder Rev. Chestina Williams Delaney

 

As time went on, people moved, opportunities began to open up for colored people, negros, blacks, and African Americans throughout the US and around the world.  

 

Our family took part in every major and minor movement to make people’s lives better:  civil rights, women’s right to vote, educational, vocational, pay equity, and feminist.  

 

Our family members are proud veterans of every branch of government and civil servants.

 

Our family has had multiple political leaders, appointed and elected.

 

Our family has a plethora of spiritual leaders, ministers who excel in the pulpit, administration, education, music, and financial stewardship.

 

And while all of these things are wonderful, they led to the drifting apart of members, so much so, that first cousins did not know one another.

 

Chestina Williams Delaney was born to Rev. Samuel “Lovelace” Williams and Smythie Saunders Williams.  Smythie died in childbirth when Chestina was six years old.  Lovelace leaned heavily on his siblings to help raise his children, who he adored, and it was this closeness that Chestina strived to ensure was part of her legacy.  Little did she know that the opportunity to do so would present so radically.

 

The children of her brothers started dating, not knowing they were first cousins.  When word made its way around the family, there was shock, outrage, and then action:  Chestina was adamant that we stop meeting only at funerals and weddings (mostly funerals), and become more intentional about establishing relationships with our kinsfolk in joyous, relaxed circumstances.  

 

With the aid of her Partner in Crime, younger sister Annie Mae, Chestina began a phone and letter campaign to bring everyone together for the first Williams Family Reunion in 1969.  The Club was formed, branches established, host cities added to the roster, and membership blossomed. 

 

The size of our gathering as shifted through our 55 years from 35 to 220; and we have had an annual reunion every year except 2020, the year of the COVID-19 Pandemic shut down.  Yet even then, we came together via Zoom calls and small gatherings to maintain our connection.

 

So this is what we celebrate, this is “out most uttermost concern: a spiritual uplift together.”  Where we gather, when we gather, how we gather is secondary to the fact that we DO GATHER TOGETHER in love.