Olivers in America

     My timeline shows a very brief recap of the last 373 years of American 
History.  Many family generations ago, a man named John Oliver, a planter 
obtained 100 acres on the James River, lately in the occupation of John Smith,
and began a long line of American descendants.  This was Sept. 22, 1623.  The 
history records show that he came from England to the New World but his 
motivation is unclear.  As America colonized and expanded westward the Olivers 
were statesman (mainly township judges and councilman) and supported their 
families with tobacco 'plantations'.  The first evidence of an Oliver 
participating in a historical event was Dionysius Oliver who served in four 
battles with General Lincoln.  The story of the township which Dionysius 
Oliver founded is described later in this paper.  After the American 
Revolution, the Olivers moved from Virginia to Georgia and did not move again 
until after 18ll when the Steamboat and many other inventions changed both the 
future of Petersburg, Georgia and lead toward an increasing migration west.  
In the early 1800's the Olivers settled in Texas in the counties surrounding 
Brownwood and Weatherford.  I could find no evidence that any of my direct 
descendants served in either the fight for Texas Independence or the Civil 
War.  Although certainly both of these events should have greatly affected 
their lives.  My great grandfather and grandfather remember well the 
depression as jobs were lost and times in Texas were hard.  My grandfather was 
nine when the stock market crashed and he recalls that his dad sold newspapers 
on the corner in Odessa and my great grandmother worked in a soup kitchen.  
Prior to the crash, great grandfather was in the insurance business and great 
grandmother was a school teacher.  My grandfather received his education while 
serving in the US Airforce and served in Japan duringWorld War II.  Three 
hundred years is really a very short time in the history of a family or 
country.

     The family Oliver will always be remembered in conjunction with the 
founding of Petersburg, Georgia.  The fourth generation of Olivers to live in 
America established a township which flourished from 1784 until 1850 and today 
is a historical part of a Georgia state park. At the age of 48 my grandfather 
many generations ago having served as a Captain in the American Revolution now 
began looking for new opportunities in Georgia. The State of Georgia gave 
Wilkes County authorization to issue land grants based on the value of one's 
services during the Revolutionary War.  Dionysius Oliver acquired 5,250 acres 
where the Broad and Savannah rivers intersected.  He laid out 86 lots (1/2 
acre/lot) in a new town called Petersburg after his hometown in Virginia.  By 
the early 1800's Petersburg had become the third largest city in Georgia. In 
fact it is even written that the Georgian town housed two US Senators and that 
fifteen Georgia counties were named in honor of famous residents from 
Petersburg.  Petersburg took a downward turn after my Grandfather's death 
(1808) because with the invention of the steamship which could not go up the 
narrow Savannah and rivers that continually flooded the low areas in the 
spring the residents eventually moved to higher ground.  Today the settlement 
is memorialized within the Bobby Brown State Park and all of its remains 
protected by federal law.  My grandfather is buried just a few miles away in 
the oldest grave at Stinchcomb Methodist church.  In fact there stands a 
historical marker which describes the site and reads "among the old graves in 
the churchyard cemetery is that of Dionysius Oliver, Revolutionary solider".

     As a young child my mother used to ask my grandfather to tell her about 
his family.  My mother remembers vividly the her father's story that all 
Oliver men were horse thieves so their short lives had nothing to do with ill 
health but simply their chosen 'profession'.  As I searched back I found 
during the many years while being tobacco farmers in Virginia and Georgia that 
the Oliver men were also often judges, councilmen and lawyers.  The Oliver 
women married well and raised large families as was the way of the time.  
After the Olivers moved to Texas it was my great grandfather's uncle that keep 
this tradition going by being very involved in the Parker County politics.  My 
great grandfather was more interested in fly fishing then voting getting.  I 
am sure that my grandfather was right that somewhere here and there was a 
horse thief or two in the Oliver family but they sure managed to keep those 
names out of the family history records.