[Granville-Hough] 25 Feb 2009 - Uncle Tillman Arender

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2009 07:58:04 -0800
From: Granville W Hough <gwhough at oakapple.net>
Subject: Uncle Tillman Arinder - 25 Feb 2009.


Tillman Arinder and his brother Sampson Arender, sons of Henry
Orrender and Alouthea "Letha" (McCarty) each served in the
Confederate Army, one or both as Orrenders or Oranders.  I do not
believe either was
literate.  Somehow, later in life, Tillman was told his name should be
spelled Arinder, and Sampson's family was told by someone else it should
be spelled Arender.

        When Tillman returned home, his wife in Jones or Wayne County had one 
baby and was
pregnant with another; and he had not been on leave.    He later claimed
he slept outside that night and left the next day as in a common law
divorce.  There may even have been a legal divorce.  Anyway, Uncle
Tillman found another wife in Smith County, and eventually he and his
younger children from the second wife settled in Covington County.  An
older son from the first wife joined and grew up with his father.  This
son married and drifted northward into Scott County.  So we have the
Arinders scattered about, and they are all distant cousins to us.

    The wartime babies in question were females who grew up in Jones
County under the guardianship of a married sister to Tillman and
Sampson, Matilda "Tilda" Mason and her husband Zebedee.  There seemed to 
be one daughter born years after the war.  I remember the names Martha, 
Nicey, and Vicey, and they were called Arinders or something like that. 

  I could never
determine whom they married or if there were families.  Anyway, if Uncle 
Tillman were right, we would not be kin to them anyway.

     Uncle Tillman must have had quite a reputation in his own right.
When my uncle Tom Richardson was living at Poplarville, he had a very
lusty breeding bull to which he gave the name "Tillman Arinder."

    All the Arinder cousins I ever met seemed to be the nicest sort of
people you could find.
    Each family and its descendants have both clung to the name spelling
they preferred, and this clearly separates the two families. My research
suggests the most likely origin of the name was from German families
from Alsace
named Ohrendorf or Ahrendorf.  There were probably a dozen or more of
these families who came to America.  Our family drifted up the Shenandoah
Valley, then some went on to NC and SC, thence to MS.  Others went to KY
and IL. There are
clusters of phonetically similar people in each of the states noted, and
the name spelling is typically Orrender/Orrinder or Arender/Arinder, and
some even keep the ending f.
    Thank you for sending the Arinder obit (Harold Hopkins sent it).  It
reminded me of old legends and
human frailties.  I well remember overhearing (when I wasn't supposed to
be listening) what my grandmother Mary (Arender) Richardson had been
told as a child about the Civil War misconduct of Tillman's wife, 
Minerva.  Grandma only knew the backwoods words for sexual activities, 
but they were so graffic that they became part of my  lifetime 
vocabulary (the unused part).  With my regards, Granville