It is fully twenty years since your editor worked on the Mississippi Hollingsworth family for the first time, a year before HR was born. Thus this family is next to our Wexfords in our genealogical heart. It is very satisfying to see such a record as this, obviously a private record which could never have been found in any court house research. Besides the loss by fire of all records in Newton County before 1876 squashed any chances of finding clues there. The will of Isaac - or his administration papers - perished in that fire. If Ike, by any outside chance, referred to his late wife Dorcas, or any of his brothers or sisters, we shall perhaps never know unless an exemplified office copy exist's somewhere.

Finally, Dr. Harold Graham theorizes that Dorcas Hollingsworth was probably dead before Isaac Hollingsworth even removed to Newton County. He believes she is buried in present day Fair River Church Cemetery, in Lincoln County, Mississippi. In 1828, Isaac sold his land there (then in Lawrence County) and removed north to Copiah County, which would place the death of Dorcas not long before that time.

As for her maiden name, Mrs Rayborn has long thought it was Smith, not only on account of the fact that this name is the second name in the oldest son of Dorcas, but because Captain William Smith, under whom both Isaac Hollingsworth and Robert Steen served in the War of 1812, had a daughter Dorcas Smith. The name is Greek, meaning a gazelle, and the Greek Scriptures carry the story of a woman of this name, in Acts ix, 36, a good, charitable woman. It was a favored Quaker name during the early history of the movement, but certainly not restricted to the Friends. It is rare among the Hollingsworths, Quaker or not. In HR we find all mentions of others with this name to be wives of Hollingsworths.

Now, on to the next goal: Find out who Isaac's parents were!