ALBERT HARRINGTON

The following bio was taken from page 226 of the book entitled “Rusk County History” compiled and edited and used with permission of the Rusk County Historical Commission.

 Transcribed by Shirley Koym

 Submitted by Gloria Briley Mayfield, Cemeteries of Texas

 Little is known about the ancestors of William Sidney and Angeline Elizabeth Parker Harrington.  Bill was born in Mississippi in 1839 and served in the Civil War.  He was captured and held prisoner in Chicago, where the captives were poorly fed.  When the war was over and the prisoners released, they made their way home by walking.  Along the way they came across camps that had been occupied by the northern soldiers.  Bill and his companions would search the camps for food.  To the hungry men, the dried bread was very “sweet.”  Then the travelers found dead soldiers, they would take their shoes. 

William married Angeline Parker at Minden about 1867, and they had eight children, four girls and four boys.  Their first grandchild, born about 1885, started their unique nicknames, Pay-pa and May-ma.  These names were used by family and friends alike for many years.   

My father, Albert Lester, was the sixth child of Bill and Angeline and was born in 1879 near Shiloh.  He married Lee Ora Threadgill in 1901.  Ora was born in Griffin, Georgia in 1875 and came to Texas in 1876 with her family, who settled in the Shiloh Community.  (See Threadgill story.) 

Albert entered the ministry in 1910, and although he never pastored a church, he loved gospel singing and helped in many revivals as song director.  He performed many local weddings, some in strange circumstances.   One couple was married about 8:00 P.M., and at 12:00 P.M. the bride’s father, accompanied by the sheriff, came searching for his daughter. 

Albert and Oma had a son and two daughters.  Edgar Verlin was born in 1903 and died in 1904.  Oma Lee was born in 1906 and married Ottis Pinkerton in 1925.  They had three children:  Carlton, Billy Ray and Sybil Cassity.  Ottis died in 1959, and Oma Lee became a nurse and now lives and works in Carthage, Texas.  I, Mabel Clement, was born in 1910 near Shiloh.  I earned a Master of Education degree from Stephen F. Austin University and taught school for thirty-three years.  I am a member of the Pine Hill O.E.S., and am active in my church.  I married Rade Griffin in 1935.  During World War II, Rade worked in a shipyard and later was a dairy farmer until his death in 1953. 

Rade and I had two sons, Joe and Terry.  Joe was born in 1938 and has a master’s degree from Stephen F. Austin State University, and is employed in the Henderson Schools.  He married Jonell Turner in 1964 and they have two children, Kim and Jeff.  Terry was born in 1941.  He graduated from Texas A & M with an E.E. degree and is employed by Dallas Power and Light Company.  He married Susan Long in 1974 and they have a son, Kevin, born in 1981. 

Jesse Verlin Faulkner, nephew of my father, was born in Shelby County in 1918 and was the son of my father’s sister, Eugenia Faulkner.  She died shortly after Verlin was born and my parents reared him.  Verlin served in World War II and was stationed in Chicago, where he met and married Betty Willett.  They have three sons, Donald Lester, David Verlin, and Daniel Ray.  Verlin works in Houston at Johnson’s Space Center. 

Submitted by Mabel Griffin