My father Curtis Middleton told me many times how my grandfather dropped dead while banking potatos. This was during WWII and the news of Grooms' death took many months to reach my father in the Pacific. He was always very bitter about this long delay.

Every person I ever talked to that knew Grooms has commented on his degree of meanness. I recall that my father never failed to tear up at the memory of his dad. There was not a single time I can remember my Dad ever criticizing his father. Is it possible that there was a softer side of Grooms that not everyone saw?

A marriage license on file in Appling County GA gives the wedding date of August 11, 1900 for G.B. Middleton and Miss Katie Deen. At the time Grooms was 27, and Katie was just 11.

Ultimately, Grooms had ten children (that lived) and 43 grandchildren; 42 by the children of Kate Deen, and one by the child of Lou Young.

For many years there was much confusion surrounding the wives of Grooms' father Henry Middleton. It was not clear who was the mother of which children. I had not been able to determine whether Grooms' mother was Martha Elizabeth Highsmith or Amarintha Deal. Only in recent weeks have I located the birth certificate of Groom's older sister Lucinda which identified her mother as Meranda Deal (Dyal). Grooms never had a death certificate, but it's unlikely that his mother could be anyone other than Amarintha Deal (Dyal) with his older and younger siblings all being hers. Sadly her grave has never been located.

I was asked recently about whether Grooms Benjamin Middleton might be related somehow to a man in Putnam County Florida by the name of AB Grooms. My initial thought to give a kneejerk response of "no". I'm glad that I chose to dig a little deeper instead.

Here's what I found:

In the 1850 census of McIntosh County GA, there was a Benjamin Grooms from NC whose date of birth was about 1787. It's not clear when that Mr. Grooms moved to the region. According to several family trees I found on ancestry.com, he was the great-grandfather of the AB Grooms who lived and died in Putnam County Florida in 2002.

My great-great-grandfather, Alexander G Middleton who was born in 1795, lived in that same region of Georgia at the same time as Benjamin Grooms was living there. And in 1828 Alexander named his fifth son Benjamin Grooms Middleton. My great-grand uncle Benjamin Middleton had no children that I can determine. His occupation was school teacher and Methodist minister. Sadly his grave and date of death is lost to history. It is this man I believe was the namesake for my grandfather Grooms.

Alexander G Middleton had another son – a Dr named William Spencer Middleton (who is the ancestor of all the Putnum Co Fla Middletons) who had a grandson born in 1872 (same year as my GF) and who was also given the name Benjamin Grooms Middleton. That man died in 1955 and is buried in Hortense Georgia.

And finally, Alexander's son Henry Middleton (my great-grandfather) named his son (my grandfather) Grooms Benjamin Middleton.

So the connections between AB Grooms and the recurring name Grooms among the Middleton clan are probably not familial connections, but instead are namesakes based on (at least initially) the presumed association between Alexander G Middleton and Benjamin Grooms in the early 1800's in McIntosh County GA. The 1840 census shows Mr Grooms living just four households away from Alexander.

But the number of parallels demands that serious consideration be given to the possibility that Benjamin Grooms, native of NC, served as the impetus for the many subsequent uses of the name in the Middleton family of southeast Georgia and north central Florida. He must have been a true friend to my great-great grandfather Alex.