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| English: A portrait of Stonewall Jackson (1864, J. W. King) located in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
All of us have some claim to fame with a celebrity or historical personage in our family trees. We might hear an allusion in rumors or detailed stories and pictures of a famous person who preceded us or even might be still living. It can be fun and even a source of a certain amount of pride to have bragging rights about so and so who did such and such. Especially when that person has a fairly reasonable amount of fame.
Among my familial precursors have been an officer in the Revolutionary War, a U.S. congressman, a federal judge, a state governor, and many other influential men and women who shaped the destiny of the United States. The city of Jackson Hole, Wyoming is named after one of my relatives. One of our greatest claims to fame is our relationship to the famous Confederate general Thomas Jonathan Jackson who is best known as "Stonewall" Jackson. A DNA test has verified that I descend from the same descendant as Stonewall.
