The Conner Family in Attala County

Yesterday, I found this picture of a historic marker for the Conner Plantation, once located in Attala County, Mississippi, and the home of Boley Conner and his wife, Anne Traweek Conner. The lovely picture was taken by Natalie Maynor and is one of many in her beautiful collection of Mississippi photos taken throughout the state. If only I could find a picture of the house that was part of the Conner plantation. I was particularly pleased to have discovered a photo of the historical marker, since Anne Traweek was the first wife of one of my Porter ancestors, Archibald Porter. According to Attala County records, a number of Conner family members are buried in the cemetery. My Porter line is descended from Samuel Porter, a brother of Archibald Porter. As the story goes, when Archibald's first wife died, he went back to Alabama,, where he still had relatives, and married his second wife, Anne Traweek. Anne moved to Attala County, Mississippi, where she and Archibald became the parents of Susannah, named for his deceased wife, and Burwell and Isabella, named for her parents.

Archibald Porter died several years later, leaving Anne a young widow with three very young children. A short time later, Anne Traweek Porter married Boley Conner, a son of Uriah Conner, who had settled with his Maryland-born wife, Rebecca Chappelear, in Winston County, near Louisville, Mississippi, after the Treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek was signed. According to the U. S. Census of 1850, taken in Winston County, Mississippi, Uriah had already died, since Rebecca was shown living in a household that did not include her husband. 


Over the next dozen or so years, Anne and Boley had a total of thirteen children, including three sets of twins. When their first set of twins were born in 1846, Anne and Boley named them for his parents, Rebecca and Uriah. Interestingly, some years earlier, Anne and Archibald Porter had named two of their children for her parents.


A few years ago, we had the pleasure of staying overnight at Linden Plantation in Natchez, Mississippi, now operated as a bed and breakfast. It is a truly lovely house, with beautiful gardens surrounding it. The house, the gardens, and the big plantation breakfast, served each morning on antique china complemented by old sterling flatware and period sterling pieces, make a guest believe they have stepped back into the days of Scarlett O'Hara. The house with its period furnishings is said to be one of the best examples of Federalist design in the United States. At breakfast one morning, the owner related to us the story of how the doors to Tara Plantation in the movie "Gone With the Wind" were an exact replica of the front door at Linden Plantation, including the beautiful leaded glass sidelights and fanlight.


The Conner family made its mark in Mississippi, both socially and politically. Interestingly enough, some of that same Conner family built Linden Plantation, and descendants of the family have lived there consistently since before the Civil War.