Squire Boone overwhelms us!

Campfire fun!

When our daughter invited us to join her and all of our grandchildren for a Memorial Day camping experience we couldn't say,
"no". Some of our best memories are from campfire stories and conversation while camping with our children and grandchildren. We all agreed to meet after church and to make the one-drive from High Point, NC to a country setting just south of Mocksville, NC.

We had a great time during our camping trip. Hot dogs over the fire, so'mores, an all-terrain vehicle, fishing and some beautiful woods made for a great time. We even set up Becker's Blessing (GC4D2T8), a new geocache to help us remember this great weekend adventure.

Jr. Geocacher fits out for the hunt

We also set up a Jr. Geocachers Training event for our two-year old grandson. While mom and dad set up the pop-up camper and organized the camp, grandma and grandpa took littleman2010 on a mock geocaching hunt. I hid some regular sized caches in the woods near our camp site, gave him a play GPSr I'd made and off he went. My goal was to encourage him to discover the fun of the hunt, understand the concept of trading items and to get him hooked on the game so I'll have a partner later on. He enjoyed finding the caches and picking up swag but became distracted easily with the other camp activities. It was fun for us to watch him.

Found it!

We also took a moment to talk about the significance of Memorial Day. It would be easy to turn Memorial Day into just a weekend for picnics and cookouts....just another day off. As more and more of us are fortunate enough to have no loved ones killed in recent war, the tendency is for the day to loose its true significance. Our family could easily fall into this category. Although we've had many who have served, including myself, for the last almost 150 years we've all come home. We did take a little time to remember two family members, members

A little fishing fun!

whose names and a little of their history is all that we have.

First we remembered Joseph Meredith, our grandchildren's 6 great grandfather, Pvt, 6th Virginia Militia. He died on 25 November 1813 near Lambert's Point, Norfolk, Virginia in the War of 1812. Military records indicate that he, like many soldiers, died of disease. He died of the measles. We don't know where he is buried but we do know that his widow later received a land grant in Washington County, Tennessee for his service.

Second we remembered our grandchildren's 4
great grandfather Joseph Edwards, Pvt, 54th North Carolina Infantry Brigade (Confederate). He died in the last months of the Civil War in the defense of Petersburg, Virginia. When I began to research my wife's family, the only thing her grandmother could tell us about sumajhuarmi's great great grandfather was that he had died in the war and that he had been left out and died of exposure. I was fortunate to be able to find a widow's pension application dated in the late 1800's which identified his unit. A little research turned up a history of the units movements and battles. It was interesting to discover what I think is the answer to our little
mystery. On 6 February 1865 the weather turned unseasonably warm. Union forces began to maneuver after a long winter stalemate. Confederate forces moved to block them. At a small creek called Hatcher's Run they met for a brief but violent clash. As the afternoon wore on the weather began to change. Within a few hours warm spring weather became rain which became sleet. It was mentioned that many of the wounded died on the battlefield from the cold weather. We believe that our Joseph Edwards was among them. He is most likely buried in a mass grave to North Carolina troops at the Blandford Church Cemetery in Petersburg, Virginia.

Squire Boone grave

When we left the Mocksville area we picked up a few geocaches in town. We had to get home in time for another activity so we didn't have a lot of time to look for caches. I intentionally left A Grave Historic Site (GCYVW6) for last since it promised to be an interesting and historic site. As we pulled into the cemetery we saw the historical marker proclaiming that this was the site where Daniel Boone's parents are buried. Wow! We pulled into the cemetery and parked at a gate in a shady area. We tracked towards the GZ. As we went we saw the grave for Squire Boone. We stopped to read the historical marker next to the grave. It showed the lands he had received in the 1750's in various parts of Davie County. Then we took pictures of the graves themselves. The marker gave the history of Daniel Boone's activities in this area before he moved on to Wilkes County and later into Kentucky and fame as a long hunter and explorer. We hopped back in the car and headed for the Interstate. Soon we were

moving at Interstate speed for home. With our minds on all that we had to get done this evening we left Davie County, camping and Squire Boone and his family legacy behind.

About two hours after we got home; after getting a good shower, I settled in to log my cache finds. I always do them in the order that I found them. When I got to the last one I realized that we had been so wrapped up in the history of Squire Boone and Daniel Boone that we never even thought of finding the cache. When I mentioned it to sumajhuarmi she laughed. Neither of us had thought a thing of it. As much as I love geocaching I guess my love for history and historic locations got the best of me today. Others might say that Squire Boone got the best of us. Now we will definitely have to go back to look for this cache.

Our 2013 Memorial Day weekend was great! I hope your's was too!