Violette Wiggins Newton

Genealogy Another Way

Mrs. Violette Wiggins Newton, a descendant of William Washington Wiggins and Eva Sheffield Wiggins of St. Landry Parish, has approached genealogy in a different way, using her talents as a poetess to record her family history and relate her searches for various ancestors. In the two poems reproduced here she tells of the exhaustive search for her great-uncle, Joseph Columbus Wiggins, and his family.

Joseph Columbus Wiggins married DeWitie Jane Ellzey in Hardin County, TX in 1882. After a short time, they returned to the Hagewood/Provencal area of Natchitoches Parish, where Mr. Wiggins was active in the timber industry. Mr. Wiggins was killed in a work related accident in 1890 and is buried in the Shiloh Cemetery at Provencal, La. DeWite Jane Ellzey Wiggins Roy remarried, reared her Wiggins and Roy children in the Natchitoches Parish area, and is buried in Pine Grove Cemetery, Hagewood, LA.

Mrs. Violette Wiggins Newton, a Poet Laureate of Texas, has kindly consented to the reproduction of the two poems concerning her family. Mrs. Newton is the author of some 15 volumes of poems and is active in the Poetry Society of Texas, both as an author and as a reviewer and critic for the Society. In 1994, the Poetry Society of Texas awarded Mrs. Newton its highest honor, the Hilton Ross Greer Award, in recognition of her years of service.

We extend thanks to Mrs. Newton for her graciousness and to the family of William H. Liles, Jr., of Natchitoches, great-grandson of Joseph Columbus Wiggins and DeWittie Jane Ellzey Wiggins, for arranging for the sharing of this approach to genealogy.