I am seeking information about the descendants of my second cousin one
generation removed, Prince Albert Roper. Here is all that I know about his
descendants:
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Prince Albert Roper (b 28 Apr 1906 Mineral Bluff GA- d 28 Oct 1967 Oakland CA) m Eva June Walker (b c1910) |
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| Howard Dean Roper (b 1939) m Nancy | ||
| Howard Dean Roper, Jr. | ||
| Tommy Ray Roper | ||
| Erma Jean Roper ( abt 1941- d 1954 Carlsbad, Eddy, Nm) | ||
| Ronnie Wayne Roper (5 Mar 1944 El Paso TX-) m 27 Jul 1968 El Paso TX Anita Jean Louise Hall (10 Oct 1945-) | ||
| Rachel Roper | ||
| Jennifer Lin Roper (b 8 Nov 1975) | ||
| Tiffany J Roper (b 29 May 1972 Tarrant Co. TX) | ||
| Shane T Roper (b 20 Sep 1977) | ||
I heard about Prince while I was a child in Ellis County Oklahoma because he had lived with my grandparents, Joshua Rufus Roper and Amanda Cordelia Sarah Catherine Little Roper, in the same area.
Prince killed a man in Georgia and fled to Ellis County Oklahoma to live with my grandparents. I would guess the data was about 1925. (I was born in 1935.) My grandfather was Prince's sporadic contact with his relatives back in Georgia. Apparently Prince felt that the Georgia authorities might have found out he was in Oklahoma, so he moved to Roosevelt County, New Mexico to stay with my grandfather's sister, Olive Elmira Roper, and her husband, Lewis Abraham Little. He married in New Mexico, had children, was divorced and moved on to Oakland California.
My grandfather continued to ocassionally serve as the intermediary between Prince and his family back in Georgia. After my grandfather died in 1954 Prince's family lost contact with him. In the summer of 1962, while on my way from graduate school in Massachusetts to a summer job in Livermore California, I stopped by Prince's sister's (Trilby L. Roper Duvall) house near Ducktown TN (near the NC and GA borders) and she told me that the family needed to contact Prince to settle his parents' estate.
I had a notebook of my grandfather's that gave an address (1915 Castro St.) for Prince in Oakland. After getting settled into my summer job I drove into Oakland to look for him. I went to the address and told a woman who came to the door that I was looking for Prince Roper. She asked "What do you want him for?" I told her that I was his relative and that I needed to contact him for his relatives back in Georgia. Then she told me that he did not live there any more, but that I could probably find him at a bar just down the street where he cleaned up after the night's closing.
I went to the bar, something that I had never done before, and, in the barely visible dim light, asked the bartender if he knew where I could find Prince Roper. He asked me the same question that the lady at the house had asked and I gave the same answer. Then he said, looking down the bar, "Tiny, this man wants to see you." The man he was talking to was huge, about six feet tall and about 250 pounds. I talked to Prince or "Tiny" a while in the bar and then he took me to his one-room flat (678 19th St.) nearby. I visited him one more time that summer. Then I replaced my grandfather in the intermediary role with his family. By this time the statute of limitations surely had run out for any charges regarding the killing, but he had no desire to return to Georgia and his health was not good. I wrote Trilby and gave her Prince's address. I later heard that they got the signatures from Prince that were needed before Prince died in 1967. (I do not know were he was buried. I was living in Virginia when he died.)
This is just one of many examples where genealogy research yields practical results.
When I was child bearing I thought that, if I had a son, I might name him Sterling Prince Roper, after Prince and a great-uncle Sterling Van Buren Roper, whom I had never met. I guess it is a good thing that I had no male children!
Prince's parents and siblings are:
| Robert Alexander Roper b Feb 1874 NC | |
| Father: Charles Manley Roper Mother: Caroline Alman | |
| Wife: Georgia A M Shuler b Feb 1866 Ga m 6 Aug 1891 Fannin Co., Ga | |
| Father: Shuler Mother: Dige D | |
| Children: | |
| Thomas Parley Roper b Jun 1892 Ga Haskell D Roper b Oct 1893 Ga Trilby L Roper b Jul 1895 Ga Spouse: J R Duvall Lethia L Roper b Jan 1897 Ga Ellen Roper b Aug 1899 Ga Flora A Roper b c1900 Ga Rissie Roper b c1904 Mineral Bluff, Fannin Co. GA Prince Albert Roper b 28 apr 1906 GA d 28 Oct Oakland CA |
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I am missing much data for the descendants of Prince's siblings. I would appreciate receiving all such data.