Ancestors and such

I get many requests for information about Pollard genealogy, history and the various Pollards around the world. I am more than happy to answer questions by email from long lost cousins and others seeking info, there is also much basic information on the web, and in large university libraries.

A few links of use include:

• The John Garland Pollard Wiki at the Swem Library at Williamsburg’s College of William & Mary has information about the archives of my great-grandfather, Virginia Gov. John Garland Pollard, who was the Dean of the Marshall Wythe School of Government and Citizenship, the predecessor of the Marshall-Wythe School of Law.
• The Library of Virginia holds the official papers relating to Gov. Pollard’s official work. His work in founding the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts during the Depression is also found in his official papers. Some duplicate information is at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Freeman Library, the institution he co-founded during the Great Depression.
• I am but a distant relation to the discredited but pivotal Confederate inventor of the term The Lost Cause, Edward A. Pollard. E. A. Pollard was the editor of the Richmond Examiner during the Civil War. We do have in common a last name, and that we were both newspaper editors in Richmond. I am always interested in Civil War scholars researching that time period.
• My grandfather, William Roland Miller of Norfolk, Va., was an Ensign who captained the U.S. Navy’s LCI (L) 681 across the Pacific during World War II. He is pictured here, with other 681 officers. The vessels were only 158 feet long. I would love to hear from anyone who is interested in these landing crafts, or are related to the sailors on the ship. The Landing Craft Infantry (Light) ships were the “disposable” ones, built quickly and efficiently. Many, like his, were sent across the Pacific without escort. There were 923 of these vessels, built in a dozen shipyards, and were used across the globe beginning in 1943. All of his crew survived. He owns a Bausch & Lomb telescope similar to the one onboard.