HENRY GRADY SMITH Welcome, Grady's web page. Grady, as he was called, married Dianne Creel. Some genealogy research on this Creel line general info posted below.
Creel Genealogy
Creel is an ancient Norman name that arrived in England after the Conquest Of 1066 (we may even be represented on a tapestry somewhere!) These brave marauders lived in Northumberland -- but you might have to search for them under a different spelling. Folks were fairly illiterate in those days, and names were recorded phonetically -- so a strong accent could change how you were listed in the official ledgers. I love that some of the common permutations for Creel are "Cruel", "Curl", and "Girl" -- my ancestors have just been waiting all these centuries for me to burst into existence! The family crest shows that my family was pretty war-like all the way back to the beginning (and if you watch us in action now, you can tell that things haven't changed all that much!) With a lovely suit of armor helmet that's missing the top of his head and appears to have its brains floating outside the skull. The motto translates to mean "I do not care for blows" or "I do not linger for blows" -- but it's pretty clear that someone in my lineage took a good one to the cranium, and the rest of us decided that we weren't going to hang around and wait for them to finish the job! On the Irish side, the name was first seen as "McCreeley" (which, in Gaelic, is spelled with way too many letters as McRaghailaigh) and "Crilly" in County Derry, Ireland. Unfortunately, I 'm not sure if I can claim this clan -- our genealogy only goes back to 1658 in England, and the Celtic part might have been thrown into the mix earlier on. Or perhaps one of the wives that married into the "Creele" family was Irish and I'm lacking that bit of information. But I know in my heart that someone in my bloodline must have fled the potato famine -- why else would I have such a love for Guinness? Grady’s wife Dianne Creel was the daughter of John Creel who lived in East Point, GA in the 1950/60. They descend from JOHN CREEL (b. 1658 in England / d. May 18, 1720 in Northumberland, VA) and his wife Anne Wilson (b. 1660 / d. May 1727) Probably through John Creel and wife Rhoda Rosanna Dodson (b. 1744 in VA / d. 1800) Rhoda was daughter of Thomas Dodson and Elizabeth Rose. Dianne’s father John Creel is somehow related to William Hampton Creel b. 1857 son of Hampton T. Creel b. 1831 all living in Fayette county GA. This Dodson and Creel line with Crawford, Callaway, Moore, Hightower and Corley famlies settled in the south Fayette County GA in the early and mid 1800s, all had members that served in the Confederate Army. The families are found in south Fulton County, East Point area most working in the cotton mills and other industries. DEC A Creel Family Website
The background for this web page is a picture of the “Drop Zone“ for the 508th Airborne “Red Devils” Infantry US Army in the Panama Cana Zone about 1962. Henry Grady Smith and the this web maker, DEC were members of the 508th in 1962 and have made jumps here. In the back ground of the picture is the Atlantic Ocean. The 508th returned to active duty at Fort Kobbe, Panama 1962 and the Red Devils officially inactivated the CZ on 15 October 1994. "The Earth is 78% water... the rest is just a drop zone!!!"
508th
82nd Airborn
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Airborn Infantry
Grady Smith
