The following is edited from an interview and some email correspondence in the summer of 2008, with Judy
Marshall, granddaughter of William Crocker.
JM: What do you know about your grandfather?
Judy: I never knew him. He deserted my mother. He was married to my grandmother Essie, who was seven
months pregnant with my mother when he took off. When my mother was five years old, she saw him at a funeral. One of the relatives
told her: ‘That man over there is your daddy. If you go over there and give him a hug, I'll give you a nickel.' My grandmother
stepped in and said, ‘If she goes over there, I'll give her a whipping.'
JM: That's interesting, because William's father, your great-grandfather, died on February 9, 1928,
and was buried the next day. Your mother would have been five years old then. That must have been the funeral where your mother
saw him.
Judy: That was
the closest my mother ever got to him. She wrote to him after she got married, but he never responded to her letters. She
spent her whole life hoping that he would contact her, but he never did. We heard he was a minister. I guess he had to protect
his second family and his church. What would they think of him, their minister, if they found out that he had a child? His
second wife may have known about it.
Several
months later, after I had found out about William's other marriage and how his life turned out, I contacted Judy again by
email and told her the information. This was her reply:
"Thanks so much for what you have done. I was pleased to hear that he served in WWI and WWII. I bet he was a
nice man. I cannot stop thinking of my grandfather and what his life must have been like. You have provided me and my siblings
with a missing link. I hope he was happy through the years. My own daddy died when I was seven years old, so I pretty much
grew up with just one male figure, Daddy's dad. I think my mother's life would have been less of a struggle if she would have
had her father in her life, especially since Essie died when my mother was so young. Sadly we will never know what happened
between William and Essie. I don't think either of them had any idea of the void my mother felt. I guess he was a good man,
but he missed out on a lot not knowing my mother. She was a beautiful and loving person."
