This text was obtained via automated optical character recognition.
It has not been edited and may therefore contain several errors.

---

and millwright. He designed and built at Pearlingtnn the first big sawmill in the United States with rapacity to cut 200,000 board feet of lumber a day. This sawmill was also the first big sawmill in America to be built without posts?he used long trusses, constructed with lumber, to carry the roof load. Another interesting thing about this man, Asa Hursey, Sr., was that he kept a record of practically every personal transaction during his life. His granddaughter, Mrs. Joe Crawford*of Slidell, has 14 boxes, each about 20X12X6 inches, filled with his old papers. Mrs. Crawford has written the following interesting history of the life of her grandfather and great-grandfather:
?Asa H. Hursey came to Hancock County, Mississippi, from Rome, or Rcacffield, Maine, in the 1830?s. He was born October 28, 1813, at Rome, Maine. He was the youngest child of Nancy and Richard Hussey.
"After his arrival in Mississippi he changed the spelling of his name from Hussey to Hursey, however, all his legal papers were signed Asa H. Hussey. His father was the son of Robert Hussey who served in the Revolutionary War. This branch of the Hussey family were descendants of a Richard I-Iussev, a weaver, who came to America in 1651. His loom is now on display in the museum at Salem, Massachusetts.
"Asa II. Hursey worked in sawmills in Maine. When he was only 21 he was part owner of a sawmill in Calais, Maine. This mill was probably located at one time in New Brunswick, Canada. He probably lived with his brother Stephen Hussey because Stephen died in Calais, Maine, in 1834. He continued in the mill business until 1838. His next venture was as an able seaman according to the paper issued to him by a Mr. Morse in Maine.
"Asa H. Hursey, like a number of others who settled on the lower reaches of Pearl River, apparently made his way to Pearlington the first time as a member of a boat crew. Christian Koch and Henry Weston were among others who first came to Logtown by boat. It is interesting to note that many, if not most of the early settlers along the Pearl made their way up the river instead of coming across country.
?The earliest date of record in Haficock County for Asa H. Hursey is a reccipt by Sherwood and Foster of Pearlington for some work he had done for a Mr. Daily, dated June 7, 1841.
?He was in this area only a short time when he marpied Miss Isabella McCall on March 3, 1842. Richard Fostei^Justice of the Peace, performed the ceremony. Duncan McCall, father of Isabella, owned two tracts of land on Pearl River, one in Mississippi southwest of Nicholson and the other in Louisiana across the river from the Mississippi tract. Apparently the newly married couple must have lived in the Nicholson-Picayune section for on March 28, 1842 he bought a bill of groceries from Leonard Kimball who operated a store and was postmaster of Hobolochitto postofTice in what is now northwest Picayune. The reccipt for the work previously mentioned and the bill for the groceries are now in Mrs. Crawfords possession.
?Among his papers are the articles of agreement between Asa
H.	Hursey andT.mile Mazily dated June 18, 1844, stating that . he bought a stpam sawmill that was formerly owned by Ford ^ and Board mail located on Pearl River above Pearlington. This mill could have been as far above Pearlington as Hobolochitto because Emile Mazily sent him a letter dated February 22,
1815, and addressed it to Hursey and Mazily at the Hobolochitto Mill.
"This mill continued to run until December 1, 1848, when Hursey and Mazily were given a lease on the river front of Square 4 bv the Pearlington Company for a consideration of $10 per year. The officers of the company were Samuel Whitef president, and Willis H. Arnold, secretary-treasurer. Included in this indenture are the householders who signed giving their permission to put the mill on the ?public quay.? When Pearlington was laid out by the Pearlington Company, the river front was evidently the public quay. The Town of JJ^earlington still has a small public quay in front of the Guittirez and Poite-vent old places.
"The next articles of agreement are between John Armstrong ^ and Asa H. Hursev when said Armstrong buys out Emile Mazilv's part on December 3, 1848. How' long this partnership
85