MRS. ELIZABETH JONES; NO. 32 “NEW LONDON TIMES” OCTOBER 25, 1901 “A Mother’s love; how sweet the name! What is a mother’s love? A noble, pure and tender flame, Enkindled from above.” Thus wrote James Montgomery and all the ages bear witness to the truth of this expression. This week I wish to write of a good old mother in Israel and tenderly try to lay at her feet a few of the flowers that might garland the silent breast. Mrs. Elizabeth Jones, widow of John Jones, one of the earliest pioneers of the county, and mother of our fellow citizen Richard Dabney Jones, was born in Boyle County, Kentucky, August 9, 1828. Her maiden name was Nichols. When but three months old her parents came to Missouri from Bourbon County, Ky., and settled on a farm near Frankford, Pike County. A four-horse wagon, of the old Virginia type, brought her father, Richard Nichols, mother, brothers, Harve and John, through the almost trackless forests westward, seeking a new home in the fertile valleys of Missouri. Of those who came at the time Mrs. Jones is the only one now living. Her father was a Virginian and proud of his native State, the “mother of presidents” and the home of heroes. Her mother’s people were Kentuckians, equally proud of that historic State. Of a family of ten, eight lived to be grown, and the grim reaper has gathered half of these, leaving only Michael, residing at Bentonville, Ark.; John J., living near Frankford; Winifred R. Hostetter, the writer’s neighbor, and Elizabeth, the subject of this sketch. Among the hills and dales of the Frankford neighborhood the girl, Elizabeth, grew up. She attended school taught by the venerable Timothy Ford, and later to Jerry Lalor (?), a gentleman whose work among the early pioneers as schoolmaster, has not ceased to bear abundant fruit. Many of our old citizens learned of him and always speak his name in terms of praise. But the little girl didn’t have many opportunities to attend school; she was the child of a rugged pioneer and in whose family all the members worked. “I learned to spin when but seven years old, before I was large enough to band the wheel,” she relates, “hence I hadn’t much time for books. We made all our own clothing. There were no fashionable dressmakers in the settlement nor flashy fashion books to follow. Out in the fields we sowed the flax, watched it grow and counted the time till we could pull it by hand, break it, scutch it, hackle, spin and weave it, then bleach it and make in to garments. This was the process followed to a new dress and right proud we were when the garment was ready for use. My father was a wheelwright and always kept the best of wheels, little and big ones, for our use. The hum of the wheel and the loom was the music of our home and I learned its every note. These lessons I haven’t forgotten.” and leaving me for a moment our good old friend returned holding in her hands a snow-white piece of linen and remarked: “Last winter sister Winnie visited in Pennsylvania and brought home a lot of flax; we sat to work on it like we used to do when girls and soon had woven many yards of toweling; this one was made from the tow, others were better.” As I looked upon the fabric woven by this good old mother, still proud of her youthful art, in the 600 slay? not a thread amiss, I wondered if many younger fingers could do as well. Later I found in my own home found about among the neighbors were samples towels, manufactured by these two good women, every step by hand from the fluffy fiber to the soft and snowy goods and given out as keepsakes among her friends. On her father’s place he built a mill, run by horse-power and on the large sweep the child, Lizzie, used to often ride, driving the horses that the farmers’ grist might be had. Thus, at the wheel, the loom and mill her youthful days were mostly spent. In 1848, in her twentieth year, she was married by her old schoolmaster, Mr. Ford, to John Jones and went to housekeeping in a rough log cabin west of Frankford. Of the many present at her wedding she can only recall as living, Mr. James Vermillion of Frankford. Her husband was a son of Dabney Jones, who came to the county from Virginia in 1817 and settled on Spencer Creek. He was here a year before Daniel Ralls, whose name the county bears. Dabney Jones was chairman of the Commission designated by Act of the Legislature in 1820 to locate the county seat. He represented the county in the early thirties and also served as sheriff. In every position of honor or trust he acquitted himself with credit. It is related of him that he brought to the county the first pig, cat and chickens introduced among the settlers. The fowls were very young, in fact mere fledglings on coming here, one a rooster and the other a pullet. The rooster had never heard the voice of his proud barnyard sire and remained as silent in the settlement as the sly old foxes that prowled about, until the good wife of his home declared “that the thing will never crow, Dabney, unless you show him how, go out there and give him a start.” Like a good husband, obedient and dutiful Dabney “went out” remembered a little and fetched a lusty “crow”. The bird took up the tune, raised his head and sent over the valley his clarion voice which to this day his numerous descendents throughout the county have not forgotten. It is understand that the pig rooted without outside help – with them its natural. John Jones had been previously married and brought into the new home four children, Hadge, Lydia, wife of Wallace Hughes of St. Louis, Heath, now deceased whose daughter, Mollie, is the wife of Matthew Emison, a druggist of New London, and William K. Jones, also now deceased, whose children, John D., Henry, Stephen D., Thomas A., and Robert L. reside in and about the city. These four children found a kind and loving mother in the stout young wife and to this day regard her with tender affection. To the marriage three children were born, two of whom died in infancy and the third, Richard Dabney, is known and respected throughout the county, having held the office of sheriff four years and by his warm and genial manner can count his friends by legions. About forty years ago Dr. Jordan of Palmyra held a meeting in New London during which Mrs. Jones joined the Christian church and has held her membership in that congregation ever since, save while briefly residing in Lawrence County, in the early seventies. Her church duties have been well and faithfully observed all these years. In the days of their prime and vigor she listened to the preaching of “Sandy” Jones, Jacob Creath, the elder Jerry Vardeman and that “eminent Baptist historian preacher John M. Johnson, all of whom she enjoyed. On my inquiry as to how the early settlers cooked their food before the introduction of stove. Mrs. Jones answered “Oh on the large open ???? before a hot log fire. It was hot work and the blistering heat would mark our faces with deep red spots that lasted longer than the artificial coloring given a girl’s cheeks these times. Ours was a coloring burnt deep at the flaming forge of duty and remained whether we willed it so or not. The woods were full of game and the ready rifle of the hunter brought it in for us to prepare which we did, and with the pone bread, wild honey or the sweet from our sugar orchards, made a meal sweet, healthful and fit for a king to eat. My husband owned a great number of slaves,” she continued, “and whatever may be said by Mrs. Beecher Stowe or others, as to the treatment of slaves by their masters, in his home they were treated as kindly as the children of the family. The slaves helped us and we helped them and the best of feeling always existed between us. I loved to dance when a girl and would frequently enter the Negro cabins on our place and witness the black people enjoy themselves as only darkies of the older time can do. Our darkies were happy and contented, well fed and housed and far more vigorous than their descendants of the present day.” In the early days the woods were full of serpents and it is related that on one occasion in the first warm spring days the reptiles which were wont to come out and sun at a “den” on Spencer Creek near the farm of Jackson Jones, were discovered in great numbers. The alarm was given out and Mr. Jones and all his neighbors and darkies met at the place and with flails and clubs in two or three hours killed three hundred rattlers. The sluggish serpents were beaten until the offensive odor would force the people back for fresh air, and then at their task again. “All our men folks,” says Mrs. Jones, “traveled with stout buckskin leggings about their ankles to avoid serious injury from the ever present rattler.” These were some of the surroundings that encompassed pioneer life and made it one of care and watchfulness little realized at the present. “In the neighbors’ homes the itinerant preacher often stopped, sent out word and the people round about gathered to hear the plain old gospel preached and soul-inspiring hymns sung. The women came on horseback with their long and graceful riding skirts nearly reaching the ground, all cast aside at the log or stile block in a heap, but each owner readily found her own on returning.” In these talks with the venerable matrons about us I find a wonderful personal independence in the life of the pioneer girl. The maker of her own garments, shaped and fashioned by her own sweet will, the owner of her own horse, saddle and bridle, she moved a veritable queen of health, beauty and freedom amid admiring and chivalrous youth. From Pike County John Jones and family moved to Ralls and settled on a farm now owned by Jefferson Bowles, southeast of New London, and later quite a number of moves were made about the county. For several years he kept the county farm, and in every calling followed had the confidence and esteem of all who knew him. He died in January 1884, at a ripe old age and rests with his fathers. Since then Mrs. Jones has made her home with her son, Dick, and his estimable wife, Maggie. In this home, like in her own of years ago, she is still the kind and loving mother, and her heart goes out in kindness toward all she meets. Dick and Maggie admit her right to reign in their comfortable and happy home while Maynard Cliff and John Lee, the only grandchildren have no wish running counter to grandmas. Though past her seventy-third milestone in the journey of life, she is still active and energetic. Her hands are never idle and her affections ever warm. The sweetest of harmony and good will exists between mother and daughter-in-law and has all these years, a condition exceedingly felicitous as it is rare. Dick though nearing the half century mark is still her “boy” and like a dutiful child still loves his mother – one of the noblest attributes of the human heart and the brightest gem in the crown of a son. With earnest hope that life to this good family may flow on in its happy course and blessings ever attend them, I close this feeble tribute.
Posted on: Fri, 04 Oct 2013 01:26:39 +0000
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