I know little about her parents, but she was likely their only child, and her grandmother lived with them. She probably survived a local epidemic as a toddler, and was married to a 2nd cousin when she was 20. Not long after her marriage, the couple moved to Mississippi County, Arkansas (almost certainly traveling by river), where their first 2 sons were born, Herbert and Lee. It's still a mystery how or when the family returned to Pulaski County, Illinois, but there 2 more children were born, Lillie (whose birth is sometimes recorded in Missouri) and Clyde. Now that DNA drives so much of genealogy, I have discovered that Clyde is not the son of Florence and Joe, but of Florence and a young man her age who was raised by his grandmother near where Florence and her father grew up. Was it an affair? Was it an assault? Was it only Clyde, or was it Lillie too? The only parts that are certain are that it was NOT Joe, and Florence and Harry Coleson must have known one another. Joe could have been back in Illinois, or he could still have been in Arkansas or elsewhere, working. There was never any mention by Clyde that he knew of this, and it's certainly possible that even Florence was never sure. What did this event mean to her, and did she have an important secret all of her life?
Florence (and Joe, likely) had at least one other child, a
girl whose name is lost. When her grandchildren visited the shack that she and
Joe lived in in the late 1930's, Florence was remembered to have become
overwrought about how my great-aunt resembled her lost little daughter. Son Lee
had also passed away by this time, although how or when is not known. Son
Herbert's WWI registration places them still in Illinois, but in 1920 the
family is in Missouri, not far from where they lived previously in Arkansas.
They are renting a farm at this point, with 3 nearly-grown children at
home. The following year, Herbert
disappeared during a jail-break, never to be heard from again. According to newspaper
article from this event, he and a jailmate broke out of jail just as their
sentences were about to expire. Little
else is known of him, but for his mother, who had already lost two children, I
can't imagine if she was devastated, angry with him, or both. It was certainly common enough then to lose
young children, and I have no idea what kind of mother Florence was, but I do
know she was a Christian and church going woman, so I imagine she prayed for
her lost children frequently. It's hard
to know if the subsistence poverty they lived in allowed them to search for
Herbert or not. Burial locations for Lee
and the assumed daughter are not known.
Florence and Joe bought some land farther west in Missouri,
which is where they lived in their shack when visited by Clyde and their
grandchildren. From there they moved to Tennessee and spent their final years
with their daughter Lillie and her family. Lillie was married to a law-breaking
man, and they had several young children, so it likely was not a quiet
environment. Joe was killed while on a walk one evening, hit by a train which
probably resulted in the authorities arriving to tell his wife and daughter.
Florence died less than 2 years later, and is remembered by a grandson for
having been fond of her corn-cob pipe. There were certainly stories about a
childhood before cars, about sharecropping and stretching the last dollar, and
likely a few recipes that disappeared when she died. She was certain to have impacted her
daughter's life as a helper who needed care, or as a helping hand to the household.
Clyde traveled from Wisconsin to Tennessee at least one time, to settle his
parents' affairs, which included selling the small amount of land in
Missouri.
Someday, perhaps we'll find what became of her oldest
son. Someday, someone may find a letter
or a page with a note regarding Harry Coleson.
I hope to find more about Mary Jane, Florence's mother, and Martha, her
grandmother. Did they enjoy Ohio River
summers, or did they prefer knitting or sewing near the fire? We know a great deal about 19th century life
for rural women, and it was work which many of us would not tolerate vs the
conveniences we're accustomed to. I can admire her for the hard work she faced,
for the hardships she endured, for carrying on after losing her children. I'm more curious about her realities,
though. Did she carry on, or did she
fold? I will never know the answers to
many of my questions, but Florence and Mary Jane and Martha and the women they
knew and cared for and loved were like us - multi-dimensional, layered people
who had stories. As their descendant,
all I can do is tell those stories to the best of my ability.
