At the turn of the twentieth century,
the communities of Amite County were no longer a series of small farming
centers surrounding a sleepy county seat. In the early 1880s, the Yazoo
and Mississippi Valley Rail Road (Y&MVRR), later a branch of the Illinois
and Central Rail Road (ICRR), arrived in the western part of the county
and rapidly linked the area with the rest of the country. This rail system
ran parallel to the Mississippi River and connected New Orleans and Mobile
with Memphis and Cairo, Illinois. During the 1890s the Y&MVRR promoted
the area through brochures circulated up North and abroad in order to lure
white immigrants with the promise of lush farming lands and lumbering jobs. (98)
People began migrating into the area, thereby infusing the old established
families with new bloodlines, ideas, and money. The town of Gloster sprang
up along the railroad almost overnight and quickly attracted the county's
professional and businessmen. This community would soon supercede Liberty
as the economic center of the county. The nearby lumber mill town of Crosby
in the Homochitto Forest benefitted from its proximity to the railway,
as did the early nineteenth-century settlement of Centerville. These three
towns and the county seat of Liberty would become the main population centers
of Amite in the twentieth century. All of these shifts from the old order
are reflected in the last testments written in Will Book Two.
As the twentieth century began, the
profile of women writing wills began to change. More wills belonging to
women were probated between 1902 and 1909 than in the twenty-five preceding
years. (99)
A higher proportion of women in the survey were living in towns rather
than on the farm and were bequeathing items of middle- and upper-middle-class
prosperity such as automobiles, railroad stock, and rental properties.
The race and ethnic backgrounds of the women who published wills began
to change as well. Whereas available records indicate that every woman
in the survey who died before 1898 was a native-born Anglo-Saxon, a recent
Swedish immigrant and two African American women published wills in 1898,
1912, and 1920. (100)
Almost all of the married women who
died at the turn of the century had ties of family and inheritance to antebellum
Amite County and had benefited in their youths from the amenities afforded
by slavery such as unpaid household help and a respite from field work.
While they and their families had lost the value of their slaves after
emancipation, several of these women had interest in family homestead or
other properties. Most led comfortable, middle-class lives and probably
considered their personal property as security rather than a means of income
or survival. Their husbands had served in and survived the Civil War and
had found ways of making a living that did not involve directing slaves
they no longer owned. A few turned into "gentleman farmers" and oversaw
tenants who worked the family's land, but most moved to the growing towns
and became professionals such as merchants, druggists, and physicians. (101)
Because most of the breadwinners were not tied to the land, this generation
moved between the different communities within the county during the course
of their careers. They and their wives would join the local churches but
would transfer membership after they moved to another town. Unlike the
antebellum married women testators who lived and worshipped for years alongside
each other, the women who died after the turn of the century may have known
a few of the others through various church and social affiliations, but
their families eventually moved and the women might not have kept up with
each other. There are no clear circles of community that encompass all
the twentieth-century women; instead, their lives and fortunes indicate
subtle social changes in Amite County as its residents slowly moved from
the farms into the towns.
AMANDA SPURLOCK
The first twentieth-century married
woman's will belonged to Amanda J. Robinson Spurlock, whose estate was
probated in 1902, twenty-one years after that of Rebecca Galtney, the last
nineteenth-century will. Amanda Spurlock's husband, Dr. Thomas Jefferson
Spurlock, Jr., was a respected physician in the community east of Liberty
near East Fork Baptist Church, where the family worshipped. (102)
Her will was the first in sixty years belonging to a woman who did not
live in southern Amite County and attend either Ebeneezer Baptist or Unity
Presbyterian Church. None of the wills remaining in Will Book II belongs
to married women who lived in that area.
Amanda J. Robinson, like most of the
other married women will writers, had already inherited property before
her marriage. Her own extended family had a long history of bequeathments
in Amite County. Amanda's grandparents, Moses and Temperance Mercer Robinson,
were early pioneers from Georgia who settled in the far eastern section
of the county in 1811 near New Providence Baptist Church. Both would write
wills in Amite County. After Moses Robinson's death in 1830, his widow
and second son John G. Robinson managed the estate for the rest of the
family. (103)
Amanda's grandmother, Temperance Mercer Robinson, wrote her own will in
1851 and bequeathed five dollars to each of her remaining children and
grandchildren except son John G. and his family. (104)
He apparently managed the family farm and may have purchased sole rights
to the estate from his brothers Aaron and Andrew.
Amanda J. Robinson was fourteen years
old when her father died in 1854. John G. Robinson did not leave a will,
but the inventory of his estate suggests that his widow, Thursey Ann Jenkins
Robinson, and his children were left a well stocked farm with an ample
labor supply. (105)
Amanda remained with her mother and sisters until after her marriage to
Thomas J. Spurlock, Jr., in May 1859, when Amanda moved to the community
of East Fork near Spurlock's family. There the couple lived in a small
but sturdy home built by her father-in-law, Thomas Spurlock Senior. (106)
At the time of the 1860 census, newlyweds Thomas and Amanda J. Spurlock
were living in this home with his then widowed mother, who would die three
years later. Thomas Spurlock's real and personal estate was then estimated
at $23,000. Ten years later the family, now including children Thomas Junior
and Julia, was worth about $7000. This figure indicates that the Spurlocks,
like most of the families whose members left wills, remained comfortably
well off even during the economic and political uncertainties of Reconstruction.
Dr. Spurlock may have served during the Civil War, but he did not enlist
in any of the eleven area companies whose rosters are listed in the courthouse. (107)
The family does not appear in the 1880 Census Soundex for Mississippi;
but that may be the result of clerical error, for the sesquicentennial
history of the county suggests that the Spurlocks never moved away from
East Fork. Furthermore, in May of 1888 daughter Julia Spurlock married
fellow East Fork Baptist member J.W. Frith, Jr.
In her January 1902 will, Amanda J.
Spurlock enumerated several pieces of property near her East Fork home. (108)
She left the management of this land to her son T.J. Spurlock to hold in
trust for his heirs and for her granddaughter, Mabel Firth. Mabel's mother,
Julia Spurlock Firth, had died in 1894 at the age of twenty-seven. Amanda
further stipulated that her granddaughter Mabel would be given fifty dollars
a year "until she reaches maturity." While it is possible that the monetary
basis of her estate originated from an earlier inheritance, none of the
property that Amanda owned in 1902 appears to have belonged to her father
John G. Robinson. After her 1859 marriage, Amanda may have invested moneys
from her father's estate into property in East Fork. None of the available
records indicates when or if the Robinson farm was broken up and sold;
because Amanda's brothers who were living in 1850 would have been under
the age of seven when their father died, their mother may have chosen to
sell the property instead of managing it until they came of age. (109)
Because Amanda Robinson had only two
heirs, she did not have to face the difficult decision of how to divide
up her extensive properties and real estate. Like Victoria Street before
her, Amanda did not include her husband in her estate, possibly because
he had his own income from his medical practice and because they had a
son ready and able to take over the management of her estate. Because her
other heir, granddaughter Mabel Firth, was still a little girl, Amanda
may have felt it more convenient and productive to set aside money that
could possibly be used for her education, clothes, and for a dowery. She
may also have counted on her husband, Dr. T.J. Spurlock, to bequeath the
child a more substantial inheritance from his own estate. Had Mabel been
older and unmarried, Amanda Robinson might have made a special provision
for the girl as her near contemporary, Julia Anderson, would do for her
spinster daughter.
JULIA ANDERSON
Julia Ann Sleeper Anderson was the
younger sister of Gardiner Sleeper, the husband of the late Nancy Sleeper
who had died in 1860. Julia Anderson's property had its origins in that
which she had inherited from her father, Gideon Sleeper, when she was a
little girl. Julia, her brothers Gardiner, Fabius Hoyt, and Lewis, and
her older sisters Chlorinda and Martha had inherited equal shares of their
father's estate when he died in 1838. A seventh child, Arminda, was born
after the will was written, and so she is not mentioned in her father's
bequest. Their mother, Margaret McDowell Stribling Sleeper, managed Gideon
Sleeper's estate consisting of eight slaves, three horses, assorted household
goods, and a promissory note for $5843 issued to neighbor J.W. Cresick. (110)
Records indicate that her mother never remarried, which may have reflected
both loyalty to her dead husband and her desire to maintain custody of
her children and control of his estate. Gideon Sleeper stipulated that
both would end should she choose to marry again. As her children's guardian,
Margaret Sleeper duly filed papers annually giving an account of her young
family's expenses. During the 1840s, most of the Sleeper children married
and began families of their own. By the 1850 census, only Julia, her brother
Gardiner, and their younger sister Arminda were living at home with their
mother. Gardiner married Nancy Daniels in October 1852 after the December
1851 wedding of Julia Ann to William Parsons Anderson, a merchant in the
county seat of Liberty.
Julia probably met Anderson through
her older and by then married sister Chlorinda Sleeper Torrance, for in
1850 he was living in Torrance's house along with her husband and two children.
During the next twenty years Julia and William Anderson would have at least
eight children, five of whom survived them. The land record book lists
several transactions by "W.P. Anderson & Wife" in the 1850s, but all
involved real estate, not slaves. (111)
Julia did not conduct any business under her own name alone. W.P. Anderson
did not serve with any of the local units during the Civil War, though
he may have joined troops from another area at a later date during the
dispute. Despite the loss of any slaves Julia may have inherited from her
father or owned by Anderson himself, he continued to work as a merchant
after the war and was successful enough to form a partnership with a young
man named McLain in the 1870s. On the 1870 census Anderson was listed as
having a personal worth of over $9000. During that time they lived in Liberty,
the Andersons were active in Liberty Baptist Church, a building within
a short walk of their house. Most of their children married into other
county families. Daughter Julia Alice Anderson wed George H. Barney, Jr.
in 1882 but died in 1889 at the age of twenty-six. Despite, or perhaps
because of this early loss, George H. Barney remained on friendly terms
with his deceased wife's family even after his remarriage three years later,
for Barney was included in his former mother-in-law's estate.
By the turn of the century Julia Sleeper
Anderson and her then retired husband were living in the railroad community
of Gloster with their youngest daughter, Mattie Imogene, and their grandchildren
Harry and Laura Anderson. In her March 1902 will, Julia bequeathed to her
husband all of her estate both real and personal, but, understanding that
the seventy-seven year old William Parsons Anderson would not long survive
her, she gave explicit instructions for her estate after his death. To
her daughter Minnie Barbre Anderson she bequeathed three lots in the town
of Gloster. Unmarried daughter Mattie Imogene would receive the homestead
in the town of Gloster. Perhaps Julia had given up hope that this youngest
child, then aged thirty-one, would ever marry and therefore gave her a
house of her own. Mattie may have also served as Julia's nurse during her
last illness. Julia divided her remaining property into sixths portions,
which she allotted to her surviving sons William C Anderson, John B. Anderson,
and James R. Anderson. Her ten-year-old granddaughter Laura S. Anderson
received a sixth, as did Julia's widowed son-in-law, George H. Barney,
Jr. The last portion was to be divided evenly between her grandchildren
Julian, Vivian, Luan, and Laura Robinson. George H. Barney, Jr. was named
executor of her estate. (112)
While she managed to apportion her
estate fairly evenly among her relatives, Julia Anderson's will contains
several glaring omissions. Her youngest son, then thirty-five years old
and documented only as L.W., was still alive and presumably still living
in the area. Perhaps she had loaned him money in proportion to what he
had inherited, but her will makes no mention of this. Laura Anderson may
have been his daughter, and Julia Anderson may have simply bypassed her
son in favor of his heirs, but Laura Anderson's brother Harry, who was
also still living at the time, was not mentioned in this will. Furthermore,
Barney's two sons by Julia's deceased daughter were not mentioned. Because
she carefully outlined exactly who would inherit each portion of her estate,
it is possible that Julia Anderson deliberately left out these people.
She gives no hint as to why she should choose to omit a son and several
grandchildren, but she seems to have been a woman with a strong personality;
and she probably believed that she had good reasons for her decision. Despite
a strong case for contention, there is no mention of any appeal or challenge
to her will. Julia Anderson's file had been misplaced, therefore the only
documentation of her deceased estate that could be found was the will book.
SUSAN WEBB
Susan J. Webb, whose will was probated
in September 1910, was not native to Mississippi and arrived in the area
after her marriage. Because of this, very little information on her life
is available and there is no legacy of family bequeathments that one can
study. (113)
Census records indicate that she was born in Alabama and that her husband,
William Y. Webb, was originally from Georgia. The couple appear in Amite
County in 1865 when their names were included on the membership rolls of
Liberty Baptist Church, but they did not marry in either Amite or the surrounding
counties. Five years later, thirty-three-year-old William Webb and thirty-two-year
old Susan were living in Liberty with William's eighteen-year-old brother
B.R. Webb. William Webb worked as a druggist and owned property estimated
at $1750. The duration of their stay in Liberty is difficult to determine
because they do not appear in the Soundex for the 1880 Mississippi census,
and the 1890 census for Amite County has been lost. (114)
By 1900 the couple was living in
the community of Gloster, where they may have known fellow Baptists Julia
and James Anderson. While none of the available church records indicate
if the Webbs transferred their membership to a Gloster parish, the fact
that Gloster is over twenty miles from Liberty suggests that the Webbs
looked for spiritual guidance locally. This move also entangled their assets,
for the wills of Susan and her husband William indicate that they invested
heavily in the community of Gloster. Susan owned, at the time of her death,
two town lots; William, by 1911, owned nine lots and a fraction of a tenth,
including the site of the store in which he had worked.
While none of the census records or
either of their wills indicates that the Webbs had any surviving children,
the couple did involve themselves in the lives of his sibling's children.
When Susan Webb composed her will in September 1906, she bequeathed her
estate to the daughter of her brother-in-law S.B. Webb. Susan Webb left
a house and land she had purchased from E.B. McLain to his wife, her husband's
niece Mrs. Mary Maggie Webb McLain. This land, described by Susan as the
place "now used and occupied by my said niece," consisted of lot number
one and the east half of lot four on block four in the town of Gloster.
Susan Webb further stipulates that if her niece died without living children,
the estate would go to her nephews William P. and Charles Webb and great-niece
Annie Webb and that they should "share and share alike." (115)
This seeming favoritism may reflect long-standing affection between Susan
and her husband's niece. While at age thirty-two in 1910 McLain was nearly
forty years Susan's junior, the two women could have had a close relationship.
The land on which Mary McLain lived was only one block away from the Webb
home, thereby facilitating an exchange between the two women. Susan would
have also realized the importance of a woman's having money and property
of her own and probably acted upon this belief in her will. She may have
also known that her own husband would be generous to the remainder of the
family. (116)
This possible reliance on her husband to remember the others highlights
a startling aspect of Susan's will: throughout the document, Susan Webb
makes no mention of her husband, William Webb. He was left nothing and
was not even made executor of the estate. (117)
Perhaps she simply assumed that he would pre-decease her; William Webb,
in fact, lived until October 1915, writing his own will in 1911, one year
after Susan died.
LOUISA BATES
Louisa P. McKenney Bates, like Susan
Webb, was neither born nor raised in Amite County. Louisa Bates first appeared
in Amite County records at the age of seventeen on the 1860 census at the
residence of her recently married sister Sophia. Sophia McKenney had married
Gabriel M. Harrington, great-nephew of Nancy Williford's first husband
and grandson of her benefactor Jeptha Harrington. Sophia and Gabriel Harrington
had a new baby daughter, and Louisa may have been staying with them to
help out. (118)
Next door to the Harringtons, the recently widowed Henry M. Bates lived
with his in-laws and his infant daughter, Harriet. Within the year Louisa
McKenney married the wealthy planter Bates (119)
and with him reared six children in addition to his daughter Harriet. After
Bates's service in the Confederate Army, the couple continued to run the
farm until shortly before the 1880 census when they moved to Liberty, where
they remained until their deaths nearly thirty years later. Louisa was
also a member of Liberty Baptist Church through which, as a young woman,
she probably knew Susan J. Webb and Julia Sleeper Anderson.
In October 1909 Louisa Bates and her
husband Henry wrote out their wills. Henry Bates was well acquainted with
this practice because he served several terms as county clerk; many of
the wills at the turn of the century are in his handwriting. Louisa and
Henry each left the entire estate to the surviving spouse, then delineated
how their children would inherit after the other's death. To five of her
children and her step daughter, now Harriet Bates Braeshears, Louisa left
each a one-eighths interest in her estate. (120)
Another eighth portion was left to the children of her deceased daughter,
Lula Bates Faust. (121)
The last part of the estate was to be divided equally between her son Elliot
C. Bates and his daughter Louisie Bates. Elliot Bates must have gone through
a difficult divorce or separation, for his mother stipulated that if the
child's mother, Vivian Gardiner, "the former wife of E.C. Bates," were
to resume guardianship before Louisie married or turned twenty one, the
money was to remain in the care of her Elliot. The child Louisie did not
live with either of her parents or with any of her family, for her grandmother's
will indicates the girl lived in the Baptist Orphanage in Jackson, Mississippi.
Unfortunately for the historian, Louisa Bates did not describe any of her
property in her will and the county had long before given up the practice
of inventories, so there is no record of they types of items in her estate.
This lack of enumeration may indicate that her estate consisted chiefly
of easily dividable money.
ELIZABETH REID
The last woman to probate a will in
either of the first two will books in Amite County remains a complete mystery.
Elizabeth Reid seems to have no history in Amite County. She may have lived
in Mississippi before her marriage, but she did not marry there nor did
she live in the state in any of the censuses taken before her 1919 death.
Although she was a resident of Chicago and her will bears the seals of
Cook County, Illinois, there are no available, traceable records of either
Elizabeth or her husband Joseph A. Reid in either that county or state. (122)
The will and nine letters attached to it give no indication why they were
copied into the will book in Amite County. According to the 1910 census,
a woman named Ella Reed married to Joseph Reed lived in Pike County, located
immediately east of Amite. Ella and Joseph Reed, however, had four children
and none was mentioned in the Elizabeth Reid estate. The only other possible
connection to the region is Elizabeth Reid's mention of a mother-in-law
named Minnie living in New Orleans. Sixty-one-year-old widow Mary Middlemass
Reid lived in New Orleans in 1920 with her bachelor brother. The 1910 census
indicated she had a daughter named Minnie, whose father was born in Mississippi.
Mary's son and Minnie's brother may have returned to his father's native
state to find a bride. While Elizabeth Reid may have owned property in
Amite County, none of the available property records mention her married
name. The inclusion of Elizabeth's Cook County, Illinois, will may indicate
that her property would only be transferred upon proof of death and the
probation of her will.
The women who died in the first decades
of the twentieth century, unlike the predecessors, were able to take advantage
of the economic and social opportunities afforded by town life and the
emergence of the rail road. They also began to participate in commercial
activity that was centered away from the home. By owning and managing properties
such as the drug store, merchantile shop, and house lots, these women sought
profit in a sphere more public than the family owned and operated plantation
or farm. The last will written by a married woman, that of Elizabeth Reid,
also demonstrates how mobile southern society was becoming even in the
early part of the century. While Nancy Williford's 1840 will was written
as she lay dying far from her home, she was amongst friends and family
with whom she had a longstanding relationship. Elizabeth Reid seems to
have no past and her death in Chicago, far away from Amite County where
she must have had some affiliations, may predict the gradual loosening
of ties to family and home that would characterize the latter portion of
the twentieth century.
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