Elizabeth (Martin) Martin

A Memorable Visit to a Cemetery

For the latest Red Room blogging topic, I am going to share this poem, which I wrote long ago based on a true experience when I still had time to research and ponder family history.  I had searched years before for this grave and had decided Elizabeth was probably buried in an unmarked grave on a farm somewhere, but I was searching in the wrong county.  I also had been in communication with one of Elizabeth’s brother’s descendants who moved to Kansas, and I had posted in Kansas asking for information, but no one seemed to have  the records I’d heard about. 

Then Sue Wilson’s husband inherited the Kansas records, and she shared the name of the cemetery where Elizabeth was buried, and I also found out that my great grandfather, who signed his named William F. Martin in Johnson County, was called Felix in his youth.  I went to the Jefferson County historical website and found that two women had very recently walked and recorded the graves in Pleasant Grove Cemetery off Route 37 south of Mount Vernon.  Gerald and I had a difficult time finding this  cemetery because only a very small sign on Route 37 was there for the current congregation meeting in the former Pleasant Grove Methodist Church building.  

Here is a poem I wrote in response to my emotional visit to Elizabeth’s grave.:

Elizabeth (Martin) Martin

Wife of William Felix Grundy Martin

5-1-1827 to 10-6-1857

Elizabeth came from Tennessee

To marry her cousin

In Illinois country.

An only daughter

With six brothers,

Her sister Margaret had died at three.

She helped out at home down there,

Content with others’ lives.

Then Felix’s dreams became her own

Which they must realize.

Though sad to leave her parents,

William Felix was a prize.

A preacher like her daddy,

Felix filled her heart with love.

Baby Margaret came along,

A second blessing from above.

Glorious sunshiny summer

Must end as all things do.

A horse threw off its rider

And troubles began to brew.

Her uncle, Felix’s father,

Was killed by that hard fall.

She comforted her young husband

Who cried but still stood tall.

Her death not three weeks later

Brought him to the ground.

For such excess bereavement

No comfort could be found.

Baby Margaret without her mother

Could not survive here long.

A third time family gathered

And sang a sadder song.

Beloved bride.  Beloved babe.

He must ride to Tennessee

To tell her parents what they’d lost

Here in Illinois country.

Time passed and much to his surprise

William Felix loved once more

And the sun began to rise.

The Civil War called him from home,

And all three brothers too.

For it seemed right that men must fight

When things were all askew.

Elizabeth had three brothers

Who’d moved up from Tennessee

And like the other cousins, they marched

Back home with Lincoln’s grand army.

Nine Martin cousins

Volunteered to join the fray.

Five came back and three died young

Their hair to never gray.

The war was finally over.

William returned to Louisa Jane.

He smiled to see son Will so big

And horse and farm again.

A three-room house they built with pride

Joys and sorrows came their way.

But he had learned when Elizabeth died,

That neither come to stay.

It was Elizabeth’s father’s turn to die,

Her mother Nancy was alone.

A younger son brought their mother up

To make an Illinois home.

Nancy saw the graves from long ago

Of the daughter still so dear

Of the babe she had yet to rock

And she shed another tear.

Nancy too returned to dust

A long way from Tennessee,

She was glad to join Elizabeth

Here in Illinois country.

I place blooms on these three graves

Where William Felix sobbed in grief,

Their early deaths gave me my life,

My great-grandmother was his second wife.