I9653: Frances W ALVIS

Notes

James Ivy Fears Lavender was born on 21 May 1864 in Griffin, Spalding Co., GA,3 died on 4 Jan 1938 in Tarrant Co., TX 19 at age 73, and was buried on 7 Jan 1938 in Mt. Olivet Cemetary, Ft. Worth, TX.20

Ad on several pages on the 1910 Tyler City Directory:
"LAVENDERS HOME MADE CANDIES Give Satisfaction.
Ask your Merchant for it. Established 1896 Made at Tyler, Texas."
James I/ Lavender Candy Company was located in Henderson, Rusk Co, TX, in the old Blanton-Nunnaly Building, built in 1884 and torn down in 1964.

Census: 1870 Federal Census - Coweta Co, Georgia - 1139 Dist - page 68 (372)
Census: 1880 Federal Census - Rusk Co, TX - ED 76, page 134
Census: 1900 Federal Census - Henderson, Rusk Co, Tx - ED 79, Sheet 11B
Census: 1910 Federal Census, Smith Co, Texas, ED 64, Sheet 1A
Census: 1920 Federal Census - Ft. Worth, Tarrant Co, Texas - ED 125, Sheet 16B
Census: 1930 Federal Census - Ft. Worth, Tarrant Co, Texas - ED 220-25, Sheet 20A
Occupation: Candy Manufacturer, Methodist Preacher.3, 21, 23, 24

Residence: 5 Aug 1870, Grantville, GA.11
Residence: 16 Jun 1880, Rusk County, Texas.12
Residence: 20 Apr 1910, 421 S. Beckham Ave., Tyler, Smith Co., TX.21, 25 1910 US Census, ED 64, SHt. 3. Vol 125
Residence: Jun 1920 through 4 Jan 1938, 201 Magnolia, Ft, Worth, TX.14, 24 Appraised at $6000 in 1930

They had ten children: Joseph William, Willis Thomas, Felicia Estelle, Martha Irene, Walter Patterson, Eula Riddle, Addie Lula, Lundy Linetta, Leonard Fears, and James Asbury.

James next married Nellie (Mary) Ellis on 8 Dec 1922 in Ft. Worth, Texas.28, 29 Nellie was born in Kansas.24; W.H. Mathews, Minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church Society presiding.

Children:
Joseph William LAVENDER b. 8 Jan 1890 d. 23 Mar 1890
Willis Thomas [Wallis J.] LAVENDER b. July 22, 1891 [1892 ]
Felicia Estelle LAVENDER b. 20 Jul 1893
Martha Irene =Irene= =Neenie= LAVENDER b. 15 Jul 1895, Texas d. 24 Sep 1984, Ft. Worth, Texas & Arwin Harry BLANKE b. 7 Sep 1895 d. 31 Mar 1985, Ft. Worth, Texas m. 2 Dec 1914
Walter Patterson LAVENDER b. 22 Feb 1898 & Ruby m. 12 Sep 1918
Eula Riddle LAVENDER b. 1901 [Oct. 30, 1908], Henderson, Rusk Co., Texas d. 18 Nov 1928 [Nov. 28, 1928], in Witchita Falls, TX =died some years after (her) Mother= m. Leroy McCLENDON b. 19 May 1901, Mount Peak, Ellis Co, TX d. 10 Nov 1984, Nacogdoches Co, TX
Addie Lula LAVENDER b. 5 Nov 1902 d. 18 Jun 1928, =died some years after {her} mother=
Lundy Linetta =Linetta= LAVENDER b. 25 Dec 1904, Henderson, Rusk County, Texas d. 6 Jan 1969, Ft. Worth, Texas & Rey [Monte Rey] JONES b. 13 Jan 1901, West, Texas d. 29 Dec 1980, Ft. Worth, Texas [Children from union]
Leonard Fears LAVENDER b. 1906
James Asbury LAVENDER b. 2 Jan 1909

(Rememberances of James Ivy Fears Lavender, 9 April 1937 - Transcribed as written by Laurence Leigh Kriv, 30 December 2001 and Bevery Janis Jones Brummel. August 2002)

Ft. Worth, Texas April 9, 1937

Some facts concerning the birth day and place also some events in the life of JAMES IVY FEARS LAVENDER.

I was born on the farm of my paternal Grand Father, Judge James Lavender, 7 miles from Griffen Georgia, Spalding County.
Date Saturday, May 21, 1864, at half past four o'clock in the afternoon.

My Father Griffin Fears Lavender was in the army at the time but was home on furlo the day of my birth.
Returned in a day or so in order to reach his command before the experation of the furlo. But was home again when I was some two months old and then back to the army and stayed until Nov. 22, 1864 when in a little fight at Griswoldville, Georgia he was killed.

After the fight he never answered the roll call and his commanding officer sent special request for his body and to get the contents of his pockets so as to send them home to my mother but his remains were not found so that he was reported as "Missing"
As there had been some prisoners taken my mother had tried to hope that he was taken prisoner and if so when the war closed next April surely he would come home but no such happy ending was in store.

Time went on and when I was some ten years old there was a re-union of his brigade and at that meeting some man whose name I do not have made an address and in that speech he said that three days after the fight he in company with two other non commissioned officers were riding over the battlefield and some surrounding territory and they found two bodies which were identified one as that of my father. Well that was the first proof we had as to my father's taking off.

He said that from what he could gather the two men had been wounded and went some distance from the scene of the battle and and there they died. He turned over the names and contents of each man's pockets to the officer in command but at the date of the speech ten years later he did not remember. My father was with the army from Atlanta on south th Griswoldville. When the cannons would fire my mother would hear the dishes in her cupboard rattle.

My father had bought a farm which he knew as the Shackesford place, and that was really his homestead but for the occasion of my birth mother had gone to the home of Grand Pa Lavender. After the war ended and father did not come home it was very evident that he was dead but the speech ten years later was the first certain facts we had. However under the law he was legally dead and his estate was administered on and sold just after the close of the war when it brought less than ten cents in the dollar of what father had paid for it.

After the administrator's sale mother rented a farm and had some now freed slaves cultivate it and then next year she bought a farm where we lived still Griffin Georgia until I was four years old when we moved to Grantville Georgia. After living in Grantville three years we moved with my maternal grandmother, Mrs. S.B. Steagall to Texas and the first year we lived at or near a little country town called at that time "Forest Hill" but later changed to "Glenn Fawn". We lived there one year and then moved to Mt. Enterprise, Texas and lived there a year and moved to Dallas, Texas. Stayed in Dallas three years and back to Mt. Enterprise where I grew to manhood.

I went to school in Georgia to a Mr. Cotter whom I though very small at the time remember as one of the best men whom I ever knew. Then at Mt. Enterprise before moving to Dallas I attended a private school taught by a man named Andrew Jordan.
After moving to Dallas I went to a private school taught by a Mrs. Miller whom I loved as a child should love a good teacher. Then I attended what we then called "The Methodist College"

After returning in 1875 to Mt. Enterprise I went to such schools as we had whether public or private until I was grown and I went to Minden, Rusk County and went to school to a Professor George Isam Watkins a man loved by every pupil who ever went to school to him. But it would be a crime I could never forgive myself for if I did not make moving remarks of one Robert T. Milner who taught school at Mt. Enterprise. He later became a newspaper editor and later a member from Rusk County of the Legislature and held under Governor T.M.Campbell some appointment I forget at this minute what it was but was later made President of the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas. After my school at Minden I taught country schools for two years there in Rusk County and then moved to Jefferson, Marion County.

Was living in Jefferson when I married. I married Julia Irene Howard of Henderson, the County Seat of Rusk County.
She was the second oldest daughter of David Patterson and Marthy Ann Howard. Of my parents-in-law I shall ever cherish the fondest memories. Surely if any man ever had a Father-in-law and a Mother-in-law who were worth their weight in gold then I had much.
My wife, Julia was the mother of by ten children two of whom died in infancy and the rest lived to be grown and then two very sweet daughters, Eula, and Addie died some years after their mother was translated to a better world than this.

In Jefferson I did various kinds of work, sold insurance some, had a job as transfer man for the Pacific Express Company for a while. Was night watchman and ticket and baggage man for the Texas and Pacific Rail Road for a while and then ran for myself a small grocery store and then sold it out to my life time friend Walter Patterson Schleuter. I worked for him and his brother Guss for three years until Dec. 1, 1896 I began making candy and kept pretty well at that until the depression some seven years ago. Since then I have made little candy. Buy whatever I sell of candy.

In 1907 I moved to Tyler Texas and lived there three years to a day and then moved to Ft. Worth. Reached here Sept. 3, 1910.
At that time I had a wife and eight children.

I was born and raised on a farm and when I said that I lived at Mt. Enterprise I really lived on a farm. Part of the time lived in the village and worked the farm just out of town but in 1879 I got my guardian to buy me a farm which lay two miles east of Mt. Enterprise.
My mother and my half-brother lived there until she married a Mr. Abriham R. Crow of Henderson, Texas and then I went to live on the farm with my step father and mother two miles east of Henderson. I made one crop on my step father's farm and then went back to Mt. Enterprise where I remained until I moved to Jefferson, Texas.

While working at Jefferson for the Rail Road the Superentendant of the narrow guage rail road from Jefferson to Greenville sent me to McKinney, Texas. While working for the M.K. and T. at McKinney I resigned my job and went to Greenville, Texas and was admitted on trial to the North Texas Mission, Methodist Episcopal Church South and was sent to the Smith Field Circuit for the year 1889 and 1890. One year and then attended conference at Texarkana, Texas and from there was sent to the Coffeyville Circuit in Upshur County. My home was then in the country four miles from Coffeyville. After a year on the Coffeyville Circuit I was sent to Park Mission, a half station with parsonage at T.C. Junction, five miles from Texarkana. Served one year there and then was located and then went back to Jefferson where I spent several years until I moved to Henderson and on December 1, 1896, I began my candy making.

My mother's parents, Rev. Ivy F. Steagall and his wife Sidney Bexley Purifoy before she married my grand father.
Grand Pa Steagall was at the time of his death a member of the Georgia Conference Methodist Episcopal Church later known as The Methodist Episcopal Church South. Grand Pa Steagall died some time about the year 1848. When my mother was only 6 years old. My father's parents were Judge James Lavender and his wife Malinda Ansley before her marriage to Grand Pa.
In my mother's family there were five brothers and she had three sisters. My father had only one brother and seven sisters.
All my aunts and uncles lived to be grown and married, most of them had children born to them so that if I knew all of them there would be quite a bunch of them. Hon. Henry B. Steagall of Alabama often mentioned in the affairs of Congress is my mother's nephew. Grand Pa Lavender represented his county for some time in the Legislature and was later elected County Judge in Spalding County, Ga.

My mother was three times married. Her first husband, Willie M. Bishop was killed in the first part of the civil war and during the war she and my father were married and in November of the same cruel war my father was also killed.
My mother lived a widow then until I was in my eighteenth year and she married Abe Crow. A well to do farmer of Rusk County and I do believe that he was as good a man as ever lived.

My Grand Parents on both sides were well to do until the war broke most of the people in the south. But still those my uncles and aunts many of them being grown and able to take care of their own affairs continued in easy circumstances but those of us left fatherless most of them found little of this worlds goods to show for what our parents and grand parents ever had.

To my mother's first marriage there was born two children, My half brother Willis Thomas Bishop now living in San Angelo, Texas and my sister Fannie Bishop who died in Dallas, Texas March 31, 1874.

I have had born to me ten children, five sons and five daughters. The oldest Joseph William born at Smithfield, Texas in 1890 and died when two and a half months old. We carried the little corpse back to Henderson and buried it in the new cemetary among the graves of my wife's people. My next son Willis Thomas and then Felicia and Martha Irene. Then Walter Patterson and Eula Riddle, (since died) and Addie Lula (also died) Lundy Linetta, Leonard Fears (died at fifteen months old) and James Asbury.

Take it all in all God had been good to me. True He has taken my wife and four sweet children but they were his any way and he loaned them to me for a while besides I still have the six all of whom are very dear to me. And I am trusting that some day we will all meet around our Father's home and then there will be no more parting.
This is my constant prayer.

Very humbly submitted,
James I. Lavender
P.S. Years ago I quit signing my third initial of my name as it seemed too long. J.I.L.

My Southern Family

Frances W ALVIS

William or Patrick BURNETT

AFT 1734 - ____

ID Number: I72163

Sources

Mary GARRARD

17 Sep 1776 - 1818

ID Number: I64926

Notes

Sources

Elizabeth GRAVES

ABT 1760 - ____

ID Number: I24184

Notes

Sources

WILLIAM JENNINGS

ABT 1480 - ____

ID Number: I55643

Sources

Rev. James Ivy Fears LAVENDER

21 May 1864 - 4 Jan 1938

ID Number: I104037

Notes

Sources

Mary Alexander MCCANTS

16 Jul 1816 - 28 Feb 1841

ID Number: I1028

Sources

Charles MILBURN

ABT 1810 - ____

ID Number: I16947

Sources

Jacob "Jake" OWENS

ABT 1780 - ____

ID Number: I39722

Sources

Judith SLYE

ABT 1690 - ____

ID Number: I87701

Notes

Sources

John SMITH

1797 - ____

ID Number: I68247

Notes

Sources

RICHARD I de ST. SAUVEUR Baron Of Normandy

ABT 0880 - 0933

ID Number: I80847

Sources

Marie WATKINS

1 Apr 1740 - BEF 1758

ID Number: I11580

Notes

Sources