LOUIS JONES

The following bio was taken from page 264 of the book entitled "Rusk County History" compiled and edited and used with permission of the Rusk County Historical Commission.

Transcribed by Shirley Koym

Submitted by Gloria Briley Mayfield, Cemeteries of Texas

The Louis Jones name has been used in my family for five generations. Jones is a common name in Rusk County, but there are a number of Jones families here not having any blood relationship.

My set of Joneses can be traced back to my great grandfather, John A. Jones, who moved from Georgia to near Pine Hill soon after the Civil War. His son, J. Ras Jones, had already arrived in Panola County in 1867. Ras later served as State Representative, and one of his sons, J. M. Jones, was Rusk County Clerk from 1912-1916. My grandfather, Louis A. Jones, did not come to Texas with his parents, but he and my grandmother, Martha Watson Jones, moved near Pine Hill from Barbour County, Alabama during the winter of 1878-79 with their eight children. One of the eight was my father, Louis, who was twenty-three at the time. Pa said that shortly after they arrived, there came a big snow which he measure sixteen inches. (Has there been a heavier snow in Rusk County since?)

I remember my grandfather well and would describe him as an honest, hardworking farmer. My grandparents stayed near Pine Hill the rest of their lives, and all eight of their children stayed in Rusk County, mostly marrying neighbors. My uncle, W. A. Joes, was a medical doctor in the Monroe Community.

My parents were married November 3, 1881 when he was twenty-six and she was not quite sixteen. I’m sure they met at Holly Springs Church at Pine Hill. She was Nancy Welch, whose parents had a large estate near Zion Hill and had earlier been slave owners. Her health began to break before she was thirty and she was a semi-invalid until her death at the age of forty-seven. My pa was a small man but a hard worker all of his life. There was a superstition at the time that if you had a visit from an industrious person on New Year’s Day, you would have good luck all year. I remember one of the neighbors being overjoyed when Pa came to see him on that day. About his only recreations was to go to Pine Hill and visit his blacksmith friend, Reuben Hillin. Pa didn’t joke much, but Mr. Hillin did, and they got along very well.

The area around Pine Grove (near Pine Hill) has had Jones feet somewhere on the soil ever since my great-grandparents arrived. Pa bought a place, later sold it to the Worley family, and bought another place in 1896. They built a house in which I was born three weeks after they moved in. I live in that same house now and have lived on this farm all but three years of my life.

Three families – Jones, Worley, and Jimmerson – moved onto adjoining farms in 1896-1897. Each of the three families raised nine children, each with four boys and five girls. Of the children of Louis and Nancy Jones, my brother Julian and I are the only two survivors, each living on a part of our parents place, and I’m sure neither of us would ever be content to live outside Rusk County.

Submitted by Elizabeth (Lizzie) Jones Rousseau