Father: Charles Burt BURNSIDES
Mother: Harriet Elizabeth HENRY
Family 1 : William Wiley
WARNER
_________________________
_--- BURNSIDES ____________|
| |_________________________
_Charles Burt BURNSIDES __|
| | _________________________
| |_--- (BURNSIDES) __________|
| |_________________________
|
|--Ruth Esther BURNSIDES
|
| _________________________
| _William HENRY ____________|
| | |_________________________
|_Harriet Elizabeth HENRY _|
| _James COTTINGHAM _______
|_Hellen Marrer COTTINGHAM _|
|_Elizabeth (COTTINGHAM) _
Notes:
 |
 |
She was born on a 40 acre
hillside farm in Clark County, Illinois near Casey and Hazel Dale. There is
some speculation that the family farm was in Keysa, Illinois -- a town which no
longer exists nor have we determined its exact location yet. Her grandfather on
her mother's side, William Henry, was born somewhere in England. He came to
America as a stowaway when he was fourteen, according to family stories.
Apparently an educated man, my grandmother once mentioned to me that her
grandfather had many fine books which he kept in a room which she was not
allowed to go into as a little girl.
Not much
is known about her father's side of the family. The story was that both of his
parents were killed in a run-away surrey accident in the 1890's in Illinois,
that his mother was a twin, and that he was raised by a German family until he
was old enough to take care of himself. He then married a woman whose name no
one can remember, but who died of tuberculosis at a young age. His future wife,
and my great grandmother, apparently took care of this first wife while she was
ill. It is also not known if he had any children with the first wife.
Grandpa Henry was William Henry, and Rachel was his second wife. Uncle Allen, was Allen Goodwin, the husband of Nellie Gertrude Henry, Aunt Nellie, and her mother's sister. Thomas and Harry were their children. James William Henry, Uncle Bill, was her mother's brother, and his wife was Aunt Jessie. Merl, their daughter, married a Joe Stepp. Grandma remained in contact with the Stepp family all her life.
| From Sikeston, Missouri, Ruth's family moved to Arkansas five years later: | ||
| Mom got a letter from her sister, Aunt Nellie. She had gone to Arkansas to see a cousin, Mary Harris and Tom Harris. So Dad said, "Why don't you go see her?" So Mama went. He said, "Bring me back some of that dirt, so that I can plant something and see if it is any good." So Mom brought back a cigar box full and Dad planted corn and beans and you ought to seen them come up. So Dad got on the train and went to see Aunt Nellie and Uncle Allen and he bought one hundred and twenty acres of land in Arkansas for twelve dollars an acre. The man he bought from was named Mr. Mitchell. He come home and we fixed to move to Arkansas. We had a box car pushed in on the spur track... We loaded all of our furniture in the house and everything we had in that box car. I tell you when we got that box car loaded it was full! He even brought his binder and all his wheat growing stuff. When we got to Tilton, Arkansas, them people sure looked! He had a hay rack, and a binder, and all them tools come in that box car. He picked up a dog at Popular Bluff, Missouri -- we called him Pontoe. We had that dog for years. Mom and us kids, went on a train, and Dad come with the box car. We had wrote Aunt Nellie and Uncle Allen to meet us. So they did in a one horse wagon. Us kids sat down on the bed of the wagon. We got off at Fair Oaks, Arkansas. The mosquitoes almost eat us up. I was sure glad to get out of those pesky things. We stayed at Aunt Nellie's. Dad got there at Tilton in a few days. We had a shacky old barn of a house, so we camped in it, and Daddy started soon to built a new house. Our horses were all taken with the blind staggers and went around and around and around. They dropped dead. Daddy pulled them down in the woods. Boy how did they smell so bad that we could hardly stand it. So we bought a team of mules from the man that Daddy brought the farm from, Mr. Mitchell. Their names were Beck and Kit. We got two cows, and chicken and hogs and started all over. Mr. Bush helped Daddy cut trees and we had our own lumber on our farm. Albert Bush -- he was my sister's husband's [Waters Bush] dad and his wife's name was Laurel... Mr. Bush had a saw mill and he would cut the lumber for our house. | ||
Charles bought a 120 acre
plot of land near Hickory Ridge, in Cross County Arkansas in 1916 and raised
rice among other things. My grandmother ended up with a portion of this land up
until the late sixties or early seventies. The cross roads at the edge of the
property (where once the Burnsides' house stood) is still known as Burnsides'
Corner.
My grandmother did a lot of farm labor
such as picking cotton and hops, and similar kinds of field work while growing
up. Her father passed away suddenly in 1921, leaving her, the oldest, as the
major bread winner for the family. She went to the "big city" of Wynne to got a
better paying job as a waitress at the VanNoy Hotel (also known as the
"Missouri Pacific Hotel") which the railroad owned and operated. My grandfather
also worked at the VanNoy in what Grandma called the "Delco Room," as a kind of
"bus boy," and he would clean out the dining cars when the trains would come
in.
 |
||
 |
 |
|
 |
||
It was "love at first
sight" both of them would later recount many times. They were a hard working
couple, and got in good with the woman who managed all the restaurants along
this particular train line.
For the next couple
of years they traveled all around Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and
Illinois, working at various railroad restaurants before Grandma had her first
child. The doctor told her that she could not continue to work as hard while
being pregnant. So they "settled down" with Grandpa getting the job with the M.
N. & A., and over the next ten years or so moved back and forth constantly
between Kensett and Helena where the M. N. & A. operations were.
They had three children and moved approximately 50
times during the next ten years. At least three of their homes burned down as
well.
| In her 1983 recording, Grandma recollects how they got to California: | ||
| Willie, Raymond's girlfriend... Mom and Helen and Virgil drove to Californy. Raymond was out in CCC camps out here... They were in an old Ford Car. We come out to see them. They were at Madera and Merced. Peaches were ripe then and Daddy and Raymond got peaches. Oh, what nice ones! We dried a lot. Mom, Virgil, and Helen were living on Phillips Allen's... a cousin of Moms. Then we went and got a motel, and they had several motels... so they got all set... Willie and Raymond to get married. They had to be here six days before they could get married. We happened to come out. They were married. We all had a good time. We went back home and my sweetheart got papers from Mare Island and the next year, August the first, we got word to come for a job in the shipyard. Well, believe me we done some work to get out here to go to work the fourth day of August... Meryl, my cousin that I had met in Illinois... had come out with their twin girls... so they had to go home and we started packing up to head to Californy. We had so much to sell -- our cow, hogs, chickens, canned fruit and all of our furniture. I called my sister Rosie and Watt and they came over in a big truck and took all the furniture. So we got here the 3rd day of August and Raymond and Willie and Mom and Helen and Virgil lived in Alta Heights on Burna Avenue. Daddy went to work with Raymond and he run off and left Daddy. He got a bus there. Well, Raymond thought that Daddy had come with someone else. We stayed at Willie's one night and Helen knew a P. G. E. man and he said he turned the lights off at a house on Camus Street. So we went down and bless my soul we got it! Ten dollars a month! Oh, we got some stuff to get by, and we lived there six months and we sold our little home in Kensett we paid a hundred and fifty dollars for it and we sold it for five hundred. Three lots close to school and every thing. We bought a house on Tocky Street. It was a small house. Daddy made another room for Esther and Bess and then it was close to school. So I worked for a Mrs. Wan. She had a rest home. Eight old women. Oh boy, I worked too! | ||
Grandma also worked at
Mare Island Naval Ship Yard during World War II. At first she worked in an
office as a file clerk, but a doctor there declared that she had a heart
problem (which was never diagnosed or noticed later), and determined that it
would be healthier for her to work out in the shipyard as a crane operator of
all things. One day, from within her crane cab, she saw a man crushed to death
while he was sitting down eating his lunch and another large crane rotated over
him. She recounted the story in horror the rest of her life.
My grandmother had an excellent green thumb, and like
her father, could grow anything which could be put into dirt. She also was an
accomplished seamstress, a busy house keeper, and could cook vast quantities of
food for the ravenous and ever-increasing Warner clan. I was fond of her
sorghum and her persimmon cookies. For many years after I had moved away from
home, she would make up big batches of them for me when ever I would return for
a short visit.
|
|
|
|
This page created on 04/23/00 01:33:20 . Updated 02/23/2001 16:12.
