Volume 5, Number 2 - Winter 1973-74
THE JOHN R. YOUNG FAMILY OF STONE COUNTY
by Lucille A. Brown
John Rufus Young and Nancy Catherine Bare Young were early settlers in the Brown’s Spring community of Stone County, having come to Missouri in an ox-drawn wagon about the year 1870 when their first-born son, Jasper Newton ("J.N." or "Newt"), was a baby.
John Rufus Young was the son of Henry Bare II who came to Tennessee about 1837 and settled near Birchwood where he acquired about 1000 acres of land. He married Malinda Frie in 1838. Malinda was born in Alabama and was brought to Tennessee to live with relatives after the death of her parents. She was nine years old when her father died and one of her earliest recollections was riding a horse with her uncle, Sam Frie, to his home at Blythe’s Ferry, three miles north of Birchwood near the junction of the Tennessee and Hiwassee Rivers. (Incidentally this site is now covered by the waters of one of the TVA lakes).
Mrs. Sam Frie was almost full-blooded Indian and she and her brother, Jim Blythe, and two maiden sisters were deported to Indian Territory in 1838. The same year Malinda Frie married Henry Bare and they lived in a small house by a spring a short distance from the small town of Birchwood, where six children were born. In 1849 they built a more substantial, if crude, two-story log house, sixteen by twenty feet in size with no windows and two doors opening opposite each other, the only light being a long opening caused by a crooked log in the east end. That house was patterned after Henry Bare’s father’s house in Jefferson County, Tennessee. Here their youngest child, Nancy Catherine "Kate", was born. In 1916 this old house burned and a new one was erected
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on the same site with the chimney resting on the same base.
Henry Bare died about the year 1854 when Nancy Catherine was two years old. He was buried in a small cemetery which he had established on his land with the intention of building a Presbyterian Church nearby. This idea was never fulfilled and the little graveyard is now obscured by brush and undergrowth. Visitors to the community wishing to see these early graves are discouraged from attempting to do so. Malinda Bare lived nearly fifty years after her husband’s death. She donated land for a church and cemetery and is buried there. She lived to be almost ninety and died of a cancer in her hand. She had prepared her clothes for her burial and emphatically asked that she not be buried "in the field" but in the churchyard at Birchwood, where she rests with several of her descendants.
John Rufus Young was the son of James Young. Nothing is known of his family except that his mother died at his birth and he was reared by his Grandmother Bowers and his Uncle Newt Bowers. His father and his older brother, whose name is not known, went to Northern Georgia and there he married and made his home. John Rufus went to school very little. When he was fifteen he went to visit his father in Georgia during the early years of the Civil War. His father told him it was not safe for him to stay there; that the Confederates were compelling all able-bodied males to join the Confederate Army. His stepmother prepared food for his journey on foot back to Birchwood and he traveled by night, hiding in caves in the daytime and feeling his way northward by the moss on the north side of trees. His father and brother were conscripted by the Confederate Army and were both killed. John Rufus Young joined the Union Army and served in Co. E. of the 5th Tennessee Infantry three and one-half years, along with other men of the Birch-wood Community, among them being his uncle Newt Bowers who lost an arm at the Battle of Lookout Mountain and Jasper Bare, who was killed at the battle of Resaca, Georgia.
John Rufus Young and Nancy Catherine Bare were married at Birchwood, Tenn. August 29, 1867, when "Kate" was fifteen years old. Their first son, "Newt" was born there November 25, 1868, and the following summer they made the difficult journey by ox wagon to Stone County, Missouri, accompanied by Grandmother Bowers, who helped care for the baby and went to visit her daughter, Lou Bowers Norman, wife of William Norman, who had moved to Billings, Missouri. They settled on a farm near Brown’s Spring and here their ten children were born. Little trace remains of the old log house. Their children are:
1. Jasper Newton Young, who lived at Hurley many years and in Southern Illinois a few years where he had five children born of his first marriage to Fannie Fountain, who died in early life. He was married to Stella McCall and they were the parents of two children. J.N. died at Ozark, Mo. March 23, 1951, and was survived by seven children, Lola Graffis of Joliet, Ill., H. Glen of Douglass, Kansas, Clyde of Ozark, Mo., Florence Brammer of Townsend, Mont., Kathryn Wilson of Quincy, Mo., Almon 0. (Bud) Young of Ozark, Mo. and Mary Lynn Geren of Monterey, California.
2. William Henry Young, who married a widow, Mollis Davis, mother of Bessie Raum of Springfield, Mo., and they were parents of three children, Irene Cowherd of Mountain View, Mo., Harold of California and Verne of Springfield, Mo.
3. Lodema ("Deamie") who married John Robert Estes and lived and died in the Clever community, leaving no descendants.
4. Mary Alice married William Kemp, who died early in life, leaving her with three small children, Robert Kemp, now of Pomona, California; Mabel, who married Loren P. ("Jap") Gipson and lives in Hurley, Mo. and Walter who lives near Hurley.
5. Charles Franklin Young, who never married. He was a shy little boy who had very little education because he refused to go to school after being teased by older children. However his lack of education did not prevent him from becoming a very competent carpenter and builder. He learned plumbing when indoor plumbing was first introduced and built many modern homes in and around Hurley, among them being the two big concrete block houses on the hill overlooking what used to be the mill pond. He learned to do electric wiring and wired houses all around the community when REA brought electricity available. He was a soft hearted man beneath all that gruff exterior and stories could be written about him, his peculiarities and generosity. He was an excellent cabinet maker and made cedar chests for several of his nieces. He also made a certain kind of ironing board which fastened to a table or other surface by an ingenious device, whether invented by him or adapted from someone elses design is not known.
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6. John Arthur Young, who married Ellen Steele of Hurley, who is still living. They were the parents of four children, Byron, a meteorologist, Fern, who married Dr. J.H. Young of Galena, Mo., Raymond, now executive vice president of Missouri Farmers Association, living at Columbia, and June who married Congressman Marion T. Bennett, now a judge in Washington D.C. Arthur was a shy young man who took his younger sister Annie with him when he first called on Ellen Steele.
7. Annie Edith Young, married Thomas R. Welch, her former school teacher of Christian County, Missouri, and they were the parents of two children, Lucille, who married Omer E. Brown of Ozark, Mo. and now lives in Sedalia, Mo., and Mary Ann who taught music many years and is married to Ralpf F. Ernst of Golden City, Mo.
8. Fred Young, who married Susie Slaughter of Hurley and they were the parents of nine children, six daughters and three sons. The oldest son, Boyd died at an early age and nothing is known of the other children, except John who has a grocery story at Sarcoxie, Mo.
9. Benjamin Young, who died at age of 4 or 5 years.
10. Ora Belle Young, who died at age of three and one-half years.
11. Lawrence D. Young, served in U.S. Army in World War I; died in Happy Camp, California, two days before the death of his last sister, Annie E. Welch. He left no children and was survived by his wife, Amy, of which nothing is known.
John Rufus Young, while being what would be termed illiterate, was intensely interested in the happenings of the world. He subscribed to many magazines and newspapers and bought books and encouraged a love of reading in his children by having them read aloud to him. The family spent the evenings sitting in front of the fireplace taking turns reading aloud and in playing cards.
John Rufus Young and "Kate" rest in the beautiful secluded Wright’s Cemetery between Hurley and Clever, beside their two babies, their son Fred Young and daughter Mary Kemp. Many people have passed along the highway without even knowing the location of this quiet country cemetery.
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