Jane Evans 1814-1887

EVANS

Posted By: Melissa Mayhew Grandt (email)
Date: 2/18/2011 at 21:20:05

[Transcriber's note: This article was transcribed exactly as it appeared in the original, including any misspellings or grammatical errors. Transcriber is not related to any persons mentioned and article is transcribed purely for genealogical research purposes.]

Williamsburgh Journal, Williamsburgh (Iowa Co.), Iowa, 5 Aug 1887, p2.

The Late Mrs. Jane Evans.

It is with a sad heart that we have to write the "Late Mrs. Evans," for we can yet hardly realize that she has left us, that she has gone "To that bourne whence no traveller returns," that she has "passed beyond the vale, that she has gone to the other side, leaving mortality behind and having reached forward to that immortality of which she thought so much, and spoke so much, and hoped for so much in her lifetime. We miss her from our midst, and we shall miss her more again, as we shall feel and more fully realize her departure. We wanted her to stay with us, we were not ready to let her go. Our thoughts were that she should abide with us again for weeks, for months, yea for years to come. Our thoughts are not the Lord's in this thing. We hear His words in this bereavement, "For My thoughts are not your thoughts neither are your ways my ways," and hearing this Divine expression we will bow down in humble supplications before Him, knowing that He is wise and good. However our comfort is, if we were not prepared to lose her, she was fully prepared to go. Our loss was her eternal gain.

Mrs. Evans was born in Llanbrynmair, in the county of Montgomery, North Wales, in the year 1814. Her birthplace was, and is, noted on account of the high state of religion in the community. Her parents were noted for this, and it was their greatest effort to bring up their daughter in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. She joined the church of God while yet very young, under the ministry of the late Rev. John Roberts and his sons' Revs. Samuel and John Roberts, whose names as faithful servants of Jesus are as a sweet savour through the length and breadth of the principality of Wales. She always cherished the memory of her youth and the happy years she spent at Llanbrynmair, and remembered with the greatest pleasure the religious privileges she enjoyed in her native place, and though she had left her native shores nearly half a century ago, yet the retrospective views of the times gone by, and the incidents that happened in her youthful days, in her beloved Llanbrynmair, were never obliterated from her memory. Her thoughts cleav to those bygone days and incidents with a tenacious and never-yielding grasp.

In 1840 she left Wales, never to see its beautiful scenes again. She came to Utica, New York, where she resided for some time. From Utica she went to Cincinnati, at which place she was married to the late lamented and much esteemed Mr. Evan D. Evans. They were determined after being married to make for themselves a home that they could claim as their own personal possession. Coming so recently from Wales, where most all the farmers had to rent at high rates of stipulation any land they wished to cultivate, it was an ambitious achievement to them to become proprietors of a landed property themselves. Land even in those days being high in the vicinity of Cincinnati they determined to turn their faces towards the land of the setting sun. In their westward adventure Mr. and Mrs. Evans were accompanied by their relatives: Mr. and Mrs. Wm. Evans and Mr. and Mrs. Richard Pugh the then Mrs. Pugh, afterwards Mrs. Williams, being Mr. Evan Evans and Wm. Evans' sister.

It was by boat that they were conveyed on this journey from Cincinnati, as no railroads were known in these western sections in those days. They navigated down the Ohio river to the Mississippi, and on the placid surface of the Father of Waters they were conveyed to Burlington, Iowa. Their best conveyance forward would be to hire an ox-team, which finally brought them to the end of their wearisome journey. This happened in the fall of 1844. Coming to our neighborhood in those days was somewhat different to what it is at present, when there were no hotels to stop at or any accommodations to enjoy no not even a roof to shelter them from the inclemency of the autumnal weather. They took claims in section fifteen township seventy-nine, range ten, west of the fifth principal meridian. We thus particularize the location as it was the first spot occupied by white people in our vicinity. They all went to work to build them a "log cabin," which is so characteristic of American life in these western prairies. Their log cabin was the first house built in Troy township and hence Mrs. Evans was the first "housekeeper" ever known in these parts. The first house was followed by another, the following spring, built by Mr. Richard Pugh, just east of the center of the above named section 15, and his was the second house built in Troy township. Mr. William Evans afterwards followed the example of the other two and he erected the third house.

We have no space nor materials to fully enumerate the incidents of their dwelling here, much as we would like to do so, as it would be of interest and benefit to read of the trials and struggles our first settlers had to endure, and suffer in first settling in our beautiful country.

Mr. and Mrs. Evans had five children, two daughters and three sons, all except the eldest daughter mourn the loss of a beloved father, and now also a beloved mother. Their first born Jane was the first female child born in the township - her cousin the late lamented Richard Pugh being the first male child - and was born in 1845 and died in 1848 only three years old.

Their other children, who are so well known and respected by hosts of friends and acquaintances are David E., John R., W.R. and Mrs. J.F. Jones, all of her children were at her deathbed when she breathed her last.

Mrs. Evans being so very well known to the greater number of the readers of the JOURNAL it is unnecessary to enumerate the different qualities that were combined to make up her noble character. Knowing her to be a human being we do not claim that she was perfect, but we do avow that she was one that was endeavoring to perfection. She could say, "Forgetting those things which are behind, and roaching forth to those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." We believe that she has obtained that prize; before now and is this moment in the full enjoyment of the presence of her blessed Savior.

It is almost twenty years since the writer of these imperfect lines made her acquaintance for the first time, and the impressions made on our mind as to her kindness and her generosity at that time has never been forgotten. In this respect we are but one among a host. How many times we have heard during her sickness that "she had been as a mother," to those that came here several years ago to endeavor to get a home in these parts; and the kind acts done by her, and by her family have not been forgotten by the grateful recipients of their generosity. Her name will be most affectionately remembered many years to come. She had been suffering several times at different intervals from bodily ailments, but would rally again. However, much to our sorrow, she was taken sick finally with a disease to which she had to surrender, to a sickness from which all the skill of her physicians, however skillful, and however anxious to succeed, could not deliver our beloved departed "Nain Evans." About two weeks previous to her decease she was taken sick, and that sickness ended her earthly career--her spiritual self is in a place and condition which know not of death and burial--her mortal remains will be interred in our cemetery to-day.

Adieu beloved old friend, rest from thy labor. The warfare was long, but we believe that thou hast obtained the victory, which is through the blood of the Lamb. Adieu. D.