Lucy Harrold Pringle

PRINGLE, TROTTER, HARROLD

Posted By: Volunteer - Rich Lowe
Date: 3/17/2015 at 07:16:58

Mrs. Lucy Pringle, mother of Jason A. Pringle of Knoxville, and of John H. Pringle and Mrs. J.W. Trotter of Bussey, died at the Trotter home on Friday morning, January 19, 1917, in the ninetieth year of her age. Death resulted from complications due to advanced age.

The maiden name of the deceased was Lucy Harrold. She was a daughter of John and Susanna Harrold, and was born at Blairsville, Pennsylvania, April 22, 1827.

When 19 years of age she was united in marriage to Perry Pringle, of Jefferson, Pennsylvania, and three years later, in 1850, came with her husband and two children to Mahaska County, Iowa. Iowa was then a western frontier state with but scanty means of travel either to or from its borders, consequently the Pringle family came by steamboat down the Ohio River to Cairo, Illinois, and then in the same fashion up the Mississippi River to Keokuk, making the remainder of the journey by ox team. They secured a claim from the government in Mahaska County three miles southeast of the present town of Bussey. That land has ever since been known as the Pringle farm.

The great trial of Mrs. Pringle's life came on September 30, 1857, when she was separated by death from her loved husband. She was then in her thirtieth year and from that time forward, nearly sixty years, remained a widow. The trying experiences of the young widow, left alone with six children in a new country, cannot even be imagined by the latter day generations.

Always a good Christian woman, she and Elizabeth Willsey took up the matter of organizing a Sunday school, which was finally established and was the first in the southwestern section of Mahaska County, and from which the United Brethren Church of that locality originated. She resided on the old farm until 1880, since which time she has made her home with her children.

Two of her daughters, Mrs. E.J. McAnnally and Mrs. Lovina Houston preceded her in death. The surviving children are John H. Pringle and Mrs. Mary Trotter of Bussey; J.A. Pringle of Knoxville; and William P. Pringle of Long Beach, California. There are also sixteen grandchildren and twenty-one great grandchildren.

Concerning the deceased her former pastor, Rev. J.H. Denny of Seymour, Iowa, said in his message to the children: "God has been gracious in giving you a mother of eminent and distinguished Christian character. The world is poorer and heaven richer because of her going."

The funeral services were held at the Methodist Protestant Church in Bussey at 1:30 o'clock Sunday, January 21, conducted by Rev. George J. Crawford of Albia. Interment in Pringle Cemetery.

Source: Knoxville Journal, January 25, 1917, page 4.