MCWILLIAMS, Mary Elizabeth (HEMENWAY) 1851-1938

MCWILLIAMS, HEMENWAY, COOK, HOPP, WELLS, DENNEY

Posted By: Betty Hootman-Volunteer
Date: 3/8/2014 at 20:11:47

MRS. MARY McWILLIAMS

Mary Elizabeth Hemenway, second child of Rev. Samuel and Diana Hemenway, was born Sept. 13, 1851, in Boston, Ionia county, Michigan, and died Friday, May 6, 1938, at the home of her daughter, Stella at Powersville, Mo.

In compliance with the tenets of the church of her parents, she was baptized in infancy and enjoyed membership in the Congregational church.

At the age of five years, she came west with her parents, stopping for a few months in Illinois before entring(sic) Iowa, where her father was to serve as a minister of the gospel period of ten years. In 1867, her father’s family moved to Clark county, where near Chambersburg they purchased a farm. She was married Sept. 5, 1882, to James H. McWilliams. With the exception of two years, 1892 and 1893, when their home was in Luray, she resided in the Chambersburg community until 5 years after her husband’s death which occurred Dec. 18, 1913. Since that time she has lived in the homes of her children: Mrs. Nell Cook, Milan, Kas….. Mrs. Dorothy Hopp, Farmington, Iowa; Mrs. Stella Wells, Powersville; and James McWilliams, Revere. Besides her four children, she is also survived by eight grandchildren: Madeline and Vera Hopp, Nancy and Mary Wells, and Donald, Douglas, Richard and Marilyn McWilliams. Mrs. McWilliams also enjoyed the kindest esteem of a step-daughter, Mrs. Kate Denney, LaBelle, Mo., and of two step-sons, John (died in 1927) and Knox (died in 1928) McWilliams.

This good woman has left to all that knew her an example of patience and courage that is rare.

Funeral services were held Sunday, May 8, at 2 p.m., at Cemetery Chapel, Ashton, conducted by Rev. M. F. Dawson. Interment in the churchyard there by the side of her husband.

Source: Scrapbook of Unknown Origin, page 89