INGRAM, Martha H.: Died 1903

INGRAM, MCBETH

Posted By: Volunteer: Sherri
Date: 1/22/2017 at 13:09:28

Obituary.

Martha H. Ingram, daughter of Robert and Hannah Ingram, was born in Muskingum county, Ohio, January 12th, 1825, and died at the home of her brother-in-law, Captain William McBeth, in Keosauqua, Iowa, Nov. 27th, 1903, at the advanced age of seventy-eight years, ten months and fifteen days. In early life Miss Ingram went to Philadelphia and resided with a brother, while pursuing her school work in preparation for teaching. While there she attended the Margaret Robinson select school, and became proficient in the sciences and in the French language and literature. After this she returned to Ohio, and taught school for a number of years. During the early part of the Civil War, she served as a nurse for the sick and wounded soldiers who were brought home. In the later sixties she was appointed postmistress at Zanesfield, Ohio, which position she held until 1873, when she came west to live with her sister, Mrs. William McBeth, who was at that time in poor health, since which time she has been a loving, helpful and inseperable part of the McBeth family. "Aunt Matt", as every one called her, was a Quaker. Holding firmly to her "birth-right" in this church, she never united with any other, and the modesty, simplicity, and devotion of the people known as "Quakers" characterized her whole life. She was good, in the largest and best acceptation of that word, for she was good to others. Her whole life was a life of ministry, and she poured out the treasures of her heart, without regard to cost. Perhaps the greatest trial of her life came when three years ago she sustained a fall which resulted in the breaking of her hip; not because of the pain and suffering, nor, primarily, because thereafter she could never walk, but because she was thereby deprived of the sweet ambition of her life, to live for and minster to those she loved. In the early hours of Friday morning, without a struggle, and without conscious pain, she quietly breathed her last and "fell on sleep". A sister in Pennsylvania is the only surviving member of her immediate family.

Source: Van Buren Co. Genealogical Society Obituary Book H, Page 78, Keosauqua Public Library, Keosauqua, IA