Anna Belle Lincoln Bayless - VA to MO
I found two news stories in the Joplin, MO, papers about Anna Belle (Lincoln) Bayless.I would be interested in information regarding her ancestry.I also have that news photo as a JPG and would gladly share.If you want a copy, e-mail me and I will send it.Thanks!
Barbara Ribling
JOPLIN GLOBE, SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 20, 1944
JOPLIN WOMAN RELATED TO LINCOLN
TOO BUSY TO OBSERVE HIS BIRTHDAY
Mrs. Anna Belle Lincoln Bayless, 2815 Bird avenue, double second cousin of Abraham Lincoln, didn’t hold any special observance of his birthday, but was busy taking care of her chickens and planning her garden for this spring.
The double second cousin relationship happened, Mrs. Bayless explained, when her mother, Mary Elizabeth Koontz, married Albert Curtis Lincoln, who were first cousins to the civil war president.
“The Lincoln family was a great one to intermarry.” Mrs. Bayless said, “and by doing so they hoped to keep up the Lincoln blood.The Lincolns were a proud lot.”
Native of Virginia
The 73-year-old Joplin woman is a native of Rockingham county, Virginia, where the Lincoln family had extensive holdings.The first Lincoln in America, Samuel Lincoln, came to Massachusetts and from there his ancestors went to Pennsylvania and to Virginia.The president’s grandfather, Abraham Lincoln, owned a large farm in that county before the revolution and during the war he sold it and went to Kentucky.
Mrs. Bayless was reared on a large farm on the well-known Valley turnpike, halfway between New Market and Harrisburg, Va., at Lacey Spring, near where the famous New market battle of the civil war was fought.Large cemeteries with the dead of both the union and confederate dead are located near her birthplace.
“Wars are terrible,” Mrs. Bayless said.“What men aren’t killed, their lives are ruined by the tragedy they experience.I know, because my uncles served on the confederate side and they were never the same after they returned home from the war.
“Destruction of property was one of the worst things of the war.My mother’s mother had a beautiful barn on her farm in Rockingham county and it was the only one left after the unionists had gone over the countryside.The union soldiers did set it afire once, but they sent a Negro back to extinguish it.”
Mrs. Bayless came to this district more than 40 years ago to visit relatives.While here, she met Albert Bayless and they were married.Since that time she has visited in Virginia several times.
She has a son, Frank Bayless, who has served in the navy the last 22 years and now is stationed at Norfolk, Va.One son, Alva Bayless, was discharged from army service recently.
JOPLIN GLOBE
Sunday, March 2, 1952
BRIDE OF 54 YEARS AGO WAS RELATED TO ABRAHAM LINCOLN
(Photo of Mr. and Mrs. Bayless)
Mr. and Mrs. Albert L. Bayless, 2315 Bird avenue (above), will observe their fifty-fourth wedding anniversary with open house from 2 until 5 o’clock Thursday afternoon at their home.
Mr. and Mrs. Bayless were married March 6, 1898, at the Carterville South Methodist church parsonage by the pastor the Rev. Mr. Ellis.Mrs. Bayless is the former Miss Anna Belle Lincoln of Virginia.The couple has spent all of their married life in Joplin and the district.
Mr. Bayless was engaged in mining until 1924, and after that was employed seven years at Christman’s store and later for 20 years by the Joplin board of education.He suffered a stroke of paralysis in June, 1950, and has been in delicate health since.He is 80 years old.
He is a native of Telford, Tenn., which is near Memphis.He came to southwest Missouri with his parents when but a child.Mr. Bayless recalls that while the family was living at Bois d’Aec, in Greene county, he was between 5 and 6 years old.His mother prepared breakfast for Jesse and Frank James.
Mr. Bayless said that upon the two bandits’ departure, each left a $5 bill at his plate.He added that his parents did not know who they were until a neighbor, who recognized the notorious badmen, told his father.
Mrs. Bayless said she came to southwest Missouri to visit her brother, Frank Lincoln of Carterville, who was employed as a railroad man.She says she never intended to stay, since she had a “beau” at her home near Newmarket, Va., in the Shenandoah valley.However, she met Mr. Bayless and their marriage soon followed.
Her mother and father, she says, were both first cousins of Abraham Lincoln and that her grandmother entertained him several times in her home in Virginia before Lincoln became president.Mrs. Bayless is an energetic 83-year old woman and she is in fairly good health and still can do a considerable amount of her housework.
Mr. and Mrs. Bayless had four children, three of whom are living.They are Mrs. Gretchen Blackwell of Lamar, Tex., Mrs. Opal Pranter of Houston, Tex., and Frank L. Bayless of Texas City, Tex., who is a navy chief petty officer, now stationed at the Great Lakes naval training station at Great lakes, Ill.He is a veteran of 27 years of naval service.The elderly couple also have four grandchildren.
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Re: Anna Belle Lincoln Bayless - VA to MO
Bob Lincoln 3/13/09