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“Obituary: DIED – At the residence of her husband in Frankfort on Mondaynight the 13th instant Mrs. MARY BULLARD KENDALL, wife of Mr. Amos Kendall, one of the Editors of this paper.
In relation to her husband, three infant children, an affectionate mother, sister, brothers, relations and friends, this dispensation of Providence is a cause of the most poignant grief; but in relation to herself, her confident hopes in a blissful immortality make it a cause of gratulation [sic] and joy. It is not easy for her surviving husband to pourtray [sic] her virtues, her feelings and her hopes. He cannot even find language to express with adequate force the feelings of grief, admiration and even joyful confidence which agitate his own bosom. Were he to say he has lost one of the best of wives, the praise would be faint. She did indeed arrive as near perfection as is generally granted to the lot of mortals. Mrs. Kendall was the daughter of Mr. William Woolfolk of Jefferson county, a plain honest farmer, and was wholly raised in the country, far from the fashions and follies of towns. Though her opportunities were small, she had made considerable progress in most of the branches of an [sic] useful as well as polite education. When introduced into another, and, what is generally considered, a more fashionable and higher grade of society, she readily accommodated herself to its manners without acquiring any of its vices. In relation to fashion, she was only desirous not to appear singular – to excel in dress she had not the least ambition. She delighted in no company except where there was an unrestrained communication of kind thoughts and friendly feelings. Speaking disrespectfully of one’s associates, neighbors and acquaintances is a habit in which she never indulged; and when such was the tenor of the conversation she sat in mute disgust. Her feelings on those occasions were known only to her husband, to whom alone she unbosomed her whole heart. Could the talebearers, the retailers of scandal, the creatures who remark with bitter envy on the superior dress, furniture or equipage of their neighbors, know with what feelings this good woman was sometimes obliged to listen to their conversation, they would learn a useful lesson.
No wife ever entered more freely and fully into all the feelings, the plans and opinions of her husband. If she had a foible in this respect, it was too strong an antipathy to those who had injured or spoke evil of him. Much sooner would she forgive and forget any wrong done to herself. In the management of her household, she was industrious and economical. She regulated all her expences [sic] by the ability of her husband, and was more than content to live humbly, that something might be accumulated for the education of her children, and the comfort of old age.
In the management of her children she might be a pattern to many mothers. It was not her opinion, that their manners, their minds, and their passions should be left to run wild, until good sense or the effects of vice, should teach them politeness and virtue; but she thought that restraint upon the passions and desires, should be coeval with the dawn of reason, inculcated by precept, example and even correction, until it should have grown into a principle and a habit. What her children might have been under the management of such a mother, may be imagined from what they already are. In relation to their education, it was her determination not to send them to school while she could teach them anything at home; for she thought that as much is lost in our school through want of discipline in the range given to the passions and in the contraction of bad habits, bad thoughts and bad language as is gained by the increase of knowledge. It was also her intention, that domestic labor and economy should form an essential part of the education of her daughters, and that they should be taught all kinds of household labor from knitting and sewing to spinning if not even weaving; for, said she, if they should be poor, the knowledge of these things will be necessary to their sustenance, and if they should be rich, so far from doing them harm, it will enable them to know when their work is well done by others.
Both she and her husband looked forward with fond and eager hopes to the time when he would be able to retire from active life and political turmoil upon a small farm, where, in the enjoyment of a competency, they might rear their children and receive their friends with hearts light as the buoyant morning and brows unbent with care. Alas! How are as bright prospects as perhaps ever dawned upon mutual admiration and love forever overclouded!
On the 2d of October Mrs. K. complained of headache, although she appeared not to be materially indisposed. On that night she had considerable fever; but the next day and night her disease had not apparently increased and no apprehensions were entertained that she was seized with the prevailing fever. On Saturday she became seriously indisposed and on Sunday the disease had assumed a dangerous aspect.
Medicine afforded her but a temporary and del-sive relief and she continued sinking gradually until her dissolution a little past nine o’clock on the night of Monday the 13th instant. In the first part of her sickness, she said it would end in death; but as the disease advanced, she drew new hopes from what gave despair to her friends and expressed a belief that she should live. For many months before her sickness she had become thoughtful on the subject of religion, and soon after she was taken, sent for Mr. Holeman, the methodist preacher in this town, and invited him to read the Bible, sing and pray with her. She told him she had not sent for him thru [sic] any fear of the result of her sickness; but because whether living or dying she wished to possess “the pearl of great price.” She earnestly begged him and others to pray for her, and although she did not then profess to have been converted, no one could witness the earnestness which she exhibited, without believing that the gates of heaven would be opened to her. When visited by her sister and one of her brothers, she told them among her -------lations, that she was near possessing “the brightest pearl that ever blazed.” Subsequently she expressed a full confidence, that she was prepared to die and a perfect willingness to undertake the dreadful journey. During most of her sickness, there appeared to be a kind of wildness in her mind and manner giving rise at some times, to the most good-humored remarks and at others to expressions connected with death and immortality of astonishing force and sublimity. It seemed sometimes as if the spirit were bursting its cerement of clay, and giving expression, by a mortal tongue, to its rapturous emotions as it ascended through the etherial [sic] blue to the abode of eternal bliss. There, it is firmly believed, she has found an everlasting rest in the bosom of her God, where she will feel no more sorrow, no more pain. Where the only thought that made death bitter – that of her children – is turned into joy by beholding how completely they are in the hands of that Being who does no wrong and bereaves and afflicts his poor creatures only for some good and benevolent end.
Her mortal remains were carried to Jefferson county where they were buried beside her dear father, whom in her sickness she once said, she should ‘see shortly.’ Before her interment, an excellent discourse by the Rev. Mr. Holeman, had spread comfort in the hearts of her relations and friends.”
Argus of Western America
Frankfort, Kencucky
Wednesday, October 22, 1823
No. 35 Vol. 16
Page 3 Columns 4 & 5
In a different issue of the newspaper was the following:
ORIGINAL POETRY: The following lines are founded on expressions uttered by the late Mrs. MARY B. KENDALL a short time before her death.
From Mary’s warm heart, fast ebbed the last feeling,
From her lips scarce a sound but of suffering broke;
By her bed, her dear husband all anxious was kneeling,
To catch the faint lispings her last wants that spoke.
At once, her pale eye with a mild lustre gleaming,
Like that which The Star o’er the evening shade flings,
While Heaven’s bright glories around her seemed beaming,
She said, deeply panting, “O bring me but wings” –
“Like a Peri [sic], I’ll fly to a warm sunny mountain,
“And seat myself where the whole world I’ll survey;
“Then I’ll fly to green banks and a cool running fountain,
“Whose beauty and freshness will never decay.
“I’ll taste, for a while, of that joy which no kisses,
“Of love most enrapturing on earth ever lends;
“Then I’ll come and convey to that region of blisses,
“My husband, my children, my mother and friends.”
Argus of Western America
Frankfort, Kentucky
Wednesday, December 10, 1823
No. 42 Vol. 16
Page 3 Col 3
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