Original page 9

55.  I just can’t remember what the men did while all this was going on, but as I recall, some would nap downstairs and the rest sit and discuss politics and crops on the porch – though how anyone could converse after all that food is beyond me.

Did any grapes ever taste as good as those that climbed over the back porch?  And then those back of the smoke house!

56.  Such thrilling games of croquet as we had, especially if Uncle Jaque was one of the players.  He would insist on moving his ball with his foot into position and what heated arguments we had.

57.  He kept his riding horse tied at the back gate, he was a real gentleman farmer – riding over the farm with his shepherd dog, supervising and giving instructions.  Do you remember hearing Uncle Jaque way off in the fields, called the hogs?  He was quite short and chubby and never walked anywhere if he could help it.  Father was a great walker and roamed all over the place.  Uncle Jaque couldn’t understand how anyone would walk for pleasure and would laugh at him as he started on one of his strolls.       

Jaque Ware

58.  I loved to hunt eggs with Father through the barn and other buildings around the barn, and there was the hay stack to slide down if we didn’t get caught. The dark, cool ice house was another place we loved to go and play.        

Top of the inside to the ice house

59.  On Sunday everyone from the youngest to the oldest went to church in Berryville.  Such dressing and polishing up as went on, then the surry with the fringe on top and maybe a buggy or two or several on horseback. 

The following picture was taken in front of Grace Episcopal Church around 1910.  It shows the styles of clothing being won then and also the way the windows looked before the stained glass windows were installed. 

Courtesy of the Clarke County Historical Society

60.  Durham is a beautiful farm of 375 acres, lovely rolling fields of blue grass.  The view of the Blue Ridge about four miles away is always a joy with its changing beauty.  Durham was sold about fifteen years ago - it didn’t seem as if any one of the heirs could afford to keep, but it has always been my regret that we couldn’t - it had been in the family for five generations.

Durham and the Blue Ridge Mountains

Durham was property that Edmonia had inherited from her mother.  The house had two big chimneys and a fireplace in every room.  It was very difficult for Josiah to have to part with his beloved Springfield, but he faced the same situation that so many other southern farmers did after the war.  He had loaned money to family and friends, and they could no longer pay him back.  Therefore, he in return, did not have the resources to pay the outrageous fees and taxes placed on landowners during Reconstruction.  As he wrote to his oldest son, James, “I do not object to selling - the house is too large for me now.  I only objected to too much sacrifice and not having my proper credits.”  He went on to explain that “the court’s order of sale was first to offer the mountain farm.  If not sold for enough, then [sell] that over the road.  If that did not bring enough, then sell as much of the other as would be necessary to make up the deficiency.  The first two sold so low that the Commissioner did not [even] report them – but, [instead], sold all the home farm, instead of [just] enough to pay the claims, and when the point was made that they had no right to sell more than sufficient to pay the debt - they took all the buildings. . .”  (Ref. 21) After so much loss and disappointment, Josiah still managed to stay optimistic.   He added that, “We have moved and are comfortably fixed on Edmonia’s farm.” (Ref. 21) 

61.  Aunt Helen had an orphan niece, whom she reared, Frances Wolfe.  She was a real daughter to them and a great comfort to them in their old age.  She now lives in Richmond, Virginia.  Uncle Jaque died in 1918 and Aunt Helen just two years later.

The 1940 census shows Frances still single (age 54) and living in Richmond.

Graves for Jaquelin Smith Ware & Helen Grinnan Ware

62.  SIGISMUND STRIBLING WARE was born Feb. 3, 1851.  Father was a small boy when the Civil War began, and Grandfather and Uncle Jaque went off and he was left as the man of the family to look after Grandmother and the other two little boys, Uncle Jo and Uncle Rob, who was a baby.

Sigismund Stribling Ware

When the fighting began in 1861, Sigismund was only 10 years old and his younger brother, Jo, was eight.  They experienced many amazing events relating to the Civil War.

63.  Springfield was just off the Valley Pike where the armies of the North and South coursed up and down.  Father said that he would never know whether they were ‘our’ men or the Yankees, when he saw them coming over the hill.  He would walk out to meet them at the circle in front of the house.  They were generally pleasant and full of jokes, whether friend or foe, but sometimes they were ugly and wanted whiskey especially.  I own a mahogany sewing table.  It has a damaged lock which has never been mended.  Father said it was broken by a Yankee soldier’s sword, or bayonet, when he was looking for liquor.   They would always pick up anything they could find to eat; all cattle, chickens, turkeys, everything.  There was very little left for the family and practically all of the Negroes had gone.

Excerpt from Biography of Sigismund Stribling Ware written by Judy C. Ware in 2013 -

“As Edmonia wrote in a letter to her stepdaughter, the Yankees ‘poured down on the place like 40,000 thieves, broke into the meat house, poultry houses and cellars in a moment’s time, carried off the horses which were left, killed hogs, sheep and calves, destroyed the garden, cut up the harnesses, cut the curtains from the small carriage which is the only one I have had since the war (Banks’ men having ruined the large one at their first invasion).   So you may imagine we are not far from starving. . . . I am today alone with the children, and as I sat in the vestibule this morning and listened to the church bell, the tears would flow in spite of all determination to bear up under my trials.’” (Ref. 19)

Rev. Jo mentioned the food situation in his memoirs as well. 

“I wonder sometimes on what we lived when times were hardest.  But if asked what tasted best, or I had enjoyed most in the form of food, I might say ‘middling’.  When the family had not tasted meat of any kind or butter for so long, Mr. Province McCormick (more fortunate in hiding some bacon) sent us a side of bacon (cured).  How economically we used it!  And then we shaved it!

And I remember how largely apples figured.  In summer we cut and dried them for winter use.  Uncle William Smith used to tell us children to eat dried apples, then drink plenty of water, and as the apple swelled - we would have our stomachs full.” (Ref. 84)

The road leading up to Springfield
Union troops would often camp on these grounds.
Photo taken by Judy C. Ware - 1986 

Return to Home Page

This site maintained by John Reagan and last updated