Biography of L. W. Jones - Conway Co, AR

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Submitted by: Cathy Barnes <bbarnes@cswnet.com>
        Date: 21 Jun 1998
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
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SOURCE: Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Western Arkansas.
Goodspeed Publishers, 1891.

page 78

L. W. Jones, Postmaster, general merchant and farmer, of Centre
Ridge, is a native of Marshall County, Ala., and was born July 8,
1842. He is the seventh of a family of eight sons and one daughter
born to Zachariah H. and Lydia (Anderson) Jones. The former born in
Chesterfield District, S. C., December, 1809, and Mrs. Jones born in
Cherokee County, Ala. They were married in Marshall County, Ala.,
where they made their home till 1847, when they removed to Bradley
County, Ark, where Mrs. Jones died the following year (1848.) Mr.
Jones was married three times, and spent the rest of his life in
Bradley County, dying in 1864; a farmer by occupation. He was a
soldier in the Seminole War, and a member of the Missionary Baptist
Church. The mother of L. W. was a member of the Christian Church from
her girlhood. The grandfather. Abraham Jones, was born in Chesterfield
District, S. C., and died in Marshall County, Ala., in 1845. He was a
farmer, and was of Welsh descent. Mrs. Jones died there also. The
subject of our sketch was reared on a farm in Bradley County, with but
very little schooling. On November 22, 1863, he enlisted in Company K,
of the Third Arkansas Cavalry of the Federal army, and operated in
different parts of Arkansas till the close of the war, taking part in
 many severe skirmishes, and was discharged at Lewisburg, May 22,
1865, as First Sergeant. He made his home in Bradley County till 1869,
when he went to Van Buren County, and in 1870 was married in Conway
County to Miss Susan Ethridge, a native of Bradley County, and a
daughter of Isaac G. and Elizabeth Ethridge, who were married in
Bradley County, where they both died members of the Missionary Baptist
Church. Mr. Jones is the father of ten children, three sons and five
daughters living. When he first married, Mr. Jones homesteaded a place
four miles from where Center Ridge is, on which he lived till 1879,
when he settled at the present site of Centre Ridge, and the next
year, 1880, opened a store at that place, being the first merchant in
the town; there he has continued ever since in connection with his
other duties. He owns a farm of seventy-three acres. Was once Justice
of the Peace, by appointment, a short time. In 1865 he was made a
Mason at Lewisburg, but now holds his membership in the Centre Ridge
Lodge. He is also a member of Napier Post, of the Grand Army of the
Republic. In religion he and his wife are Advents. Mr. Jones' paternal
great grandfather, Jones, was a boy during the Revolutionary War, and
his parental name was Faxton, but during that time he was stolen from
his home by a Tory whose name was Jones, and who gave the boy his
family name which he ever after retained.