Nansemond County Virginia USGenWeb Archives Biographies.....Beale, Altheus L., 1957 

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Former County Deputy Lives in Ancestral Home 

Alpheus [sic; Altheous] Lafayette Beale Marks 82nd Birthday Hale and Hearty 

     By RICK HINMAN 

  Talking with an octogenarian can be most enlightening.  An interview with 
one who is a lifelong resident of Nansemond County and still lives in the home 
in which he was born, brought to light some items of interest. 

  Alpheus Lafayette Beale, 82, - he celebrated his 82nd birthday last Sunday 
with a number of his relatives and friends - still drives his automobile, 
reads without the aid of spectacles, smokes cigarettes, cigars "when someone 
gives me one" and sometimes a pipe.  He said he’d never gone in for chewing 
tobacco. 

  Before he could be asked the inevitable question, he said, "I suppose you 
will ask to what I attribute my long and sickness-free life.  Well I'll tell 
you, I never drink liquor under eight years old." 

  For ten years, 1942-52, Beale served as a deputy sheriff-jailer at the 
county jail. 

    Gives Up Farming 

  Beale does not farm now, but he has what he calls "my righthand man and good 
friend who has been with me for about 20 years."  Uncle Louis Bolden, a 
greying Negro, tends to Beale's needs, does the heavy chores and looks after 
things in general. 

  Beale became a widower about three years ago when his wife, Mary Anna 
Pruden, daughter of the late John and Anna Pruden died.  It could not be said 
he lives a lonely life.  His son and daughters visit him three or four times 
a week with the grandchildren and great grandchildren. 

  Beale’s home, which was once three rooms - he tore out a room to build a 
rear porch and a kitchen is between 150-175 years old.  It is situated a few 
miles east and south of Chuckatuck on Suffolk Route 4, between the Oakland 
Christian Church and J.R. Kirk’s Lumber Mill.  It was named Rushworm farm, 
after its original owner, an Englishman, Beale said. 

  Beale could not remember the second owner’s Christian names but he said the 
man was always known as, "Old Man Hatchell." 

  Beale’s father purchased the place from a Mrs. Saunders, he said, but here 
again first names got the better of him. 

        Kitchen Separate 

  As in many farm homes in the old days, Beale’s kitchen is separate from the 
main part of the house.  One walks along a covered porch from the front door 
of the house to the kitchen and dining room. 

  He explained that the timber used in the construction of his home was cut 
with a whipsaw - whipsaws are not common now as they were in days gone by so 
for the benefit of those who have not seen one, it is a kind of narrow pit 
saw, tapering from the butt to the point, with hook teeth, averaging from five 
to seven and half feet in length, used by one or two men.  The weather boards 
are beaded as is the wainscoating in the house. 

  There are two items within the house of which Beale is very proud.  One is 
a conk shell, dug from a marl pit in Southampton County, its age - maybe 500, 
maybe 5000 years old - but it is not its age which makes it precious to Beale. 

  His mother, Adeline Frances Dixon, who was born in Nansemond County, used 
the conk shell to call the men folks in from the field for lunch.  As Beale 
put it, "its was one of the sweetest sounds I ever heard.  Most all our 
neighbors, at least those within a half mile of us, used to hear mother’s call 
and say, there's Mrs. Beale calling the boys to lunch and they too would head 
home for lunch," he said. 

  Beale said the conk shell held to one note which carried a long distance. 
This note he said would rise to a "higher pitch if the shell was blown full 
force." 

        75-Year-Old Clock 

  His second prized possession is a mantle clock.  This time piece has ticked 
steadily day in and day out for more than 75 years.  Beale’s father purchased 
the clock from a traveling salesman from North Carolina for the sum of $39 - 
the clock must have been packed well, the salesman got around to his customers 
in a horse and wagon - a sum in those days that took a farmer a long time to 
save.  The clock was just one carried around the countryside clothes, pots, 
pans, tools of various kinds bolts of cloth, needles pins, whalebone stays, 
buttons and so on and so forth. 

  The clock was manufactured by the Southern Calendar Clock Company of St. 
Louis, Missouri and patented in 1879.  Although the clock keeps good time the 
calendar registered two days slow - it was Wednesday on Friday according to 
the Beale timepiece.  The name its manufacturers gave the clock was "Fashion," 
and the ancient timepiece is a credit to its inventor. 

  Beale pointed to some birthday cards, "I celebrated my 82nd birthday last 
Sunday and 30 people visited with me, all but four of them were relatives. 
We had a real country lunch, fried chicken, country ham and all the fixin’s. 

  "I was born in this room and all my brothers and sisters were born in this 
room, and one of my grandchildren was also born in this room," Beale told the 
interviewer. 

  Beale had three brothers and five sisters, they were named "Jim, Tom and 
John and his sisters were Sally, Lore, Mary Lou, Nannie and Dora."  His father 
was J.L. Beale. 

  Beale's own children were a son and six daughters.  Otis S. Beale, was the 
oldest child and the daughters in order of their birth were Mrs. W.S. Dixon, 
Mrs. H.E. Newsom, Mrs. Mildred Jones, Mrs. Virginia Marsh and Mrs J.F. 
Haughwout. 

  He has nine grandchildren and eight grand-grandchildren. 

  Promising to drop by and sit awhile, the interviewer went on his way 
wondering if he’d ever reach the age of 82, and if he did, whether he would 
have the memory and the youthful outlook on life that his host has at this age.

[photo, captioned: ] 

LOOKING BACK OVER 82 YEARS FROM HIS PORCH:  A.L. Beale celebrated his 82nd 
birthday at his home near Chuckatuck last Sunday.  He spent ten years as 
deputy sheriff and jailer of the Nansemond County jail 1942-52. 


Altheous Lafayette BEALE, retired farmer, former deputy sheriff, 
b. 30 Aug 1875, "Rushworm Farm," d. 23 Dec 1959, at home, Crittenden, 
interred in Newman Memorial Cemetery*, Oakland Christian Church, 
   near Chuckatuck, 
"Suffolk (VA) News-Herald," Vol. 35, No. 213, Sep. 9, 1957, p. 3, col. 6-8 

*Find a Grave Mem. #7277235 

Birthdate &c. from D.Cert. 32033 (Chuckatuck #23) 

The conch shell was a Pleistocene-era fossil - 
   approximately 1.5 million years old. 


Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by 
File Manager Matt Harris (zoobug64@aol.com). 

file at: 
http://files.usgwarchives.net/va/nansemond/bios/b400a1bi.txt