Ruth Anna (Merrill) Hays (1830 - 1907)

Born 22 Dec 1830 in at or near, Wilkesbarre, Pennsylvania, USA

Ancestors

Wife of Addison (Hayes) Hays — married 16 Nov 1852 in Franklin County, Ohio

Descendants

Died 1 Feb 1907 at age 76 in Chicago, Illinois, USA

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Extracts of a "Memoir of Ruth Anna Merrill," by her daughters, Mrs. Lillie Florence (Hays) Turner and Mrs. Mary Caroline (Hays) Allan as published in Adrian Merrill and his Descendants by A.M. Merrill. The Character Sketch was supplied by Mrs. Turner and the Biographical Sketch by Mrs. Allan.

Character Sketch

Ruth Anna Merrill was born at or near Wilkes-Barre, Pa., Dec. 22, 1830. When or she was quite small her parents moved to Franklin County, Ohio. She lived there until her marriage to Addison Hays, Nov. I6, 1852. If I remember correctly, she lived at her father‘s home for some time after her marriage - being there when her oldest child, Estelle, was born. She later moved to Columbus and to Newark and when I was five years old father moved his family to East St. Louis, Illinois. He was then a locomotive engineer on the Ohio & Mississippi railroad. We lived there only a short time, as mother’s health was poor after the birth of sister Isabelle. We then moved to Lebanon, Illinois, and lived there until about 1881. At that time mother’s home was broken up and she and Isabelle came to live with me. She spent her remaining years in my home, being with me when she passed away.

Words fail me when I try to tell what my mother’s life was for it consisted not of houses and lands as I believe she never owned a foot of land in her life. Yet she was rich, inasmuch as she had a Father in Heaven “Who holdeth the wealth of the world in His hands." Mother was a real Christian, a devoted mother and a true friend in time of need. Her life was full of sorrow and disappointment, yet she never complained. She was kind and gentle and always willing to do all she could to help others.

I never saw my mother angry in my life nor heard her say an unkind word that would hurt another. She was timid and retiring, caring little for the pleasures of life, other than her home and her children. Always she was ready to go where sickness or death was in her neighborhood to give any service which would help. Well do I remember when the cholera broke out near our home. Many were dying around us and some with no one to care for them or to give them a drink of water. Mother left us with sister Estelle and she was one of the few who risked her life for others who could not care for themselves.

She was small in stature but she had faith and courage within her. She was not strong physically - never weighing more than one hundred pounds and in later life only about ninety. Yet she was never afraid to do what she believed was her duty. I wondered often how such a frail body could hold so much courage and endurance in hard places. She certainly was one of God’s noble women! Her days were crowded with suffering, sorrow and sacrifice for others - especially for her children. Not many mothers to-day are called to suffer as mother did. She instilled into our minds that character is better than reputation and that honesty is more than great riches.

As far back as I can remember, mother held a deep respect for her parents - especially for her noble father. She often told us that his word was as good as a bank note to those who knew him. In our mother we found these same qualities and she handed them down to us as something worth while.

She spoke but little of her girlhood life but she often mentioned that she was more of a home girl than her sisters. She preferred to help her mother at the old spinning-wheel that Cousin Helen speaks of as now being in her home. She would often tell us how she could do a day’s work at the old wheel second to none of the older ones. Her education was limited yet she was a great reader. She knew the old spelling-book and but few could spell her down even at seventy-five years of age. She was an invalid several years before her death and that gave her time for reading and quilting. She had a wonderful memory and loved nature. She look upon it as the handiwork of God. In the quiet of nature, she found rest and a new strength.

Her family consisted of six children which she reared to maturity. We looked on her as both father and mother for on her was the responsibility of the family. Father was a railroad man and often would be gone far from home for months at a time. This left all on mother but she never failed us. But two of her children are now living - Mary and myself. George was killed at Argentine, Kansas. Estelle and Isabelle passed away in East St. Louis and Addison in Chicago.

Biographical Sketch.

The many changes of residence of mother and her family were largely due to the fact that my father and brothers were railroad men. After her marriage, mother lived for a time in her father’s home north of Columbus, Ohio. Estelle and my brother George were born there. A few weeks after George was born, father got a job at Newark, Ohio, and they moved there and began housekeeping. In a letter which mother wrote, Aug. 28, 1856, to Martin Shultz and wife in Iowa, she said, “We are not keeping house. Add went out to Iowa last fall and we have not kept house since, but we are going to Newark to live as soon as I am able." Her son George was only 18 days old at the date of that letter. On the 6th of Sept., 1856, she wrote to her uncle William Kelly that she was living in Newark. Brother Addison was born at Newark.

From Newark, the family moved to Columbus, Ohio, and Lillie and I were born there. We lived on High street. This brought us up to the period of the Civil War which began in 1861. Mother told us that father did not enlist and that Uncle Bill Hubbard of Columbus paid a substitute for my father so that father would not be so far from mother and the children. Mother also said that tho father did not enlist, he ran a government train in the South during the war and she was left alone in Columbus with four little children. There was a military camp near our home and the soldiers frightened her very much as they carried water from our yard and sometimes became drunk and made much disturbance. She would never undress at night as she did not know what might happen. The soldiers had trouble with the police. Mother said, “ God certainly took care of me and the babies."

Cousin Helen Taylor writes that during that time "Uncle Add went off down south and left Aunt Ruth and four or five children with nothing. They came out to our house and stayed. So you see what work mother and Aunt Ruth had. I know they canned and preserved berries, peaches, pears and everything they could get." I asked sister Lillie about this and she says mother and the children moved to Aunt Caroline’s for a while for father was gone some time. When he came back they returned to Columbus. I do not know when we moved to East St. Louis but sister Isabelle was born there in 1868. From there we moved to Lebanon, Illinois. Father’s run was so that it was better for him. Some years later we moved to Seymour, Indiana. Father’s run then was from Seymour to Cincinnati. We lived there several years. Sister Estelle lived there, too, as her husband, Thomas Bowman, was firing on the B. & O.

Father was an engineer on the B. & O. for some 35 years, off and on. While living in Seymour, father lost his run and he decided to go west. He was gone some time and as mother’s health was poor, we decided to break up housekeeping. Mother went to live with sister Estelle, and Isabelle and I went to Cincinnati to live with Lillie. Isabelle and I went to work and several months later, mother came to live with us and we were together again and lived in a part of Lillie’s house.

Father had let drink master him and it made him so unsteady that he could not be depended on and he could not stay and work anywhere long. He was a good man in many respects but drink had ruined him as it has many others. He made several trips to see us but he had not changed his way of living. In 1894 we received a letter from the authorities in Los Angeles that our father had long been in the Catholic Hospital and was dying of cancer. It said that father wished to see his wife and family and insisted on coming home but would probably die on the way. He came and we cared for him as best we could for three weeks and then he became unmanageable and we had to send him to the City Hospital in Cincinnati and he lived but a week. He died July 13, 1894, and was buried in St. Joseph’s Catholic Cemetery in Cincinnati. While in the hospital in Los Angeles he professed the Catholic faith.

At the time of father’s death, I was married and lived in Cincinnati but after about ten years, my husband and I moved to Vincennes, Indiana, and mother soon came and made her home with us. While there, my husband had a prosperous business but he died in 1902. Mother and I continued there about two years while I closed out the business and settled the estate. During that time, Uncle George Merrill visited mother and me. Sisters Estelle and Isabelle had moved to East St. Louis and mother and I decided to move there, too. Lillie had moved to Chicago. In 1904, after the World’s Fair, I coaxed mother to move to Chicago. We lived in Englewood, a suburb of Chicago.

In about three years, mother took bronchial pneumonia and after a sickness of only three days, she died, Feb. 1, 1907, at the age of 76 years, 11 months and 1 day. She died at Lillie’s home. At the funeral, Rev. C, E. Carnell, pastor of the Nazarenes of Englewood, officiated. Burial was made in Mount Hope Cemetery at East St. Louis. Mother was a devoted Christian all her life. She was a member of the Methodist sect but her family cares and burdens and the absence of her husband so much of the time made it impossible for her to engage in the activities of her church. Mother outlived her two sons. Addison Eugene Hays died in Chicago. Ill., October 9, 1904, aged 54 years. George Adrian Hays was killed by moving flat-car in the switch yards in Argentine, Kansas, April 9, 1889, at the age of 33 years. He left a wife but they had no children. He had gone west to seek employment, but tho he was a locomotive engineer, he was working as a switchman until a better place should be offered. At night, as he stepped off of the switch engine, a flat-car just thrown in on the switch ran over him and he lived but a few minutes. By error, a telegram was sent to mother at Vincennes, Indiana, but she had gone to Covington, Kentucky, and was living with Lillie. After a waste of much time it was too late for any of us to go to his funeral as we could not locate the place until after the funeral was over. I can see my mother walking the floor and wringing her hands in great agony. She did not weep but was asking God to be with her boy. Before his death, we had not heard from him for several months, but we knew he had gone west from where he had lived in St. Louis. George was not a professing Christian but he lived a clean moral life and when asked what he thought of religious matters he would say, "No, I am not a Christian but I have one of the best Christian mothers that ever lived."

Mother’s aim in life was to live to serve God and to keep his commandments and she did not have time for any such hobbies as this generation is taking up. She looked after home and her children. This world had but little attraction for her. Not having good health for most of her life and a large family to look after, she had no time for social life nor for public affairs. She seldom left home only when someone was very sick. At home she spent her all for those she loved. She was a fine Bible student and she kept her Book always where she could get it. I cannot say enough in praise of my mother.

The remains of mother, sister Isabelle and brother George were laid to rest in graves side by side in Mount Hope Cemetery at East St. Louis and sister Estelle is buried there, too, but in another lot. George was buried at Wyandotte. Kan.

We had lived in Chicago about three years when mother died. I remained there several years after her death but came back to East St. Louis in 1915 and have lived here ever since. While I lived in Chicago, Uncle George Merrill and his son George made me a short visit. They had come to Chicago with live stock.

In 1916, Lillie moved to Olivet, Illinois, a college village about thirteen miles south of Danville, Illinois.

Additional Material supplied by A. M. Merrill

Lillie lives there yet at this date of printing and so does her daughter, Mrs. Ruth Judd. Mary still lives in East St. Louis and owns her own home at 739 North 27th street and Mrs. Lillie Tegtmeier lives at 758 on the same street. Maud May Bowman (now Mrs. Chester Peters) and her father, Thomas Bowman, and her daughter, Esther Morriss, live in the old Bowman home at 717, Sinclair avenue and Edward Bowman and family live at 1912, Cleveland avenue.

It is easily seen from the portrait that she was handsome in her youth. The later picture shows that the cares of life had left their traces on her face. She was a small woman as was her sister Caroline. Mary was much larger than either. My father expressed his opinion late in life that Ruth was the best of his sisters but he seemed to have loved Caroline best. He regretted that Mary went her own willful way as long human strength could endure. Mary was no quitter but she tried the impossible. A limit to almost anything can be reached. All know of Aunts Ruth and Caroline is what I have heard. I knew Aunt Mary well.

An error has somehow crept into the family record in Aunt Ruth’s Bible. It says that she married Addison Hays, "November 23, 1853 ". Mrs. Helen Rugg Taylor examined the county records in Columbus, Ohio, and found the following entries in Record V page 419: Addison Hays ) Ruth Ann Merrill ) Issued Nov. 13, 1852 Married Nov.16, 1852 by S. Davis, M.G.

D. Rugg ) Caroline Merrill ) Issued Nov. 13, 1852 Married Nov. 18, 1852 by E. Washburn, V.D.M. This quotation from the record should settle the matter. It may he noted that Addison Hays and D. Rugg obtained licenses on the same date but the weddings were two days apart.

From all I can learn it seems that gambling and drunkenness must nave been very common vices in that part of Ohio in which my grandfather reared his family. It is not my business here to criticize those whom I have never seen but I have thot it my business to make as complete a record as possible of what I have learned. The marriage choices of Ruth and Mary were a great grief to my grandfather and events seem to have proven that his fears were well founded. He knew very well that moral character should be the first consideration. His daughters did not believe it - they lived to learn. What was true then is true now and it is well for us all to learn that all things - both good and bad - are results of causes and that marriage rarely makes a reformation in character.

Aunt Ruth seems to have been a woman of almost limitless patience and of a great determination to rear her children to be good and useful men and women. However, she had to oppose the well-known tendencies of railroad people whose improvidence is proverbial and whose habits are generally greatly shaped by liquor and irregular hours. She was a peacemaker, I am told, and as the Merrill family was large and the children had strong wills, there were often clashes of opinion and intention. At such times Ruth stepped between the contending parties and commanded the peace. Her daughters have given her great praise and no doubt she deserves it all. My father always added his testimony to her goodness. All testimony agrees that she denied herself nearly everything in her struggle to rear her children. I believe we can all agree that she made the best of an environment that was far from the pleasantest.

I here express the hope that these pages in her memory will help her descendants to keep her