Emma Childers (1900 - 1918)

Born Apr 1900 in Swain County, NC

Ancestors

Died 18 Oct 1918 at age 18 in Winston-Salem, NC

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Biography

As per her death certificate, Emma died during the Spanish Flu Epidemic of 1918 as did her sister Edna one month later. Emma's death certificate indicates that she died in Winston-Salem, NC, while residing at 529 Holton Street, and had been employed as a domestic servant.^[1]

Notes: The death certificate identifies Emma's mother as "Bertha Edwards". J. Samuel Edwards was Bertha's step-father, having married Bertha's mother in 1890. Also, the certificate lists "Holton" as Emma's street of residence, but we do not find such a street name today. Was it "Horton" instead? The informant for her death certificate was "Miss Childress, Aunt". (Who was that? By 1918, all of her father's sisters were married and, presumably, not using the Childers family name. However, her Aunt Mattie Childers Reynolds resided in Winston-Salem at the time of the 1920 census and probably earlier.)

Burial was at Whittier, Jackson County, North Carolina. (Was this Union HIll Cemetery?)

The membership roll of the Oconalufta Baptist Church, at Smokemont, Swain County, NC, noted her death thus: "Childers, Emmer . . . 1918 (died)"^[2]

In the fall of 1918 the Great War in Europe was winding down and peace was on the horizon. The Americans had joined in the fight, bringing the Allies closer to victory against the Germans. Deep within the trenches these men lived through some of the most brutal conditions of life, which it seemed could not be any worse. Then, in pockets across the globe, something erupted that seemed as benign as the common cold. The influenza of that season, however, was far more than a cold. In the two years that this scourge ravaged the earth, a fifth of the world's population was infected (20 –30 million people) many dying within 24 hours of infection. The flu was most deadly for people ages 20 to 40. This pattern of morbidity was unusual for influenza, which is usually a killer of the elderly and young children. It infected 28% of all Americans. An estimated 675,000 Americans died of influenza during the pandemic, ten times as many as in the World War. Of the U.S. soldiers who died in Europe, half of them fell to the influenza virus and not to the enemy. An estimated 43,000 servicemen mobilized for WW I died of influenza. 1918 would go down as an unforgettable year of suffering and death and yet of peace.

Sources

1. ↑ "North Carolina Deaths, 1906-1930," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:F38G-6QZ : 17 July 2017), Emma Childress, 18 Oct 1918; citing Winston-Salem, Forsyth Co, North Carolina, reference fn 356 cn19481-409, State Department of Archives and History, Raleigh; FHL microfilm 1,892,358.
2. ↑ Florence Cope Bush, Oconalufta Baptist Pioneer Church of the Smokies, p. 82, Misty Cove Press, Concord, TN, 1990.