In my father's family history is a true legend, one that speaks more clearly at some times than at others, but always with a ghostly calling, as hoarse whispers through a moss-hung forest.
The records say that Edmund Mason arrived in Southeast Texas from Ireland, a "red-headed Methodist preacher, teacher, song writer." He worked as a preacher and settled in Crockett, Texas before the Civil War.
When Edmund married, the woman was a Cherokee medicine woman, whom they called "Elizabeth." She rode on horseback through Houston County, delivering babies and healing the usual illnesses of the 19th Century, using the methods her parents had taught her, boiling herbs and making tea from fresh leaves.
Edmund and Elizabeth somehow managed to combine the teachings of the Methodist Episcopal Church with her old ways. They were ahead of their time. Their new church flourished, which they founded in Crockett, and even today the church there honors Edmund, and his history and his work. The Texas Methodist state-wide newsletter declared him a fine man, stating "as a preacher, he stood tall."
They had children, among them a son Isaac. When the Civil War began, Edmund and his 17-year-old son rode away to serve side by side in the Texas Cavalry; by some miracle they both returned home at the end of the War. Elizabeth had carried on with the duties of the church, as well as her duties as a Cherokee midwife, so that the home fires were still burning strong when the men finally came home.
Elizabeth taught Susan, their daughter, the ways of the Medicine Woman, and they rode together for many years, the circuit around the county, until Elizabeth died, long after the daughter had married a Read and moved to Lufkin to run the Read Hotel. The Methodist Church became a force in the lives of Edmund and Elizabeth's children, one photograph depicting clearly the strong, big-boned Susan holding a Bible in one hand, the other hand on her hip in a determined stance.
Young Mrs. Read continued to treat the ill with no doubt a mixture of modern medicine and her mother's old ways. She was my father's grandmother, and the stories about her are few, although one uncle remembers her home made cookies and boarding-house meals.
Edmund and Elizabeth, long dead, both still fire my imagination, visit my dreams and inspire my goals. I see them now in their simple cotton Sunday clothes: the fiery Irish preacher who wrote songs and taught school, the quiet Cherokee woman, trailing through the trees on horseback. . . I believe that their ways continue in us still, however assimilated we are in our modern world.
The customs of the Masons, both his and hers, were passed down in the family, treasured more than any chest of silver. Inspiring us to express ourselves in each our own way, we see ties that bind and also powerful differences which make us individuals.
I see Elizabeth, smudging the yard, her medicine bag and her horse with sage smoke, in preparation for riding on an emergency, while Edmund crouches over his books, preparing this Sunday's sermon. The children are playing sticks and hoops in the church yard, a yellow dog leaps up joyfully, the chickens squawk in their coops as the Medicine Woman mounts her horse and gallops away, down the proper brick streets of Crockett, toward a dusty pine-tree path.
You gave us an eloquent depiction of another time and place. It is wonderful to have such a history to recall in those moments of repose.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great glimpse back to your family's past...I can see how the heritage has played out in you, embodying healing of another kind. This is all so neat to read. More!
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