THE GRANDMOTHER OF DEXTER

Mary Anna Shepard took a passage in the first chapter of the book of Genesis and made it her life’s mission.  “And God said, go forth and multiply.”  Genesis 1:28.  By the age of eighty four, Mary Shepard’s immediate family was enumerated at one hundred and five, not counting her descendant’s in laws. All but a dozen of the crowd still lived in their native county of Laurens.

Macon News columnist Susan Myrick wrote ”Mrs. Shepard is strong and active. Her

hair, though gray, is not snowy, as one may expect at her age.  Her face is seemed and wrinkled with the passing years and much hard work, but her small body is straight and the gleam in her brown eyes is intelligent and alive.” 

Mary Anna Ruth Harvey Shepard was born in Georgia on January 7, 1847, some twelve  years before the beginning of the Civil War.  Mary was the daughter of Curtis C. Harvey and Sarah Jane Forest. The Harveys lived near Hawkinsville where Curtis was a school teacher.

Four days before Christmas 1865, Mary took the hand in marriage of Thomas Hansel Shepard, eight months her junior.  Shepard, a native of Pulaski County, was the son of James Monroe Shepard and his bride Mary Ann Higdon Shepard. 

Thomas joined the Confederate army in 1864 upon his attaining the age of majority.  As very young private, Shepard was assigned to the Third Georgia Reserves.  As General Sherman moved his 100-thousand plus man  army through Georgia, Harvey and his beaten and starving Army  mostly retreated toward Savannah before turning north into South Carolina.

Shepard was given the lucky, but gruesome,  assignment of working with the wounded in an Augusta, Georgia hospital. 

At the age of eighty-four Mrs. Shepard, this still spry mother of seven told Myrick of the Macon News that she an accurate count of her family.

“I have six of my own still living. Then J.T. has 10; Mrs. Thomas,10; Raymond six, George seven, Nancy Lou three, and Jack one.  That makes 46 grendchildren for me.” Mrs. Shepard remarked.

“Now for great grandhchildren: J.T. has 26 grandchildren, Mrs. Thomas 10; Raymond six, George, Seven, Nancy Lou three, and Jack one.  That makes fifty-three great grandchildren for me.” Mary concluded.

And since we are talking great grandchildren that number continued to rise.  The total number of descendants today would be several hundred.

“I had a hard time raising my childre, Mary Ann told Myrick.  By the way, it was Susan Myrick, of the Macon area, who was the technical advisor to the directors of the classic movie, Gone With The Wind.

In comparing the Great Depression to Reconstruction, “Granny” Shepard proclaimed, “Folks who think that there are hard times, do not know anything about it.  They are living in paradise and don’t know it.  I came on right after the war.  I know about hard times.  I raised my family right here in the piney woods where the nearest store was in Cochran or Dublin.  All this country was wild,” Shepard concluded.

“We were 18 years old when we got married.  My husband farmed.  That was about all a man could do where we lived.” she said.  Mary and her eldest daughter made all of the family’s clothes.  The ladies even dyed their garments with crushed walnuts, indigo plants, pine bark, and gall berries to make five different colored clothes. 

Raymond Shepard disagreed.  He believed the the 1930s were the hardest of times.  He had vivid memories of his father driving a twenty-mile long road to Cochran to pick up fertilizer.

“Granny” Shepard held her ground as she always did.  “My grandchildren think these are hard times, because they have had their wages cut.”  Mrs. Shepard exclaimed.  

“I have been mighty blessed to have so many fine children,”Mrs. Shepard proudly proclaimed.  

  

Mary Anna’s daughter and mother of fifteen children herself,  Mary Jane Thomas, in speaking about her octogenerian mother remarked, “ Mom is mighty spry and strong.  She really has never been sick a great sight in her life.  It has only been in the last two years that she has been out of service.  She has had pleuresy three years ago.    She can read better than I can.” said Mary Ann.

Mary Ann spotted her mother one day earlier reading with her glasses pushed up on her forehead.  When she asked Granny, she responded, “Some times I can read better without them,” the eighty-four-year-old  replied. 

In the month of March, our country pauses to salute the history of women in America.  This particular column is a tribute to the mothers of the post war South, both black and white, who worked as hard as they could to keep their family healthy and strong.  Like most of these women, they had unwavering faith in God.  

Thomas Shepard died on June 16, 1916. 

After a ten-week battle, Mary Anna Shepard succumbed to death on September 10, 1936.  Before a very large crowd of family and friends Mary was buried beside her husband in the old section of Mount Carmel Cemetery near Dexter.

@ Macon News, February 2, 1932 by Susan Myrick.