Samantha Blevins Pruitt Adams

Samantha Blevins was born December 5, 1870, to Rev. Calloway C. Blevins and his wife Lucinda Caudill, presumably in Wilkes County, North Carolina, as her parents were living in Walnut Grove township when the census was taken in July of 1870.  (1)

Samantha married Adam Hampton Pruitt on December 30, 1885, and gave birth to thirteen children, twelve of whom lived to adulthood. She was widowed in July of 1916, when her husband, Hamp, died of cancer of the stomach at age 53. Samantha was about 46 years old, with six children still under the age of 18.  Dora was 17, Fay was 14, Gar was 12, Vestal was 9, Zona was 7 and Dennis was only five years old. All except the perhaps the youngest two children were old enough to do chores and help provide for the family. Additionally, two of the older boys, Mack and Charlie, were still at home. Mack was 20 and Charlie was 19 years old when their father died, and were still living with their mother and all the younger siblings when the census was taken in 1920, except for Dora, who married in 1919.  (2)

Samantha Pruitt and her five youngest children - click to enlarge

In this photograph, from left to right: Gar, Samantha and Fay. Back row, left to right, Vestal, Dennis and Zona Pruitt.  Dennis was born in 1911, so perhaps the picture was taken around 1920 or so.  (3)

In 1926, Samantha and five of her children, Fay, Gar, Vestal, Zona and Dennis were living at 221 E. 13th Street in Winston-Salem, NC. Fay and Zona worked at P.H. Hanes Knitting Company, Gar was a barber, Vestal was a laborer, and Dennis was a clerk at Hampton Brothers. The youngest in the family, Dennis would have been 15 years old in 1926. No city directory was found for 1927, but in 1928 Samantha and the five children were still in Winston-Salem. By 1929, Samantha and Fay had left Winston-Salem.  (4)

By 1930, Samantha was back in Wilkes County living with her son Charlie, who was married with four children of his own. Her daughter, Fay, was also living with Charlie and his wife, Phoebe.  (5)

On September 14, 1931, Samantha married a second time, to her late husband's first cousin, Ambrose Adams. (6)  Samantha was 60 and Ambrose was 56. This was a first marriage for Ambrose, whose shared the homeplace with his mother, Lucy Adams. Ambrose died May 27, 1943, leaving Samantha a widow for the second time.  (7)

Ambrose and Samantha, probably 1941, with three of Vestal's children - click to enlarge

Samantha died of bronchial pneumonia at the home of her son, Gar Pruitt, in Edwards township of Wilkes County, in the town of Elkin, on April 2, 1957, at the age of 86. (8)  She is buried at Walnut Grove Baptist Church beside her first husband, Adam Hampton Pruitt.  (9)

Hamp and Samantha Pruitt's grave marker - click to enlarge

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Information added after initial publication is referenced in red below

(1)  1870 census, Calaway Blevins household, Walnut Grove township, Wilkes County, NC, www.ancestry.com.

(2)  1920 census, Mack W. Pruitt household, Walnut Grove township, Wilkes County, NC, www.ancestry.com.

(3)  picture shared by Robyn Pruitt, daughter-in-law of Vestal Pruitt, email to Ervin Pruitt dated 20 January 2007.

(4)  Winston-Salem City Directory, 1926-1929, www.ancestry.com

(5)  1930 census, Charlie Pruitt household, Walnut Grove township, Wilkes County, NC, www.ancestry.com.

(6)  Register of Deeds Office, Wilkes County Courthouse, Wilkesboro, NC, record #7362.

(7)  NC Death Certificate for Ambrose Adams, #336 (stamped), www.ancestry.com.

(8)  NC Death Certificate for Samantha Pruitte Adams, #13916 (stamped), www.ancestry.com.

(9)  Photograph taken by Debbie Hendren Pruitt at Walnut Grove Baptist Church, 4650 Cabin Creek Road, Hays, NC.

Ambrose Adams

We recently made pictures at the Adams family cemetery in the Walnut Grove community of Wilkes County, NC, looking for the grave marker of Ambrose Adams.

Ambrose Adams and Samantha Blevins Pruitt married in 1931, when Samantha was 60, a widow for the previous 15 years.  Ambrose and Samantha shared 12 years together before his death in 1943.

This was a first marriage for Ambrose, who lived with his widowed mother, Lucinda Wagoner Adams. Following their marriage, Samantha moved into the house with Ambrose and his mother, who died in 1940.

Samantha's first husband, Hamp Pruitt, was Lucinda Adams' nephew, the son of her sister Mary Wagoner Pruitt. Samantha's two husbands, Hamp and Ambrose, were first cousins.

"The Ambrose place" is the way my father-in-law refers to this house. He and his siblings were sent across the mountain path to help with chores when his grandmother was living there. It's located across the road from the Adams family cemetery.

 

 

 

 

The house is in poor condition, with the end walls gone.

 

 





The center of the house, more protected from the weather, remains fairly solid.

 

My father-in-law says that Rural Electrification brought electricity to the community in 1948. By today's standards, this house would have provided a rugged existance. But I imagine that this little four-room house held plenty of laughter in it's day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



 

 



Adams Family Cemetery

My father-in-law had described the location of the Adams Family Cemetery off of Cabin Creek Road in the Walnut Grove community of  Hays, NC. Since several collateral relatives are buried there, I had been planning to visit (when the snakes aren't crawling!)

I finally joined FindAGrave as a volunteer about 10 days ago, and lo and behold, received a request for a picture of Ambrose Adams' tombstone in the Adams Cemetery.

Equipped with my orange bucket of cemetery supplies, we visited the cemetery. The cemetery is in poor condition. There are four or five graves in this photo.

And more fieldstone markers are in this stand of young pine trees.  (I'm pointing to a fieldstone in the photo. See me?) Altogether, we counted about 20 graves. Most were either marked with stones with no writing, or were simply depressions that were obviously old burials. 

This was the only tombstone with visible markings. It appears to read:

MILLARD FOARD DID AUG THE 27, 1889

I was aware of several Foard/Ford families in the community in that era, but I don't know exactly who Millard was. If he was a child born between census years, there may be no other record of him unless his birth and death are recorded in a family Bible somewhere.  Without more information, such as a birth date, there's no way to know if Millard was a child or an adult.

Ambrose Adams was buried here in 1943, and my father-in-law doesn't remember any other burials that occurred after that. My father-in-law was a child when Ambrose passed away.

The current owner of the property says that Ambrose did not have a marker placed on his grave, only the metal marker placed by the funeral home.

The landowner also said that there were several graves with only metal markers. His description sounded like the markers were meant to be temporary, only lasting until a permanent marker could be placed. He remembered, possibly, 27 graves that could be identified in earlier years, with stones, metal markers, or depressions. We didn't find any metal markers, although there could have been one or more, buried under the leaves.

So the FindAGrave photo didn't happen. I did contact the person who made the request, who is a cousin of my husband that I have previously exchanged emails with.

It's so sad to see a cemetery fall into this state of disrepair.