Lena Booth Marbury's Friends List

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Lena with Daughters

l to r. Allie Marbury Brantley, Lena Booth Marbury
and Mable Marbury Jackson

I've been researching the Booth family and preparing to upload what information I have to my site and Christmas at my mother's house presented a good opportunity to find an interesting "Booth" document I thought I remembered being among the things my grandmother, Virginia Brantley Lovelace, saved.

It only took a few minutes to find what I was looking for: the guest book from my second great grandmother's funeral on October 8, 1949. Sarah Evelena "Lena" Booth Marbury was 81 when she died. Lena was my grandmother's maternal grandmother. Lena's daughter was Allie Marbury Brantley whose daughter was Virginia Brantley Lovelace whose daughter was Shirley Lovelace Williams who was my mother.

The names assigned to grandmothers by their families seem to make them more personal for me. My mother is called "Name" by my children while my grandmother, Virginia, was "Grandmama." Her mother, Allie, was "Mama Allie" and my mom says she remembers Lena was called "Gran-may-mee."

Sadly, by the time she died, Lena had buried her husband and three of her four children; her husband, Hardy Joyner Marbury, died in 1932 at the age of 59, her son Dennis Love Marbury died in 1927 at the age of 34 of cancer, her daughter Price died in 1933 of cancer at the age of 38, and her daughter Mable died in 1942 at the age of 41.

My great grandmother, Allie, was her only surviving daughter and Lena lived with her family.

Before I jump right to the funeral, here are the only photos I have of of her. They all seem to have been taken in the early to mid 1940s. I would love to get my hands on a few earlier ones so if you happen to have any, please let me know.

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Four Generations

l to r: Virginia Brantley Lovelace, Bobby Lovelace
Allie Marbury Brantley and Lena Booth Marbury

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l to r: Guy Lovelace, Virginia Lovelace holding Bobby Lovelace,
a Marbury cousin, Cordillia Lovelace Jacocks, Betty Brantley Sullivan (looking left),
Lena Booth Marbury, Allie Marbury Brantley and Willie Brantley

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Lena Marbury's death certificate

According to her death certificate, Lena died of "Myocardial Degeneration due to Interstitial Nephritis" meaning a kidney disorder led to her heart failing or, in other words, she got really old and everything stopped working.

Her death certificate also shows she lived in district five of Haywood County in the Holly Grove community and her "length of stay in this place" was "life." Her father was listed as Billy Booth and her mother was "unknown White (It was Mary Elizabeth 'Eliza' White)." Her doctor was Dr. Hess who was everyone's doctor in the area at that time and American Funeral Home in Brownsville directed the service.  The date of burial was October 8, 1949 and she was buried at Holly Grove Baptist Church.

It's interesting to look through the names of those who attended her funeral service. It's like a 1940s version of her Facebook friends list except she never got to accept their friend request.

Those who attended her funeral have last names that show up throughout my genealogy research in the Haywood County area and include: Williams, Lovelace, Castellaw, Watridge, Joyner, Cobb, Brantley, Marbury, Overton, Outlaw, White, Williamson, and of course, Booth.

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I'll soon have the Booth family information uploaded on my site but the family line of her husband (which goes back to Alfred the Great, by the way), Hardy Joyner Marbury can be viewed here.

Visit my Blog Home Page or the Haywood County Line Genealogy Page.