Reeves, Elijah

Summary

Father: Reuben Reeves
Mother: Nancy Fox

Birth: 18 Apr 1819, Alabama
Birth Source: Family Bible in RW pension file of Daniel Fox

Death: 23 Aug 1892
Death Source: Headstone

Spouse1: Nancy Reeder

Narrative

Children of Elijah Reeves and Nancy:

1. Sarah Elizabeth Reeves, b. 26 Jun 1843
2. John Wilson Reeves, b. 1844
3. Mary Jane Reeves, b. 1847
4. William J Reeves, b. c1849
5. Martha Reeves, b. c1851
6. Nancy Minerva Reeves, b. c1856, m. Samuel Burrel

Headstone says born 18 Apr 1818.

From the biography of his son William J. Reeves:

His father was Elijah Reeves, a native of Alabama, who at seven years of age was taken by his parents to Kentucky to what is now Marshall County. He was a son of Reuben and Nancy (Fox) Reeves, both of Alabama, who lived on a farm for many years in Kentucky and reared a large family of children. The grandfather of William J. Reeves died there at the age of sixty years, after which his widow came to southern Illinois to the home of her son Elijah, where she died at the age of seventy-one, years. The first wife of Elijah Reeves, and the mother of William J., was Nancy Reeder, daughter of Jesse Reeder. Mr. and Mrs. Reeves lived some ten years on their farm in Kentucky, and came to Johnson County with their three children during the winter of 1848-49, making the journey with their own team and driving their cattle before them. They were in humble circumstances, and took up one hundred and sixty acres of land, one and a-half miles from the present home of William J., to whom they sold their claim two years after settlement, when they bought a claim of another one hundred and sixty acres one and a-half miles west, with a small clearing, on which they built a small rude log house and there made a permanent home. They improved one hundred and forty acres of the land, and erected a good frame house and barn, residing here some thirty years, the mother dying in 1881, aged sixty-five years. They here buried four children, two dying in infancy, and Elizabeth, wife of Levi Lay, who died at the youthful age of eighteen years, and Martha, wife of Crayton Wood, who also died in her eighteenth year. There are now four living: John W. Reeves, a farmer in Kansas; Mary Jane, wife of Joseph Holland, a farmer in Arkansas; William J., and Minerva, wife of Samuel Burrel, a resident of Carmi, ILL. The father of this family died at Ozark in August, 1892, aged seventy-three years.

It appears Elijah took care of his brother Absalom's family after he died as his children William, Minerva, and Henry are listed with him in 1870.

Sources

Birth:        Family Bible in RW pension file of Daniel Fox
Death:        Headstone, Rushing Cemetery, Johnson County, Illinois
Census:      1860 Census - Johnson County, Illinois
                   1870 Census - Johnson County, Illinois
History:      Biographical Review of Johnson, Massac, Pope, and Hardin Counties, Illinois, p324