St. Charles, Missouri
March 1923
OLD QUILT
(Large, with applique of birds and flowers)
This quilt was made by Mrs. Becket of Columbia,
S. C. when seventy years old, and was given to her daughter Jane
(Mrs. Charles Robinson). Mrs. Robinson, at her death in
1833 in St. Charles County, Missouri, left the quilt to her namesake,
Jane Durfee, who was then four years old. Jane Durfee married
John Jay Johns. She left the quilt to her daughter Elizabeth
(Mrs. Charles Henry Gauss).
Jane Becket's sister, Margaret, married Thomas Lindsay,
who came from Scotland previous to 1800 and lived in South Carolina
at Columbia and Charleston. some time after the Louisiana
Purchase of 1803, Thomas and Margaret Lindsay made the journey
to St. Charles county, Missouri, bringing their negroes with them.
Mr. Lindsay bought many acres of land, and his home stood on a
hill near Elm Point. Here he kept "open house"
for the pioneer ministers who came to the new country. Jane
Becket came either with her sister or later, and married Rev.
Charles Robinson, who came from Granville, Massachusetts.
The first Presbyterian Church of St. Charles was
organized in Qugust 1818, and Rev. Timothy Flint was the supply
until the following year, when Mr. Robinson became the first pastor
and served until his death in 1828.
Thomas Lindsay's sister, Anne, Mrs. Patrick Glenday,
came in 1816 direct from Perthshire, Scotland, with her husband
and two daughters, Helen (aged twelve) and Anne (aged six).
Six years later, Mrs. Glenday died, her husband and daughter Helen
went back to Scotland. Anne chose to remain with her uncle,
Thomas Lindsay. she married rev. Thomas Russell Durfee,
who came to Missouri from Fall River, Mass. Her two daughters,
Jane and Margaret, were named after the Becket sisters, Jane receiving
the quilt from Mrs. Jane Becket Robinson.
Thomas and Margaret Lindsay, and Charles and Jane
Robinson, also Rev. Thomas R. Durfee, are buried in the family
burying ground near Mr. Lindsay's home near Elm Point. The
Lindsay and Robinson graves are enclosed by a stone wall; Mrs.
Lindsay's grave has a stone erected by the American Bible Society,
he having given a large amount of land to the A. B. S.
Thomas Durfee's grave, being unmarked, could not be located when
it was desired to remove his remains to the Johns family lot in
Oak Grove Cemetery, near St. Charles, but a stone was erected
on the Johns lot, next to his wife's grave, which is next to that
of her daughter, Mrs.. Jane A. Durfee Johns.
Source: Typewritten notes in the private collection
of the Chambless family. Transcribed to softcopy by Susan
D. Chambless, June 3, 2000.
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