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Jacob Sessum Rainwater’s 1st family

Jacob S. Rainwater’s 1st family

Etta Rainwater Dale, Jacob S. Rainwater, Presley Rainwater, Susan Rainwater Hunt and Delilah Rainwater Finkel, ca 1890s.

Jacob Sessum Rainwater was born on 12 February 1836 in Tennessee to James Rainwater and Delilah Kifer, the second of five children born to this couple. The family moved from Tennessee to Washington Co., Arkansas in the 1840s, and to Missouri in the 1850s. There Jacob met and married his first wife, Catherine Lucinda Williamson. Married in 1858 in Ray Co., Missouri, the couple brought 8 children into the world: James, Nov 1859, Mary Catherine, 1861, Susan, 1862, Presley (aka Preston), ca 1866, Delilah, ca 1868, Eva, Dec 1870, Lucy, 1876-1883, and Etta, ca 1879.

Jacob seems to have had a serious case of wanderlust, moving many times and great distances for the day in which he lived. In 1863, he moved his family to Oregon, but moved back to Missouri a few years later. Some time after 1870, he moved to Labett Co., Kansas, but in 1874, returned to Missouri. In May of 1875, he moved to Colorado, about 30 miles from Canyon City on the eastern side of the Rocky Mountains. Eventually he moved to Dayton, WA, where the family finally settled.

Jacob served on the Union side of the Civil War in the Missouri 51st Militia, Company A, from 28 Jul 1862 - 13 Jan 1863. His service papers indicate that he was the company bugler. His discharge date coincides with his family’s trip to Oregon, suggesting that the journey was undertaken to remove his family from the danger of the conflict.

Lucinda Williamson Rainwater, Jacob’s first wife, died around 1880, shortly after the birth of Etta, their last child. In 1884, Jacob married his second wife, Nellie Pintler, in Columbia Co., Washington, and started a second family, who will be the subject of October’s gallery. He died in 1906 in Dayton, Columbia Co., WA.

Related items
Jacob Sessum Rainwater’s obituary

Credits
Photo and biographical information supplied by the late Ray Rainwater


© 2018 Ray Rainwater
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