Edgefield advertiser. [volume] (Edgefield, S.C.) 1836-current, 1920-01-28
Tribute to Mrs. Robert H.
Minis.


tist church.)
This morning as I sat at the break
fast table, I was thinking of the once
happy home where children had play
ed and the grandchildren had gath
cred and where there were always
enough loved ones and friends to
make good cheer, and now the home
is desolate and that, by the loss of
just one who dwelt therein. This
thought came very forcibly to my
mind, that the death of one person
changes the whole world. The more l
thought of it, the more l believed it
was true. Each one, whether great or
mediocre or small is such part OF
some life or some interest that their
loss creates decided difference in
what is and what may be.
For many years, as far back as my
memory runs, the face and figure of
Mrs. Minis has been very familiar to
me. have faint recollections of her
in my earliest childhood as she would
pass our home on her way to Sunday
School and to minister to the sick
and suffering and carry them COM
fort and solace. In the old church
which stood in this same spot, l re-
member how she sat at the organ in
those days when it was not such an
easy matter to get an organist even
for one of the old fashioned kind
and especially such faithful one
who never missed in rain or sunshine
or for what most people would have
considered genuine reason. At the
revival meetings, I remember too,
away back when was seven years
old, when DR.. Luther Gwaltney was
conducting revival service and how
inspiring the singing was with the
playing of the old organ and how
nv own heart was thrilled as I deter
mined that 1 too, though so small
would be Christian. Later, when l
was ten years old and very ill with
pneumonia, near death, they said, l
remember how the presence of this
sympathetic comforter charmed and
.cheered me. Somehow she had mag
netism for me which still recall
very vividly, and now it is all men,
,ory, her life and labors and associa-
;tions of the past, but this memory is
the connecting link between our
present and our reunion hereafter. 1t
is what makes our associations eter-
nal.
Through Sunday School, church,
prayer meeting and special meetings,
through more than forty years she
made the music for the church SER
vices from the time of the little old
humble organ till the great pipe or
gan was finished and the Centennial
OF the Edgefeld Association was eel
ebrated. 1t was not many years ago
since her eyesight so failed that she
could not read the notes, and if it had
not been for hearing the music, she
could have played on and on though
blind, so familiar was she with every
metre and all that suited it. She i'm
proyised her own voluntaries and the
memory of these sweet harmonies
will go with me down the years.
Every time another comrade along
the journey of life takes abode in the
better land, we become more rem
iniscent, and more ready too, for the
change ourselves, as more and more
faces beckon us onward and upward.
Shewas born in 1886 not far from
the Pleasant Lane community where
she was reared and where her home
was centre of refinement and cheer
for all the people IN that section.
Rose Cottage is known by many who
have read the stories of the past and
/ have never passed there, the house
still standing today, without thinking.
of the family who once lived there,
of what I know of DR.. and Mrs. John
Lake and of his grandson, John Lake
who labors in China today.
The golden anniversary of her mar
riage to Mr.. Robert H. Minis was cef-
ebrated in 1905, seven years before
his death and her death came seven
years later. In the home in which
they both died, these two lived to-
gether for fifty-seven years and were
always known for their devotion and
congeniality of disposition. Mrs.
Minis never lost interest in the affairs