Death Ends Career Of Social Worker,
Miss Mattie Diggs

The Parisian, Paris, TN
Friday, May 6, 1949

Funeral services for Miss Mattie Harris Diggs, welfare worker of Henry County, and a lifetime resident of Paris, who died early Friday morning at a local hospital, were held Saturday afternoon at the First Methodist Church. Rites were conducted by the Rev. J. E. Underwood, pastor, and burial was in the family plot in Palestine cemetery.

McEvoy Funeral Home was in charge of arrangements.

Serving as pallbearers were Vernon Postlethwaite, Frank Aden, R. S. Baxter, Fred Blanton, Charles D. Trevathan and Guy Wiggins.

Miss Diggs, whose home was t 804 Dunlap Street, had been in failing health for two years, but had continued in her duties as a case worker with the local office of Tennessee State Welfare Department until within recent weeks. Her death resulted from a cerebral hemorrhage, suffered a week earlier.

A daughter of the late Robert Knox and Mrs. Emma Douglass Diggs, Miss Diggs was a member of old and prominent families in Henry and Sumner Counties. Her maternal grandparents were Mr. and Mrs. Richard E Douglass. She was born 60 years ago in the Palestine community near Paris.

Following the death of her father, a Henry County farmer, Miss Diggs came to Paris with her mother and sisters to reside at the Dunlap Street address.

With the State Welfare Department for a number of years, Miss Diggs taught in the Paris city schools as a young woman, later going to Helena, Ark., where she taught in the Helena schools and was connected with the Red Cross of Phillips County in the flood areas along the Mississippi River.

A member of the First Methodist Church, Miss Diggs was active in all departments of the church and served as president of her Sunday School Class. She was also a member of the Business and Professional Womens’ Club of Paris.

Survivors are three sisters, all of Paris, Miss Sarah Diggs, of Belle Glade High School faculty, in Florida; Miss Mary Lou Diggs, instructor in Grove School, and Miss Corinne Diggs, circulation manager of the Paris Post-Intelligencer, Mrs. B. P. Moore, of McKenzie, is an aunt.