Elizabeth Pauline Nichols b. 13 JUL 1839 York Twp., Switzerland Co., IN; d. 11 FEB 1923 Grant Twp., Jackson Co., KS; m. 30 AUG 1857 Leavenworth Co., KS; George Washington Bennett I b. 12 OCT 1829 OH; d. 27 FEB 1920 Grant Twp., Jackson Co., KS. Both buried: Olive Hill Cemetery, Jackson Co., KS.

CHILDREN:

1) William Ryston Bennett b. 1858

2) Mary Bennett b. 1860

3) Hannah Catherine Bennett b. 1863

4) Hiram Wakefield Bennett b. 1865

5) George Washington Bennett Jr. b. 1867

6) Lucy Amanda Bennett b. 1870

7) Kansas Elizabeth Bennett b. 1872

8) Alfred Emerson Bennett b. 1875

9) Thomas Leonard Bennett b. 1878

10) Agnes May Bennett b. 1881

11) Garrett Lovell Bennett b. 1884

PARENTS: Nancy Wiley b. 13 JUL 1818 Switzerland County, IN; d. Aft. 1885 CO; m. Abt. 1838 Switzerland County, IN; William H Nichols b. Abt. 1815 Lexington, Fayette Co., KY; d. Bet. 1860-1865 Easton Twp., Leavenworth Co., KS. Burial places unknown.

SIBLINGS (all born Switzerland County, IN):

1) Elizabeth Pauline Nichols b. 1839 [SELF]

2) Oliver Nichols b. Abt. 1842

3) William Francis Nichols b. 1844

4) Thomas M Nichols b. 1846

5) Benjamin Lampton Nichols b. 1849

6) Lucinda Nichols b. 1851

7) John A Nichols b. 1853

8) Clara Nichols b. 1855

9) Henry H Nichols b. 1861

MATERNAL GRANDPARENTS: Lucy Lampton m. William Royston Wiley I.

PATERNAL GRANDPARENTS: Sidney/Sydney McDaniel m. Thomas Nichols.

POLLY BENNETT

(Elizabeth Pauline Nichols, Wife of George Washington Bennett)

ELIZABETH PAULINE NICHOLS, usually called Polly, daughter of William and Nancy (Wiley) Nichols, and the wife of GEORGE WASHINGTON BENNETT, was born on a hill farm not far from the Ohio River, near Florence, Switzerland County, in Southeastern Indiana, on July 13, 1839. She received a good elementary school education, to which was added considerable home instruction by her father, who was a teacher. She was naturally endowed with a keen mind and retentive memory, the latter being intensively cultivated by the exacting training required by her mother.

     In the Summer of 1856, when Polly was 17 years old, she had an opportunity to go to Fort Leavenworth, a frontier Army outpost in the newly organized Territory of Kansas. A friend of the Nichols family, known as Dollie Gray, was the wife of a Cavalry officer stationed at Fort Leaven-

worth. Dollie's husband was often required to make prolonged trips to St. Louis, Ft. Riley, and other places. Dollie had several children, two of school age, but there were no school facilities at Ft. Leavenworth. The plan was for Polly Nichols to visit Dollie for a year or two, acting in the dual capacity of companion for Dollie and teacher of the children.

     Polly's brother, William F. Nichols, accompanied her on the long journey to Kansas. At Leavenworth, William made the acquaintance of George Bennett, and in a short time Polly and George were friends. Bennett had recently entered a quarter section of land in the new Territory, and he was looking for a wife. Neither Polly nor her brother wanted to go back to Indiana. On August 30, 1857, at Leavenworth, POLLY NICHOLS and GEORGE WASHINGTON BENNETT were married.

A detailed story of the events of her life would be largely a repetition of what has already been written about her husband. She was a "homebody", having few if any outside interests. Entirely unlike her mother, she was of a subdued and gentle disposition; whatever "Pap" decreed was accepted as "the law" in the Bennett household.

     Looking back upon it, from our viewpoint, her life would seem to have been one of considerable hardship; but from her viewpoint, she no doubt would have denied that. She shared the difficulties that were the common lot of all pioneer women, but in many respects she was much better off than most of her neighbors. There was a spring near the house, and she did not have to carry water from the creek or draw it from the well the hard way. She had a "spring house," with a constant supply of cold, running water. There was a floor in her cabin, glass window panes, a stairway instead of a ladder, a kitchen with a cook stove and a cupboard. When the prairie settlers were literally starved out by drought, the bottom land along the creek never failed to produce enough to feed the family. There was always sufficient clothing. She did not have to work in the field, as so many pioneer women did. Nevertheless, regardless of viewpoints and comparisons, it must be admitted that her life was mostly a story of sacrifice and incredible physical exertion.

     Polly Bennett was an excellent cook. She fed her family well, but not from grocery store shelves. She always had a garden. There were plenty of apples, potatoes, turnips, cabbages, buried in the pits in the yard. The benches in the spring house were loaded with more canned fruit, jams and jellies than the family required. They butchered their own beef and pork, and there was an abundance of fish and game. There was plenty of milk, butter, poultry and eggs--so cheap that they seldom went to market, but were consumed at home. She was among the first women in the community to have a sewing machine, a heating stove, a rocking chair, rag carpet, and coaloil lamps instead of candles.

Polly Bennett had a far better education than the average women of her day. Along with her elementary schooling, she had a marvelous memory. When she was nearly 80, her acute mind still retained a prodigious amount of information she had learned as a child. She could recall names, dates, and events, not only of things within her personal experience, but also things that had been told to her of happenings that took place long before she was born. Birthdays, weddings, funerals, names, places, events--her keen mind was a veritable storehouse of such information. In 1916 she wrote many pages--dozens of them--crammed with material of that kind that she drew from her memory. Indeed, this book would have been quite impossible without her contribution to the family's history. If the reader marvels at the great number of names and dates appearing herein, let him remember that Polly Bennett somehow carried no small part of them in her mind, apparently without effort.

     George and Polly Bennett had 11 children, whose names and descendants are listed, beginning on page 39.

     ELIZABETH PAULINE (NICHOLS) BENNETT died at her home in Soldier Valley on February 11, 1923, in her 84th year, and was buried beside her husband in the Olive Hill cemetery.

THIS WAS GRANDMA

     Grandmother Bennett was a small woman; in appearance almost frail, but she was a dynamo of energy. Along with bearing 11 children, she did an incredible amount of work almost up to the day of her death. Housework, in her schedule, (I am referring to the 1890's and earlier,) was not strictly limited to the house. It also included milking several cows twice a day, tending the garden, looking after a few hundred chickens, turkeys, guineas, geese and ducks; gathering the eggs, churning the butter, canning the fruits and vegetables, making jams and jellies, leaching lye from wood ashes, boiling soap in a big iron kettle over an outdoor fire, occasionally splitting a little fire-wood, carrying water up the hill from the spring--these chores were considered "housework"; as were the routine duties of cooking, washing, ironing, mending, baking bread, sweeping, scrubbing, and making practically all of the family clothing. In case of illness, she was the doctor and the nurse, too busy to get sick herself. These tasks, except the milking, were shared by the girls as they grew up. The Bennett family roots ran back through many generations of East Kentuckians, and their way of life was not much different from that of their pioneer ancestors.

     Grandma's every-day dresses (circa 1890) were plain, serviceable, home made, of gingham or "yard goods," with a little touch of color--not much. Her Sunday dress (possibly she had more than one, but I doubt it) was a severe black, well starched and ironed, suitable apparel for anybody's wedding or funeral. She was an excellent seamstress, but she did not cater much to style or design. To her, "a dress was a dress was a dress"; supposed to cover the body (ears to ankles), keep the wearer warm, not soil readily, and last a long time; any additional quality, style or frills were purely incidental (if not downright sinful). In her later years, perhaps influenced by the worldly manners of her daughters and daughters-in-law, but definitely to Grandpa's disgust, she had several Sunday dresses, relaxing somewhat on the "color line" and even displaying a little lace trim.

     My early memories of Grandma Bennett are largely associated with big slices of warm bread, fresh from the oven, with thick slabs of butter and generous spreads of jam and preserves. She spanked Art Lattimore for throwing rocks at her little chickens; she didn't happen to catch me at it, but I never was too confident about what she might do under provocation. On the other hand, my confidence in Grandpa was boundless. Grandma was always telling me stories, knitting stockings and mittens for me, giving me Christmas toys, and (again unlike Grandpa) at the summer picnics she sometimes gave me a nickel to spend at the stand. In her later years she spent a great deal of time answering my questions, and writing down incredible quantities of names, dates and events pertaining to the family; much of the material in this book comes from her remarkable memory. I was very fond of Grandma.

From "The Bennett Book," by John A. Shields, privately published April 16, 1956, reprinted in September, 2021.