Duncans
Nancy Jane Prater
Birth:Jul 1833 in , Floyd, Kentucky, USA 1
Death:18 Oct 1909 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA 1
Sex:F
Father:Elijah Prater
Mother:Jemima Patrick
  
Burial: Patrick Cemetery, Patrick, Madison, Arkansas, USA
AKA: 1
Changed: 4 Mar 2007 08:35:29

Spouses & Children
John Harrison FRALEY (Husband) b. 1826 in , , Kentucky, USA
Marriage: ABT 1849 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA
Children: 
  1. DescendantsSamuel Fraley b. May 1858 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA
  2. DescendantsElizabeth Fraley b. About 1866 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA
  3. DescendantsJemima Fraley b. May 1851 in Van Buren, Crawford, Arkansas, USA
  4. Martha Fraley b. Feb 1861 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA
  5. Mary Fraley b. Jan 1855 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA
  6. Samuel Fraley b. 1857 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA
  7. DescendantsEdith Jane Fraley b. About 1861 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA
  8. DescendantsEmeline Fraley b. About 1853 in , Madison, Arkansas, USA
 
Reuben Patton (Husband)
 

Notes
Individual:
Buried Patrick Cem. , Madison Co. Ark., supposedly beside 1st husband, John Fraley. His grav
e is unmarked. Also supposedly, her parents lie in unmarked graves in Patrick Cem. Some say they're buried in Brashears Cem.

John Fraley was killed by bushwhackers during Civil War. See notes on John Fraley. Nancy Ja ne was called "Aunt Jane" by young neighbors. After the killing of John Fraley, another group of bushwhackers came again to her home and were stealing what little she had left, including a mare she had. She was slipping up behind a bushwhacker who was about to take her mare, with an axe in her hand, ready to kill him. A neighboring Thornsberry boy, who had been forced to join up with them, caught her just in time and stopped her, telling her "Aunt Jane, if you had killed him, they would have killed you, and then your little children would have been orphans indeed."
Nancy Jane took her children & went to Fayetteville for the balance of the war, working for o ther families, cleaning, etc. to make a living for them. After the war, she went back to her little cabin and found a lot of dried blood on the floor. Tho she scoured & scoured, she could never get all the bloodstains up.
She had an affair with a Union officer from Mo. and bore Elizabeth, born abt. 1866. No one k nows his name.

Not long after John Fraley's death, Nancy Jane was working in the fields, and looked up & sa w her husband coming toward her. She turned & shouted to her children to come & see their daddy. When she turned back around, his vision had disappeared. The children never saw him.

Her father died sometime after the 1880 census. Nancy Jane was living just over the mountai n from her parents with her second husband, Reuben Patton. Her father was gravely ill. While at her home, Nancy Jane looked up and saw a round light with feathers in it spinning around & around rising up over the mountain top, and remarked that her dad was dead - that was his spirit leaving. She hastened to her parents home & sure enough, her father had just died.

The 1920 census shows her birth as Jan. of 1831. Her tombstone says died l0-18-1909, aged 8 2 yrs. Most of the censuses would have her born abt. 1833, so that's the date I picked, whether right or not.



Sources
  1. Title: Frances McElroy

http://www.gencircles.com/users/mloveridge/1/data/1656