Wednesday's Child: Ruth E. Allen

Little Ruth E. Allen was born on the 9th of June in 1917. She was the only child born to Walter Ambrose Allen and his young wife Lilla Jane Hooks. Lilla Jane was the niece of my great-great grandmother, Sarah Jane Hooks Hill.

Ruth died of bronchial pneumonia at 8 months and 7 days old. There was a horrific influenza empidemic that went through the area of Stanly, Anson, Union and surrounding counties between 1916 and 1918. Her mother Lilla, would die the following year of bronchial pneumonia following influenza at the tender age of 19 years, 8 months and 20 days.





The family had moved to Carthage, in Moore County, just north of Montgomery, but were brought back to Dulin's grove to be buried. Walter Ambrose Allen, Ruth's father, was a member of the Dulin family, his mother Carrie, being born a Dulin. W. A. Allen would fight in WWI, remarry a girl from the coast of North Carolina, Betty Clark, and father 3 little boys, 2 of whom lived and 1 who also died as an infant. W. A. Allen would not live to be an old man, either. But that is another story. Ruth's grandmother, Rebecca Isabell Aldridge, was the daughter of Caleb Hampton Aldridge, whose sister Francis Julina Aldridge, is also one of my great, great grandmothers.

Monument of Lilla Jane Hooks Allen at Dulin's Grove.