The Sibert Family of South Carolina and Alabama

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MARTHA ADA BEESON (1871 – 1911), daughter of of Mary Ann Frances Sibert³ (David², John David¹)

Martha Ada Beeson was born on 30 December 1871 on her father's homestead in Big Wills Valley, Etowah County, Alabama. [1] She died on 14 March 1911, while a missionary in China. [1] She married Wilmuth Farmer. [1] Wilmuth was born on 14 October 1877 in Conyers, Rockdale County, Georgia. [2][3][4] He died on 30 October 1970. [2][3] He was buried in the Santa Clara Mission Cemetery in Santa Clara, Santa Clara County, California. [2]

As a young girl Martha was invited to live with her Uncle William and Aunt Marietta Sibert in Gadsden. She was close friends with [presumably] Fannie Sibert and attended school in Gadsden. In 1866 her brother John Wesley established a school in Arcadia, Louisiana —the Arcadia Female College—and she went there to study. Her brother left to take the presidency of the Marengo Female College in Demopolis, Alabama and she accompanied him, finishing her undergraduate and masters degrees at this school. [5]

According to the census, in 1900 Martha A., born in December 1871, lived with her parents in Duck Springs, Etowah County and taught school. [6]

Upon graduation she accepted a teaching position for a year in Paradise, Texas. She then spent a year teaching in Chico [Texas?], two years working at the East Mississippi Female College in Meridian and two years teaching in Blountville, Alabama. After this she offered herself to the Mission Board of the South Methodist Mission Convention to be sent to China. She attended Missionary School in Nyack, New York and spent a year in Nashville. [5]

On 11 January 1902 she sailed from San Francisco with a party of missionaries on the S.S. City of Peking. She landed in Shanghai on 8 February, traveled to Kuang Si [Guangxi] and on 24 February began to study the language. [5]

Wilmoth Farmer came to China as a missionary in 1901 and he and Martha married on 26 January 1904 in Canton. On 31 April 1907—in hope of a rest for Wilmoth—Ada and Wilmoth set sail for home. In the United States, they visited Ada's family and in the spring they had a son who lived only briefly. On 17 January 1909 they departed Vancouver for China. On 5 January 1910 Ada complained of being ill with severe dysentery and on 14 March 1911 she died of the disease. She was buried in the foothills of the Western Mountains. [5]

Photo of Ada and Wilmoth at their wedding

After Ada's death, Wilmoth returned to the United States. The Methodist church sent him back to China, but he found himself drawn to Catholicism there and the church dispatched him back home. In the United States he converted, and was later ordained a Jesuit priest, renamed Father Francis X. Farmer. He returned to China as a Jesuit missionary and served there from 1926 to 1949—he was held prisoner by the Japanese from December 1941 to August 1945. He spent the years 1949 to 1966 at Loyola University. [7]

Endnotes:

1. Jasper Luther Beeson, Beeson Genealogy (Macon, GA: n.p., 1988).

2. "Find a Grave," database with images, FindaGrave (accessed March 27, 2024), memorial page for Fr Francis X. Farmer (14 Oct 1877–30 Oct 1970), Memorial ID 32582597, citing Santa Clara Mission Cemetery, Santa Clara, Santa Clara County, CA; Maintained by Patricia Farmer (contributor 46947658).

3. "California, U.S., Death Index, 1940–1997," database, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/5180), entry for Francis X Farmer.

4. "U.S., Passport Applications, 1795–1925," database with images, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/1174), entry for Wilmoth Alexander Farmer.

5. Reverand Wilmoth Farmer, Ada Beeson: A Missionary Heroin of Kuang Si (Atlanta: Foote & Davies Co., 1912). Her biogaraphy is from this book.

6. "U.S. Federal Census Collection," database with images, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/search/categories/usfedcen) > 1900 > AL > Etowah > Duck Springs > District 0156, image 14, lines 96–100, entry for William Beason.

7. Rita H. DeLorme, "Adventures of Father Francis X. Farmer, SJ (formerly Reverend Wilmoth A. Farmer)," Southern Cross (https://southerncross.diosav.org/features-20140930-adventures-father-farmer).

27-Mar-2024 11:27 AM