| |
Obituary
for W.B. Swain - from the Greenville newspaper
W.B.
SWAIN PASSED AWAY AT MIDNIGHT IN LOCAL HOSPITAL
Pioneer
Citizen and Prominent Planter
Succumbed After 54 Years as Large
Contributor to Delta Progress
Washington
County and the Mississippi Delta today mourns the
death of a leader in the building and development
of this great alluvial empire. W.B. Swain
passed away at the King's Daughters
Hospital last midnight after a
complicated illness which had held him in the
hospital for the past six weeks, although his
health began to fall away near three years ago.
William
Beauregard Swain was born in Holmes
county, near Goodman,
on August 21, 1861, the son of Samuel Ray
and Harriet Sales Swain. When he
was a lad of 19 years he came to Washington
county with his father to cut timbers from the
forests south of Leland, from which they erected
their first Mississippi Delta home. They
cleared the lands upon which produced some of the
first cotton in that section, and from that
modest beginning Mr. Swain became one of the
wealthiest planters in the Mississippi Delta,
always maintaining that pioneer spirit that
brought him from his home in the hills as he
ventured out on new farming methods and never
hesitating to seek and obtain the best in animals
in equipment and in housing method for preserving
his properties that aided toward his success.
Mr.
Swain always took great pride in making his home
and plantation attractive as well as convenient.
His home at Hollyknowe,
surrounded by beautiful gardens, is probably the
handsomest in the Mississippi Delta while the
fertile fields extending along the highways have
proven a great attraction for visitors as well as
home folk.
When
a new enterprise was a proposed in his vicinity,
whether it was the Baptist Church in
Leland, of which he was a member, or
whether it was a commercial of civic enterprise
for the good of the community Mr. Swain was
always found among the large contributors,
although his contributions were made in a quiet
way and without further ado on his part.
Several
times Mr. Swain had been appealed to accept
public office - supervisor, especially, because
his good business judgment was considered of much
importance in governing bodies of this
kind, but he declined, and while taking an active
interest in public affairs never held office.
As a member of the Greenville Lodge of Elks he
was always doing his part, but declined to hold
an office.
On
December 30, 1902, Mr. Swain was married to Miss
Marion Edith Hobbs, of near Black Hawk, Miss.
whose beautiful life, blended with his has
brought to this family their three surviving
children. Walter B. Swain,
who after returning from college has divided with
his father the burdens of operating their
extensive interests; Mrs. Hugh (Jeffe
Swain) Sudduth, of Holly Knowe, and
their youngest son William Denton Swain,
at this time a student at Mississippi
State College. The devoted wife
and their three children were at the bedside when
the end came. Also surviving of the
immediate family are his brother, A.P.
Swain of this city, and his sister, Mrs.
W.L. Hay, of Leland.
Funeral
services with Wells Funeral Home in charge of
arrangements, were conducted by Rev. E.H.
Westmoreland in the First Baptist Church
at Leland this afternoon at 3:30 o'clock, where
hundreds of friends paid tribute to his life of
service. Immediately after the service in
Leland the remains were brought to Greenville and
laid to rest in the Greenville Cemetery
beside his father and mother and sisters,
who had preceded him to the grave.
The
pallbearers are: Active - Steve Schillig, George
Briesch, Edmund Taylor, Ralph McGee, Aubrey
Finklea, John W. Dickens, J.S. Hafter and W.L.
Francis. Honorary - Jere Nash, E.W. Wood, A.H.
Stone, H.C. Crosby, B.F. Wasson, T.H. Baird, S.R.
Geise, M.L. Virden, B.D. Bradera, Dr. H.A.
Gamble, Dr. Paul G. Gamble. Wm T. Wynn, B.O.
McGee, R.C. Terry, J.W. Thompson, Albert Lake, Jr.,
C.C. Denman, W.O. Edwards, J.H. Anderson, W.P.
Kretschman, Jimmie Whitehurst, S. Whitehurst, W.W.
Smith and R.G. Jones.
|
|
William Beauregard Swain August 20, 1861 - October 25, 1934
The
following Biography can be found in “History
of Mississippi, The Heart of the South”
Volume III, pages 76-79; published by
The S.J. Clarke Publishing Company 1925.
. |
| By common consent of those
acquainted with the situation, William Beauregard
Swain, planter, merchant and community builder,
proprietor of a beautiful place in Hollyknowe,
Washington county, and owner of much other land
in that county, has for many years been
recognized as one of the chief individual factors
in the development of the Delta country and in
the promotion of the general interests of that
now greatly favored section of the State of Mississippi.
It is easily enough recalled that when Mr. Swain
began his operations there forty years and more
ago the situation in many parts of the Delta was
regarded by all the most optimistic as being all
but hopeless from an agricultural viewpoint.
Those whose perspective includes a retrospect of
conditions thereabout during the ’80s of the
past century and who now are in a position to
ride along there in Pullman
trains or in automobiles along paved highways,
have no need to be reminded of the amazing change
which has been brought about throughout that
section. For the
information of some of the present generation who
take existing conditions for granted, without
thought of how they were effected, it may be well
to keep in mind that when Mr. Swain began his
operations on Bogue Phalia in
the Stoneville neighborhood in
Washington county, in the early ‘80s, there
were hardly more than a hundred acres of cleared
land in that whole section, extending between the
present towns of Shaw and Leland
and that there were many who had no hope that
much of this then waste land ever would be
brought under cultivation, for the annual
flooding of these lands in those days of
inadequate levees took the heart out of all save
those who had the hardihood of thought and the
clarity of imaginations to look ahead to a time
when the river eventually would be effectively
harnessed and the great Delta with its
inexhaustible treasure of alluvial soil be
subjected to the uses of mankind. It is not too
much to say that during the height of his
operations as a developer of the
land and promoter of plantation
operations Mr. Swain bought and subjected to
plantation uses no fewer than ten
thousand acres of what had long been
regarded as hopeless land and by the exercise of
his well-directed energies, working along various
lines, in time brought this land under subjection
and reduced it to the uses of agriculture,
bringing it to a profitable state of cultivation,
a record of individual accomplishment in realty
promotion which is said to stand without parallel
in Mississippi to this day. Diligent in business,
mindful not only of the obligation he owed to
himself but of his equal obligation to the
community at large, Mr. Swain naturally has
prospered and in the pleasant evening time of his
life finds himself very comfortable situated, owner
in Hollyknowe of one of the most spacious and
beautiful homes in Mississippi, a summer home in
the mountains of Colorado and still retaining
some thousands of acres of choice Washington
county land to keep up his interest in plantation
promotion. He also carries on in
Hollyknowe a well stocked and well appointed
commercial establishment, has considerable banking
interests and has for years been looked
upon as one of the most substantial figures in
the general agricultural, commercial and social
life of the Delta country
William Beauregard Swain
is a native son of Mississippi and has been a
resident of this state all of his life, an active
promoter of its substantial interests since the
days of his young manhood. He was born on a
plantation in the highlands of Holmes
county, on August 20, 1861, a son of Sam
R. and Harriet A. (Swain) Swain, and was
there reared, receiving his education in the
public schools of that community. From the days
of his boyhood Mr. Swain has been interested in
land development and cotton growing and upon
attaining his majority he began operations along
those lines on his own account, starting in as a
renter of a somewhat dubious tract of one hundred
acres in the Stoneville neighborhood in
Washington county. He there found by practical
experience what could be done by the exercise of
intelligent direction in the development and
cultivation of unimproved lands in the Delta
country and his operations ever since have been
largely confined to Washington county. As his
affairs progressed he gradually extended his
operations, taking over and clearing an annually
increasing acreage, until during the height of
his operations he came to be recognized as one of
the largest cotton growers in the south.
After his marriage Mr. Swain established his home
at his present site in Hollyknowe, where he and
his family are delightfully situated, having also
the advantage of a summer home in Colorado. Years
ago Mr. Swain established a general store
on his plantation and this through the years has
come to be a mercantile establishment of a large
local importance, a fine trading center for the
community for miles thereabout. He also has other
interests of a substantial character, and has for
years been a helpful force in the community,
second to none in the Delta country. In1917,
with a view to contracting his agricultural
operations to a point that would not involve so
much of his personal attention along those lines,
Mr. Swain began to sell off some of his cotton
land and his acreage now has been reduced to the
eighteen-hundred-acre home tract in Hollyknowe,
about three and half miles east of Leland, and a
fine productive tract of about seven hundred and
ten acres in the vicinity of Hollandale, also in
Washington county, in the direction of the
affairs of which he continues to take an active
personal interest, his sons also
now coming to be active factors in the general
promotion of these interests. As one writer has
said of Mr. Swain’s operations: “He
has advanced with the scientific progress of
agricultural methods and by his notable success
in a modern enterprise conducted along up-to-date
lines, has proved the efficiency of system in
promoting the productiveness of the soil.”
It was on December
30, 1903, in Lexington, Mississippi,
that William B. Swain was united in marriage to Miss
Mamie (Marion)
Hobbs, daughter of C.A. and
Laura Hobbs. Mr.
and Mrs. Swain have three children: Two sons, Walter
Beauregard and William D. Swain;
and a daughter, Jeffie Clair.
The Swains have a beautiful home in Hollyknowe, a
home for years noted for its gracious hospitality.
They are affiliated with the Baptist
church in Leland and have ever taken a
proper interest in local good works in the
general social and cultural activities of the
community. Mr. Swain is a member of the local
lodge of the Benevolent Protective Order
of Elks in Greenville. The thoughtful
student of biography does not need to be told
that there is no greater stimulus to individual
effort than that which is found in the personal
examples and in the life stories of such men as
William B. Swain, who has set before the world a
notable example of industry, courage and
perseverance. One writer has said of his
career: “He has made his private enterprise
a public asset and Mississippi is the richer in
resources and civilization by reason of his
citizenship.”
|
|