A Romance of Real Life in Missouri.
Springfield, (Mo.) Herald.
On Monday evening, 24th inst. Mr. T.G. Childers and Mrs. Lucinda Phillips were married at the latter’s residence on Division street. This is their second wedlock with each other, and the story of their separation and final reunion after twenty years, is equal, in point of romance, to that of Enoch Arden.
Mr. T.G. Childers and Miss Rebecca Tatem were first married in their native county, Franklin, in 1856, and lived together until 1861, when the husband joined the Southern army in response to a call for volunteers. Soon he was made prisoner by the enemy, who kept him for awhile in St. Louis, and finally sent him to Alton, Ill., for keeps. After sixteen months of captivity he was exchanged and resumed his duties as a Southern soldier, remaining in the army until the close of hostilities in 1865, when, like a dutiful husband and father, he returned to his wife and little children, but sad changes greeted him where all had once been contentment and happiness.
The husband had been reported killed in the terrible struggle of Vicksburg, and his wife, and long and tearful waiting, was forced to give credence to the story, and subsequently found solace in the love of a Mr. Phillips, whom she had known in childhood. True to the vows of long ago, she was loth to bury the first love. Still she was a woman, and therefore to be won, and so it was, the soldier husband returned from the dangers and privations of war to find her whom he had vowed to love until parted by death, the wife of another. It was an ordeal more trying than any he had experienced during all the bloody conflict through which he had passed. Yet there was no remedy save to suppress the affections so fondly remembered, and trust in time, whose easy flight corrects all errors, softens grief, and rocks sad memories to sleep.
He married again in 1866, but his second wife died three years later. In 1875 he married a third time, but was once again robbed by death of his consort one year afterward. About a year ago, Mr. Phillips died, leaving Childers’ first wife in widowhood.
Mrs. Phillips has a brother residing in Franklin, whom she visited not long since, and at whose house she chanced to meet Mr. Childers, her first husband. They met as friends, but their friendship quickly warmed, the love of twenty years ago returned, and though not so fervent as in the earlier dream of youth, it was not wanting in earnest devotion. Their second marriage to each other occurred on Monday evening, the 24th inst., in the presence of their families, respectfully and collectively. The event was celebrated with music and dancing, and the bride and groom, though sprinkled with the silver of time, seemed happier for the sorrow they have known.
Source: The Banner-Watchman, Athens, Georgia, Tuesday, October 30, 1883; Pg. 3
NOTE: Mrs. Lucinda F. (Tatum) Childers, md. (2) W.J. Phillips, 1 Nov. 1863, Franklin Co. MO.
