Washington County, Florida
It’s a blistering hot day in August, 1898. Four months pregnant, my great grandmother, Minnie Clara Bertha Brock must find a way to survive. Her parents are dead, her land stolen. She has nothing, and no extended family to take her in. Only her parents emigrated with her from Germany.
She is not afraid of hard work. But farm work is hard to come by. No one wants to hire a pregnant woman. If she were a man, maybe.
This story might have ended in tragedy, and the baby my great-grandmother carried may not have made it were it not for two wonderful women, Mary Grantham Gilmore, and her daughter, Martha Ellen Gilmore. These strong women lived and farmed a land-grant in Washington County, Florida, secured by Mary.
They took my great-grandmother in, nursed her through her pregnancy, and took care of her when the baby, my grandmother, Esther Lee Corley Stewart, was newly born.
They had suffered their own tragedies, and knew what it was like to bring a fatherless child into rural northwest Florida in the late 1800s. Martha’s illegitimate child, Christopher, carried their last name, Gilmore, rather than his absentee father’s.
Last night, I was having dinner with a dear friend who has faced some pretty dark moments over the past couple of years. And yet, she looks beautiful—her face glows with peace. She made this comment, “the Lord brought me through a really bad time. Maybe I can use it to help others who are going through the same thing. Maybe I can give them hope.”
The hope offered by friendship is life-giving.
