Personal Info________________________________________
Father: John Godfrey Vollenweider
Born: October 22, 1842 (?)        Aarburg, Switzerland
Died: June 15, 1917 (?)              Near Williams, Iowa     Age  74
Parents (Father): John Jakob Vollenweider

Mother: Eliza J. Kaump
Born: September 29, 1848         Georgetown, Wisconsin
Died: March 14, 1896                Williams, Iowa     Age  47
Parents: Unknown

Married: Unknown

Buried: Williams Cemetery, west of Williams, Iowa.
Vollenweider family plot near the northwest corner,
about twenty yards north of a large evergreen tree.
This also contains the remains of two infant children
of James and Emma Caudle (daughter).

Editor’s Note: In August of 1969, Uncle Willard, my grandfather’s brother-in-law, died unexpectedly. He was buried in the lower section of the Williams Cemetery. During the service, my Grandma Lou told me that if I followed the third line of gravestones from the road up the hill, I would come upon the Vollenweider plot (her grandparents). Being twelve years old, the chance to sneak away and do some exploring sounded exciting and I quickly scampered off. Five minutes later I came upon the handsome obelisk, then went back to report my triumph. Thanks to this little adventure, I have never forgotten its location.
___________________________________________________

John Vollenweider was born in the picturesque town of Aarburg, Switzerland. The records there show his date of birth as November 3, 1842 and that he was baptized on November 20. His tombstone in the U.S., however, lists October 22 as his birth date. This is probably be due to the difference between the Gregorian (or modern) calendar versus the Julian. At the time of John’s birth, they would have been twelve days apart, with the Julian lagging.

John came to American as a young boy and settled in Georgetown, Wisconsin where he met and eventually married Eliza. In 1875, the couple and their two daughters moved to Williams, Iowa where John used his cabinet making skills to open up the town’s first furniture store. The family lived upstairs on the second floor. The store burned down in the disastrous Williams fire of 1882 in which everyone had to flee in their nightclothes. The building was uninsured, resulting in a loss of $1,400. After that, the family moved out to a farm. While in Iowa, three more children came along.

Although he was a creative individual, as left-handed people sometimes are, John was not very industrious. Eliza did almost all the work from keeping house to raising a garden. Soon after she died in 1896, John and the two boys moved down to a ranch in Texas. One of their diversions was hunting deer at night. John also owned (and could play) a rare Stradivarius violin, which lamentably was lost to history. A somewhat eclectic mix of hobbies.

John later returned to Iowa, passing away in June of 1917. There is some confusion surrounding this date as well: the tombstone says June 15, but John’s granddaughter Lucille Caudle (Wilson) distinctly remembered him dying on her ninth birthday, which was a day earlier. It may be that both dates on John Vollenweider’s gravestone are incorrect.

Children of John & Eliza Vollenweider

Edna Vollenweider – Housewife
Born: UnknownDied: Unknown

Emma Lulu Vollenweider (Caudle) – Housewife
Born: April 5, 1873Died: November 22, 1950

William Vollenweider – Farmer
Born: Unknown Died: Unknown
William was the first baby born in the town of Williams, Iowa.

Ida Belle Vollenweider
Born: Unknown Died: August 12, 1878
Died as an infant.
Possibly buried in the family plot in the Williams Cemetary
as there is a very old, small, broken tombstone there.

Adolph Vollenweider – Farmer
Born: Unknown Died: Unknown

Personal Info________________________________________
Father: Abraham Reece Jr.
Born: 1782
Died: May 2, 1852          Booneville, North Carolina   Age 70
Parents: Unknown

Mother: Mary Owen
Born: January 22, 1786
Died: March 28, 1858     Age  72
Parents: Unknown

Married: 1826

Buried: Most likely somewhere near Yadkinville, North Carolina.
___________________________________________________

Abraham Reece was a rancher. Upon his death, he willed his family one feather bed, one cow and one bureau. Nothing is known about his wife Mary except that she and Abraham were opposed to their daughter Margaret marrying Abram Caudle due him being a decade younger. This displeasure did not stand in the way of love; the two were married nine months following Mary’s death.

Known Children of Abraham & Mary Reece

Margaret Reece (Caudle) – Housewife
Born: December 8, 1827Died: March 2, 1911

Personal Info________________________________________
Father: Jacob Abraham Caudle  “Abram”
Born: September 7, 1837     Boonesville, North Carolina
Died: November 15, 1899   Age  62
Parents: Unknown

Mother: Margaret Reece
Born: December 8, 1827     Boonesville, North Carolina
Died: March 2, 1911           Age  83
Parents: Abraham & Mary Reece

Married: December 21, 1858 for 30 years

Buried: Radcliffe Cemetery, Radcliffe, Iowa.
Go in through the main gate for about fifty yards and find
the Caudle plot for James (son) and Emma on the right.
Jacob and Margaret are buried next to them.
___________________________________________________

Abram Caudle was a solidly built man who had great faith in his own judgment. Weathering the disapproval of his future in-laws, he managed to court and wed Margaret despite the fact that she was ten years his senior.

Margaret was a very short, pretty, southern lady who was once voted the “Belle of Yadkin County” (North Carolina). A little over four feet tall, she also chewed tobacco, probably a habit she picked up from her rancher father.

The death of Margaret’s mother in the spring of 1858 may have helped clear the way for the marriage of the two as they exchanged vows later that same year. Abram then assumed ownership of the Reece Plantation (from his wife’s side of the family).

It was not the best time to be starting a family in the South. A little over two years after the couple had been declared man and wife, the state of North Carolina married itself to the Confederacy. Abram and his brothers ended up fighting for the South. One surrendered and was somehow shot later in the war while the other two deserted.

According to family legend, Abram and his brother Abner became horrified by the scenes of death around them and decided to return home. Hiding behind a barricade of dead men and mules, they stole away from the scene of the fighting and eventually made their way back to the plantation. There they dug a hole under the barn and had the children take the fresh dirt out to the field so no one would be aware of the hideaway, which was used for the rest of the war whenever unwanted company appeared. There also is a story of them breathing through reeds while hiding in a pond or river.

Raising a family in the South during the Civil War involved almost unendurable hardship. All the slaves save one had left the plantation while Margaret gave birth to two boys. She was sometimes forced to cook for “visiting” soldiers, first the Confederates, then the Union. If troops were know to be in the vicinity, some of the food would be hidden by bending a sapling over, tying a ham to the end, then releasing the tree.

After the war, two more boys and a girl were added to the family. Abram and Margaret then left the South, moving to Hardin County, Iowa in 1869. Then, in 1877, relocated one county over, to a farm some six miles northeast of the town of Ellsworth. Abram donated land for the Lincoln Church there of which he was a member. The farm ended up staying in the family for over a century. A grandson, Robert Caudle, at one time farmed land that had been owned by both his grandfathers: Abram, and John Vollenweider.

Abram died just before the turn of the 19th century, having been bothered for some time by a festering ulcer in his leg.

Margaret lived to an advanced age and her good looks never left her. She finally passed away due to cancer that had started in her mouth, probably a result of her tobacco chewing. Her granddaughter Lucille Caudle (Wilson) remembered seeing Margaret standing in front of a hall mirror trying to see how the cancer was spreading.

Editors’s Note: When my “Grandma Lu” shared the above memory with me back in 1984, she was talking about a woman who had been born when John Quincy Adams was president.

Ironically, although the family survived the Civil War unscathed, two of the sons later died violent deaths as noted below.

Children of Jacob & Margaret Caudle

Abraham Reece Caudle – Minister
Born: October 20, 1859 Died: Unknown
"Reece" moved to Nebraska and married a divorced woman. 
He and his wife were later murdered by the woman’s son
from her first marriage. 

Sara J. Caudle
Born: December 20, 1860Died: December 21, 1861

Aaron Caudle – Farmer
Born: March 14, 1862Died: April 10, 1910
Aaron suffered through what we would now call a mid-life 
crisis. After becoming increasingly depressed, he finally 
shot himself in the corncrib.
It is a known fact that the number of suicides increased 
during the "end of the world" stories that circulated prior 
to Earth’s encounter with the tail of Haley’s comet in May 
of 1910. It is interesting to speculate whether this was a
contributing factor.

John Henry Caudle – Farmer, Cattleman
Born: April 28, 1864Died: May 5, 1927
John was named after John Henry Hoodsbeth, the one Negro 
who stayed and helped the family during the Civil War.

James Jackson Caudle – Farmer
Born: April 17, 1868Died: August 18, 1940

Mary Cornelia Caudle (Foster) – Housewife
Born: February 28, 1871Died: March 19, 1939

William Caudle – Farmer
Born: February 4, 1872Died: January 5, 1948

Personal Info________________________________________
Father: James Jackson Caudle  “Jack”, “Jim”
Born: April 17, 1868      Near Yadkinville, North Carolina
Died: August 18, 1940   Webster City, Iowa   Age  72
Parents: Jacob & Margaret Caudle

Mother: Emma Lulu Vollenweider
Born: April 5, 1873             Georgetown, Wisconsin
Died: November 22, 1950   Goldfield, Iowa   Age  77
Parents: John G. & Eliza Vollenweider

Married: December 21, 1893 for 46 years

Buried: Radcliffe Cemetery, Radcliffe, Iowa.
Go in through the main gate for about fifty yards. The
Caudle plot will be on the right. Easy to see.
The parents of James Caudle are next to them.
___________________________________________________

Jim Caudle was a farmer and a cattleman. His handsome looks were enhanced by premature white hair. An energetic, rugged man, he would ride his horse long distances on purchasing trips. Amongst his neighbors, who called him Jack, he was regarded as somewhat of a cattle baron and eventually owned more than one thousand acres of land in Iowa and South Dakota.

Emma was a large, pleasant woman who was often sick due to a bad heart. Like most farmers’ wives in those days, she had to cook for a veritable army of children and hired hands, especially at harvest time. It was not a very comfortable life compared to today. The seed for the following spring was stored in an upstairs bedroom and it was a challenge keeping the mice away. The couple did not have a telephone until years later when they retired in town.

While courting Emma, Jim sometimes walked the few miles between their farms and on one occasion was attached by a pack of wild dogs. Had he not been carrying a walking stick to beat the animals off with, he would have been badly hurt. As it was, he escaped with jut a few bites and scratches although his clothes were torn.

Upon getting married, Jim bought the Vollenweider farm from Emma’s father and the two settled down to start a family. Sadly, none of the first three infants survived more than a couple of days. The couple’s fear of never having healthy children was finally dispelled with the arrival of James Wylie just before the turn of the century.

Life in the Caudle household could be both affectionate and chaotic. Jim would often bounce Emma, who weighed close to two hundred pounds, on one knee and his daughter Lucille on the other. The three boys were the usual rambunctious types, getting into mischief. What one brother could not think of to tease their sister Lucille with, another one would.

In 1927, in his late fifties, Jim came down with pneumonia that slowed him considerably and left him susceptible to colds. A few years after this he and Emma moved to Ellesworth, leaving the running of the farms to the sons. The oldest, known in the family as Wylie, tried to make a go of cattle farming on the South Dakota acreage for a few years, but ended up coming back to Iowa. A son-in-law, Glen Wilson, also worked a farm, which unfortunately led to some money disputes.

After attending a family reunion in the summer of 1940 (held at a place called Brigg’s Woods near Webster City), Jim came down with a cold that developed into pneumonia and passed away not long after that. His last words were “I think I ain’t gonna make it.” His daughter Lucille, who was in the room, then said the Lord’s Prayer next to his body.

Actually, Jim’s health had started to fail before the reunion. When the pictures were later developed, people were shocked at how frail he appeared. (Far left in below photo.)

Emma continued to live in town and tended a garden. She became a rather attractive woman in her later years, finally suffering a stroke and dying in a nursing home the day before Thanksgiving, 1950.

The four children who died in infancy are all buried in the Williams Cemetery. Two are on the Vollenweider lot, and the other two are nearby in the front row by the road.

Children of James & Emma Caudle

Margaret Caudle
Born/Died: March 1, 1895
Strangled on the umbilical cord during birth. 

Infant Son
Born/Died: August 23, 1896 — Stillborn.

Note: Margaret and the son are buried in the Vollenweider plot
in the Williams Cemetary, Williams, Iowa.

Edna Grace Caudle
Born: January 18, 1898Died: January 20, 1898

James Wylie Caudle – Farmer, Salesman
Born: October 2, 1899Died: April 17, 1961
Wylie liked to boast that he was going to live to see three 
centuries, but only made it to two. He died at the age of 61
of a heart attack.

Ida Eliza Caudle
Born: November 12, 1902Died: January 30, 1903
Crib death.

Note: Edna and Ida Eliza are buried in the front row near the
northwest corner of the Williams Cemetary.

William Frederick Caudle "Fred" – Farmer
Born: October 28, 1905Died: 1967
Fred was a good businessman. He also died when he was 61,
from cancer. On his deathbed, his sister Emma asked if 
there was anything she could do. 
Fred replied, "Sis, there's nothing you or anyone can do."

Emma Lucille Caudle (Wilson) – Housewife
Born: June 14, 1908Died: March 30, 1987

Robert Lee Caudle – Farmer
Born: May 16, 1911Died: January 19, 1992
"Uncle Bob" married Ruby Wilson, making his and sister
Lucille’s children double cousins.