The family history of the Butler family would not be complete without the many mothers and grandmothers that have gone before us. I'm afraid I have been remiss in writing about the many Butler women who helped shape hearth and home over the generations.
Just becoming a mother has always been the nearest to death that many women would come and many did die in childbirth from complications. Many Butler men have more that one set of children because of the death of their first wife and subsequent remarriage. The onset of widowhood would plunge most of our grandmothers in days past into poverty. The children would be considered orphans even if only one parent died. These children were asked to grow up and take adult responsibilities to help the remaining parent. This was a matter of life and death in many cases. The winter food supply being dependant on the harvest of gardens grown by the remaining parent and children.
The civil war was perhaps the most devistating occurence in American history that tested the will to survive of those left after the shooting had stopped. In all my research I have yet to find a single branch of our Butler family that did not suffer the loss of someone through either injury or disease from that terrible conflict.
Martha Garner Butler
Thank you to all the Butler mothers past and present. We appreciate your courage, sacrifice, and love.
Mary Whitley Butler
Lydia Braswell Butler
Georgia Butler
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