Leah holding baby Ray
Ray on the rocking horse.
Toddler Ray
Leah, Ray, Aunt Jane
note: Leah & Jane are sisters and their husbands Richard & Earl are brothers!
Richard Thomas Barnes holding Lynn A Barnes; Richard Ray Barnes standing at his mother's knee
Baby Lynn A Barnes & big brother Richard "Ray" Barnes
Leah with her two sons Lynn & Ray
Ray growing bigger!
Ray Barnes (left) with his friend, son of Ruby Westerman Griffith
Richard Ray Barnes (left) Lynn A Barnes (right)
Richard Ray Barnes 1916 - 1921
One day about a month after Father's death, we were sitting on the porch and were talking of members of the family who had come from other places to the funteral. He told me how some of the cousins had quarreled and asked me what caused the contention between them, then added, "Mama, I just love everybody." Later as we were still sitting on the porch, he said, "I dreamed last night that Grandpa was alive; he came and stoody by my bed." Then, "Mama, Grandpa died, why can't I die?" Eagerly then I replied, "Why Ray, you don't want to die, do you?" To which he replied very casually, "Oh, no, I guess not," and I asked, "What do you want to live for?" The reply came sweetly from the child's lips, "Oh, to drink water, and oh, to do a lot of things." I crushed him to my mother heart, and with a tender caress, the same heavenly calm that I knew when he was first given into my care filled my very soul and being. How sweet and true are the loved words of our Savior, "And a little child shall lead them."
The following days were filled with the same peaceful tranquility, and as I think now of the calmness, I am reminded of times during my childhood in Nebraska, when an awful stillness and suffocating silence would fill the atmosphere, as cyclonic clouds were forming in the sky, and we all knew that a time of great danger was approaching.
On the morning of July 16, I went about the household duties with an indescribable joy ringing in my heart. I felt that all was well and that the blessings of Heaven were being poured out upon me. I had scrubbed the large and beautiful white pine floors of our home with water that had been softened and cleansed with wood ashes, as was the usual custom because of lack of soap. I remember thinking, "Why do I need soap when the lye water makes the wood so much whiter?"
The field below the house had just been irrigated, and when I suggested to Ray that he and Lynn, who was then past three, be careful of the footmarks, Ray replied, "Do you think I would track mud on your pretty floor?"
It was a sultry, hot day, and all through the day I had worried about the cow and horse that were tied to a wagon near the house, with no shade of any kind. As the day wore on I became obsessed with the impulse to get the poor animals to water, as they were without feed and had been in the hot sun all day. The first impression was to leave all of the children in the house, then straightway came the thought. Should I leave the boys in the house with Ila who was then thirteen months old, there was danger that she might get hurt in their play. I remember of a mental vision of their climbing up on to a "milk safe" and causing it to tip over on her. She was not yet in the climbing stage so I felt that she was safe in the house alone.
"Turning the cow loose, I drove her and led the horse down an incline and around the brow of the rocky hill. All the way Ray coaxed me to let him lead the horse and I said, "No, dear, you might stumble and fall and the horse would step on you." It seemed to me that all the while some one was directing my actions and words. From the time we left the house I was obsessed with an unknown fear. Not knowing why because it was a work horse and it wasn't unusual for me to handle the animals. Lynn followed some distance behind us. When we reached the ditch of water neither of the animals seemed to even see the cool water, the horse just standing there, and the cow making a quick run for the alfalfa that had just been watered. Her hunger seemed greater than her thirst and it was then that I let Ray take the rope in my effort to get the cow back as I knew that it might take only a few mouthfuls of the wet alfalfa to bloat and kill her. As I turned the cow back, my thoughts became frantic with fear and just then the horse started with one awful lunge. Ray had evidently put the rope around his waist and the scene that followed was perhaps one of the most tragic that any mother has been called upon to witness. Satan may have had his part in the accident, but God, I am sure, preserved the child's body by turning the horse back from the rocky hill as he circled the field three times.
It was not until a loved neighbor by the name of Jack Allison heard my cries to the Lord for help and joined his prayer with mine, that the horse stopped. As he did, he appeared as a monstrous beast, head high in the air, nostrils distended and all four limbs resembling an iron statue. He stood in this position with no one holding him until the child's body was released, then with drooping head he walked slowly away.
No sign of life was apparent until we worked with the child, but his breathing did return until after the doctor and his father came. His final passing was peaceful and quiet.
One never knows just how we live through such a tragic experience. We are sustained I am sure by a power greater than our own, then too, I suppose that when one is suffering from shock, that there is little reaction from the natural emotions. My eyes were tearless and I was conscious of no physical pain. I was thinking mostly of Dick's Mother having just suffered a bereavement and knowing how great our loss would be to her also. My husband has said that for months, even years after, he always knew when I had dropped off to sleep because of the pent-up emotions that gave way to sobbing in my sleep. Throughout the forty-one years since this accident, the awful experience has hovered over my life like a dark and fearful cloud. In this I have perhaps shown weakness, as it was only through this great sorrow that I was given the spiritual blessings that came to me, and by which the power of the Priesthood and God's care for his children was made manisfest.
We had accepted the hospitality of the Allisons at whose home we had been since the accident as this was before the time of the usual present service of the Mortician at the Mortuary.
On the second morning after Ray's death, we were at the breakfast table when Dick began relating something that happened during the night. We and my sister Ana were resting in Mrs. Allison's room which was off the parlor where Ray's body was lying. He said that he woke up about twelve o'clock and thought that Mrs. Allison or someone was in the room, then he decided that the clothes closet door was open and that he could see the clothing in the closet. He then got up, but the closet door was closed and by that time he could see no one but he was sure that he had seen a personage of some kind. When he went out into the kitchen, Mrs. Allison, Mrs. Bunnel and Pearl Street were all sitting there. I began crying and told of an incident that I had experienced just hours after he had been awakened. Dick had come back to the room and we were all resting, when I too, was awakened, and became aware of a personage standing in the center of the room. Dick and my sister were both asleep. I was positive that there was someone there and that she had the build of a large short figure. I could see no features as there was a sheer, filmy veil of light violet cast entirely enshrouding her person. I was not frightened or surprised and did not feel any unusal emtion, only a calm, peaceful reassurance that my Mother was there, and as she vanished from my view, I saw the shape of her arm pass over my body and up over my head as it too, disappeared. To me it was a wave of comfort, and the reason for the veil which was drawn around her was to let me know that she was waiting for the glorious opportunity of accepting the loved grandchild that she had nver know in her earthly life.
From the Personal History of Ada Leah Van Horn Barnes Rindlisbach.
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