Doris Grayson Baker

White female, born 23 August 1898 in Linden, Marengo Co., Alabama.

She first appears in my research as the mother of a child stillborn on 8 September 1928 in Pensacola, FL. The father was listed as Charles Baker. I use the last name “Baker” for Doris as that was the name given on her death certificate. Whether she was actually married to Charles Baker is a matter of uncertainty.

Doris was enumerated in the 1900 federal census in Linden, Alabama, in the household of her father, Thomas W. Grayson. He was 54 years old and a farmer at the time, born in Alabama. His wife was Julia S. Grayson, 39 years old. Doris was 1 year old, and lived with siblings Lizzie (10), Gertrude (7), Walter J. (5), and Norman L. (4).

In the 1910 census, the family was still in Linden. Thomas was 63 and was listed as the County Tax Assessor. His wife was Lena M., age 33. Doris was the youngest, 11 years old. Lizzie B., 19, was working as a stenographer. Gertrude was 17; Norman (spelled Narbonne) was 15; Walter was 13. Also in the household was Lena’s sister, Ethel Gregory, 19 years old. She worked as a saleswoman in retail drugs.

In the 1920 census, Doris was living in Mobile, Alabama, in the household of her sister, Gertrude Summersell, and Gertrude’s husband, George D. No occupation is listed. A Doris Grayson is listed in the Mobile City Directory as boarding at 508 1/2 Conti St. for the year 1920. This is not the address of the Summersells that year so it is uncertain whether it is the same Doris Grayson. According to the Linden Democrat-Reporter, Doris lived with her sister off and on for months at a time after she reached the age of about 20.

The Linden newspaper, along with the papers in Selma and Demopolis, mentioned Doris beginning in her childhood. She appeared to be very much in the middle of Linden society life, with her school years, participation in church, social occasions, and comings and goings out of town regularly documented in the society columns. On 5 January 1928, The Democrat-Reporter in Linden covered a bridal shower she and her sister gave for her friend, Ruth Phares. This shower was covered in The Times-Journal in Selma, AL and The Demopolis Times in Demopolis, AL. Doris was a bridesmaid for Ruth’s wedding. The Times-Journal also covered a meeting of the local chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy held at Doris’ sister’s home on 22 January 1928. Doris served as Secretary of the chapter. She was also a member of the Philathea Sunday School class at Linden M.E. Church.

It was quite a shock to the community, then, when Doris died three days after giving birth to her stillborn daughter. She died 11 September 1928 at Pensacola Hospital, of an “embolism following spontaneous delivery of premature infant.” Her death certificate listed her residence as the Volunteers of America home at 800 E. La Rua St. in Pensacola, and that she had been in the city 6 days before her death. It also indicated that she was married.

The obituaries in Linden, Selma, and Demopolis described Doris’ death as sudden. Only the Selma Times-Journal mentioned a cause of death, reporting that she “died of an attack of acute indigestion, according to telegrams received here by her father, Tom Grayson.” Her brother-in-law, W.H. Whitlow, was dispatched to Pensacola to accompany the body home. (He is incorrectly listed as her father on her death certificate.) The Demopolis Times noted that “Friends and relatives were stunned by the news as Miss Grayson was expected to arrive here in a few days.” Research has not yet uncovered when she left and where she was to have gone before her death.

Doris’ funeral was covered on the front page of The Demopolis Times. The officiant was Rev. J.C. Phares, the father of the same Ruth for whom Doris had served as a bridesmaid earlier that same year. She was buried at the Linden Cemetery.

Research on Charles Baker, the father of the child and Doris’ purported husband, is ongoing. There were several Charles Bakers in the area and there is no information from the death certificates to identify him more specifically. It would also be useful to know if Charles and Doris secretly married at some point, or if Doris lied about being married to avoid aspersion from the Volunteers of America, a Christian organization. Neither her nor her child’s death certificate indicates whether Charles was present, but if he had been, it is surprising that he was not the informant on Doris’ death certificate rather than the VoA. Whatever Doris’ marital status, she was a woman of deep secrets and sorrows beneath her society facade.

FAMILY:

Mother: Julia S. Grayson

Father: Thomas W. Grayson

Child: Unnamed daughter

SOURCES:

Florida Certificate of Death, Florida Deaths, 1877-1939. Database. FamilySearch. http://FamilySearch.org : 14 June 2016. Index based upon data collected by the Genealogical Society of Utah, Salt Lake City.