The Advance July 15, 1913: Seldom have the people of Monticello received a greater shock than when the news was flashed over the wires Thursday morning of the sudden death of Mrs. Chas. T. Duke at the Usona Hotel in St. Louis about 4 o'clock that morning. Mrs. Duke accompanied by her youngest daughter, Miss Katherine, had been in St. Louis for several weeks where she was taking a treatment from a Mrs. Taylor, a Christian Science practitioner, for some slight ailment. She was getting along nicely and although she was complaining some on the day of her death and had suffered from a severe headache, her condition was not such as to cause uneasiness. On the night of her death she retired late. Shortly afterward, her daughter, who was occupying an adjoining apartment not receiving a response to a call, entered the room and found her dangerously sick. Help was immediately summoned but death ensued in a few hours. Immediately on receiving the news by telegraph, Col. Duke and daughters, Misses Elizabeth and Marguerite, left by automobile for Tillar to catch the northbound Valley train. The body was brought to Monticello on the 5 o'clock train Saturday evening and interred at Oakland Cemetery Sabbath afternoon in the presence of a large concourse of sorrowing friends. Funeral services were held at the family residence at 5:30 o'clock. Mrs. Duke was a daughter of Col. and Mrs. W. F. Slemons. She was about 45 years of age. She was reared in Monticello and her entire life was lived in this city with the exception of a number of years when the family resided at Baxter where Mr. Duke's Mercantile and plantation interests are located. Assisted by her daughters, Mrs. Duke entertained much company at the commodious family residence in this city. She was an active member of the Daughters of the Confederacy and was keenly interested in many other public matters. Kindly and sympathetic, a cultured lady and gracious hostess and a woman of marked intellectual powers she was deservedly loved and popular and she leaves a host of friends behind, many of them lifelong friends, in Monticello and elsewhere in the state to mourn her untimely death. In addition to her husband and three daughters, she is survived in her immediate family by her aged father and mother, Col. and Mrs. W. F. Slemons, two brothers, H. T. Slemons of Monticello and Wirt A. Slemons of Louisiana, and one sister, Miss Freda Slemons of New York. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Get personalized email addresses from Yahoo! Mail - only $35 a year! http://personal.mail.yahoo.com/

There is an article in one of the old Historical Journals about this family. It was year before last if I remember correctly. BETH