Julie's Mecklenburg, Virginia Discoveries

Henry Clay Kidd was a wounded WWI veteran. He stayed awhile in a European hospital recovering. Henry was gassed badly during the war. It affected his lungs and skin for the rest of his life. He returned to the United States Apr 1919.

I met Elva Kidd White two months ago (Mar 2020). She showed me this picture (above) of her father. I asked Elva what she did as a teenager for dating or courting. She answered me, “Nothing! My father said I wasn’t allowed to date!” She did not date until after she left home and moved to Richmond. Elva knew Warren White when she was younger. They wrote eachother letters during WWII. I asked Elva how her parents met. She said she didn’t know, that wasn’t the type of question they could really ask. Adults found it intrusive or too personal. This is Elva’s parents: Henry Clay Kidd and Susie Littleton Seymour’s wedding picture. They married 1 Mar 1923, in Brodnax. (Brodnax is a town partly in Mecklenburg County, partly in Brunswick County)

Henry Kidd owned a store in South Hill. At first, Henry’s family lived in town; then they moved to the country to have a farm. Their farm supplied the store with produce, milk etc… Elva told me she never felt hungry. They were always well fed and did well financially during the Depression. Her father tried to help people with jobs, and tried to be a good and fair employer. On Sundays, Henry’s family went to church, then visited with his wife’s family in Brodnax. They had a car, electricity, and a phone at home and also at the store long before more rural parts of Mecklenburg had these luxuries. Elva wrote in her family history memoirs book, “Even during the Depression, I always had plenty of food and the clothing I needed. My father didn’t even finish the grammar grades, but had beautiful handwriting, was a hard worker, and provided for his family. He worked on Saturday nights until midnight, but never worked on Sundays. He started with asthma when he was in his early 40’s: A result of the mustard gas and trench warfare of WWI”

Above is the ship manifest showing Henry coming home to his father Charles Kidd, in Bracey, VA. Charles would have been married to Lucy Burton then, (1919) living on highway 903 in Bracey. Henry Kidd was the sister of Nancy Kidd. Two of Nancy’s sons (Charles and Aubrey Tudor) have been the last two veteran spotlights on this website. Here is a chart showing Henry’s branch of the family. This download is a PDF size 8.5×11.

I’m very thankful to Elva’s sons, Brent and Randall White, for helping me meet Elva and get copies of these pictures. The White family has done an amazing, truly impressive job, preserving older pictures and stories!