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She had 3 sets of twins!
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From "On the Hills of Home" by Cal Sharpe (1972):
Pages 27 & 28
"In 1858 Aunt Eliza was born to be included among this family of Daniel Sharp's eighteen children. She was thought to be number 17, and in 1878 she was married to Adiel Davis at his home near Chapel Hill, when log cabins were still in style. Several of her older children were born there, numbering 17, only one short of her father's record.
Aunt Eliza and her husband moved to Texas, thinking the climate would be better for Uncle Ade's (Addie) health, as he suffered with catarrh. Then, too, Uncle Jack and Aunt Vic lived there, and wanted them to come and live near them. Aunt Eliza died at the age of 39 when her second set of twins were born, and was buried at Cumby, Texas. All of her children except Alma returned to Alabama to live. Six of her children are living today. They are: Henry, Cecil and Lottie, who live in Birmingham, Alabama; Sherwood in Vicksburg, Mississippi; Effie in Winter Haven, Florida; and Bess in Miami, Florida. Aunt Eliza had 16 grandchildren, all of them girls. Her descendants, many who are living today, are examples of her noble character. She was a beautiful girl with a lovely complexion and beautiful hair."
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Eliza Adeline Sharp Davis
THE ITINERANT DAVISES
Eliza Sharp and A. S. Davis
As told by Alma Davis Low to Margaret Low Ridley
"Mama and Papa were married on January 2, 1878 (in a log cabin, I think), in Chambers County, Alabama, near LaFayette. I was born February 6, 1879 in Chambers County. Wilfred was also born there.
When I was nearly three, Papa decided to move to Texas in Robertson County near Calvert. One of Mania's older brothers, Jack, lived there, and one of her older sisters, Victoria, also lived there. She was single and later married a widower, Hugh Griffin, with two children. Dan was one of the children of Victoria and Hugh. Papa bought a place and we moved out there, but lived there only two years.
In Robertson County, Winfred and Clara were born.
Mama had an older brother, Frank Sharp, who lived in Kansas (Longton on the Elk River, in the southeast part of Kansas). There were four children when we decided to move to Kansas, and after we got there Papa bought a place, and we set up housekeeping in a log cabin. We lived four years in Kansas, and Henry and Effie were born there.
Wilfred and I started to school at the age of six or seven. It seemed like we walked two miles to school. We had to cross the Elk River on a fool log. The school house was built of rock, and a big boy who lived on the road going to school threatened to cut off our ears.
Papa made wonderful crops, and the tallest corn I ever saw, making 90 bushels on an acre. He would hill up turnips and apples for the winter, and they would keep fresh. We lived close to the river, and the land we worked was between our house and the river. Once it came a rainy spell and the river overflowed, causing the water to get in our kitchen about a foot deep. This happened at night, and Papa loaded us into the wagon and took us up in the hills to where the bachelor lived that Papa bought the farm from. While we lived there, one of Mama's sisters, Aunt Lou, with her husband, Uncle George Yates and two children, moved there from Alabama.
The winters were severe there and Papa had catarrh. He decided he needed a milder climate, and so we moved back to Texas.
In the meantime, Uncle Marcellus Sharp, a younger brother of Mama's, came from Alabama and located close to Uncle Frank Sharp at Busby, Texas. Uncle Marcellus worked for a man who lived in a brick house, fell in love with his daughter, Florence, and married her. Grandfather Daniel Sharp had 12 boys and 6 girls, all children of the same parents.
Then we moved to Hill County, not knowing a living soul there. We chartered a railroad car for our household goods and livestock. Papa put Mama and us four children on a passenger car, and we came right through to Morgan. There we went to a hotel and stayed nearly a week waiting for Papa to get there. We had a barrel of apples and one of turnips, and a container of vinegar which was made from apples grown on our farm. When he got there, he had to get out and find a place to live, as we knew no one. He found a man about a mile from town, who wanted to move into town, so we rented that place and lived there one year. Lottie was born there. I missed one year in school when we lived at Morgan when I was nine years old. From there we moved over about 15 miles in Hill County into a log house, until Papa could build us a new three room house. During the year we lived there, Ethel and Everett were born. Then we decided to move to Grayson County about 175 miles away. This time we moved in a covered wagon with all of our household goods, I think we had a cow tied to the back of the wagon. Along the way we camped several nights, and the night we spent in the Baszos River bottoms, it sleeted on us. Fay was born in Grayson County. Papa had two families of cousins who lived there. We went to Cousin Rill as family when we got to Grayson County, and Papa rented a farm and set up housekeeping there. After one year we moved to Hopkins County, where the Bentons and Hullings lived, having moved there from Georgia or Alabama. Papa put Mama and me, and the four children who couldn't walk (Lottie, Ethel, Everett and Fay), on the train, and he came through with the other children (Wilfred, Winfred, Clara, Henry and Effie) in a covered wagon. We lived 4 miles south of Cumby for five years. Bess, Ruby, Cecil and his twin brother, a baby girl who lived eight days, and another set of twins were born there. Mama died when the last set of twins were born. They lived only about a month after Mama died. We were living a mile south of Cumby. I lived at home for one year after Mama died. I told him if he wouldn't marry, I would stay with him as long as he needed me. But Papa wrote Aunt Mattic to find him a wife in Alabama, and she recommended Miss Lena Edwards. They exchanged pictures, and he went back there, where they were married just eight months after Mama died. We children were upset because he married so soon. He demanded that we call her Mother, but we called her "Miss Lena." Papa was the head of the house, and there never was any question about who "ruled the roost." He was strict with us, but he wanted us to have an education, and there were plenty of magazines and books around. Nearly all of the children went either to college or business school.
When we moved to a new place, we always went to Sunday School. If there was not one there. Papa would organize one. We used Sunday School materials from David C. Cook Co."
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