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Note: N198 Source Unknown
A FINE OBITUARY
Fulsome and eulogistic obituaries were generally accorded the dead during the middle years of the nineteenth century. Indeed, this practice lasted well into the twentieth century, so it is interesting as well as unusual to find an obituary handled with restraint and truthfulness in the year 1861. Below is an account of the death of Dr. Fontaine Meriwether, which occurred April 30, 1861, at Eolia, Missouri. The account was written by an Episcopal rector, W. N. Irish. It speaks well for the firmness of Doctor Meriwether and for the forthrightness of the rector. "May the souls of the faithful departed rest in peace"!
Died, at his late residence, near Prairieville, Pike Co., Missouri, April 30, 1861, Fontaine Meriwether, M. D., aged about 70 years, formerly of Albemarle Co., Va.
After many years of suffering and infirmity this venerable physician has been removed from this world of sin and sorrow, to another and a better one. His death was immediately due to a severe accident which happened to him some four months since. His long confinement, aggravated other diseases which he had endured with fortitude for a long time.
The parish at Prairieville has been some time vacant, but as I once had charge of the same, and living but a short distance from it since I resigned, it has been my privilege to give services as I was able. When I first entered on my duties in that parish the spiritual condition of Dr. Meriwether engaged my earnest attention. He was not a professor of religion and I was fearful that as he had lived, so would he die, resting his hopes of salvation upon a mere morality. As a man he was all that could be desired; amiable, moral, of an earnest and affectionate disposition, and he freely gave the benefit of his medical knowledge and experience, which were great, to those who were unable to remunerate him. Until the infirmities of old age prevented him, his skill as a physician placed him in the front of his profession and for miles around the people sought his counsel.
While rector at Prairieville I had many solemn conversations with Dr. Meriwether with regard to his soul's eternal interests, and one each occasion left him, with a load upon my heart, saddened with the thought that as far as he was concerned, I had labored in vain. These conversations gave him confidence in me, and I was urged by him to make him one more visit during a severe illness some fourteen months since, and even then I was not able to clear his mind, although he was greatly exercised by serious convictions. Recently, however, several persons in that neighborhood, under my past ministry, desiring Baptism and the Lord's Supper; while doing that I was able to see him once more, when I found to my joy that the Spirit of God had done a good work with him. He was "humble as a little child." His proud heart was subdued by the grace of God. With "due care" I found him sufficiently instructed in the principles of the Christian religion, and after, as I truly believe, he placed his hope on Christ. I administered to him, with others, the Holy Communion.
I have written the above that not only his large circle of friends in VIrginia and Missouri may be comforted wit the thought that he died an humble Christian, but that the ministers of Christ may persevere in their work, although to their own view, in many cases, they seem to labor in vain.
W. N. I.
I cannot resist using an inscription that appeared on a tombstone in Elmwood Cemetery:
"He awaits the resurrection of the just,
While we sorrow in hope."
N. H. M.
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Note: N199 Richmond Dispatch (Richmond, Virginia), 25 May 1861, Saturday
DIED
Dr. FONTAINE MERIWETHER, at his residence, in Pike county, Missouri, formerly of Virginia, on the 30th April, 1861.
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