Martha Ann Leith Mitchell (1908 – 2003)

Martha Ann Leith was born at the family home called Meadow Field in Loudoun County, VA. She attended public school at Mountville through 6th grade. She attended 7, 8, 9, 10^th grades in public schools in Morgantown, WVA while living with her brother Theodoric (Toots) and his wife, Henrietta. We believe she didn’t finish high school. She married Turner J. Ross in 1928. They lived at the Trappe near Upperville until, after just 2 ½ months of marriage, Turner died of an accidental death. Ann returned to Sunnyside, the family home near Mountville, to live with her family for the next eight years before she married Morris. A few years after her marriage to Morris, she settled into motherhood raising her four children. She was an active member of the Lyon Park Woman’s Club. Once the children were in school, she worked in the cafeteria at Fillmore, later Long Branch, School. After Morris’ death she stayed active, volunteering as a docent at Robert E Lee’s home, delivering Meals on Wheels, crocheting afghan blankets for her family, participating in a craft group, gardening and volunteering at church.

One incident of Ann’s childhood stands out. In a conversation with her son David in 1998 she shared this:

Mom suggested that she “had a plain old childhood” , but described being shot when she was around 10. It seems that she and her brothers, Joe and Julien were playing outside at their home at what must have been the Meadows Field. She said “A rabbit ran into the old stone fence. We’d try to shoot the nose or head so there wouldn’t be shot in the rest of the meat. Julien was about 13.” Mom went on to say that Joe set the shotgun down so he could hold or pull the rabbit out and Julien picked up the gun. Joe was going to hold the rabbit, and Julien was going to shoot it.

But the shot missed and Anne was hit in the back of her leg. “It just missed an artery” she said. The family rushed Annie to the closest “doctor” who couldn’t do anything for her. They transported her in the bed of a pickup truck lying flat on her stomach. Trying to catch a train to Washington, they first went to the Plains and then to Leesburg. The missed both trains. So Ann rode in the back of the truck into Washington. Her brother Walter rode in the bed of the truck with her. Dr. Gelter rode in the front seat.

Arriving at the Emergency hospital in Washington a Doctor Mankin first met them. “We can’t do anything for her.” “Oh yes you can” said Walter. Hospital staff tried to keep her comfortable until Dr. Neal , from home came , treated her and no doubt saved her life. Mom remembers that he called her “Little Arthur” because she looked like her father, and that he would pick her up by her bathrobe to move her.

She had to sleep on her stomach for a week with her leg up, knee bent. She recovered after a long stay. When she was in the hospital at the end of her life, the Nursing staff and Doctors wondered about the steel shot still in the back of her leg.

Mom was in the hospital for 2 months. After the first weeks she had more mobility. Put in the “ladies ward”, she was appreciated by the staff, apparently, being tasked as the “watchguard” for the nurses dancing in the “black ward”. This was the time of the great Flu Epidemic of 1919, as well as the WWI Armistice. Flu victims were put on the porch for the fresh air. Mom described seeing the patients being wheeled back from the porch with the sheet over their head. She also recalled siting on the porch watching the planes fly over dropping leaflets announcing the Armistice.

Click on any of the images below to enlarge then.