The final resting place of Benjamin Jones at Oakwood Cemetery in Martinsville. 

Two hundred years ago, a man called Benjamin “Poplar Foot” Jones lived on land that is now within the City of Martinsville. He was born in 1752 and grew up around Culpeper County, Virginia. Not much is known of his early life, but local legend says he grew to an impressive height as he matured, allegedly far surpassing six feet tall. His large shoe size earned him the nickname “Poplar Foot,” probably in reference to the extensive root systems of poplar trees, which are known to spread out about three times the height of the tree. 

When the Revolutionary War erupted, Jones was in his early twenties and heard the call to action. He enlisted on 13 July 1776, nearly a year after the first Culpeper Minutemen were raised by Gov. Patrick Henry and met in Williamsburg. Jones served (according to his tombstone) with the 3rd Virginia Regiment. During his service he also trained as a surgeon’s assistant which provided him many opportunities to learn the complexities of medicine and prove himself as a capable physician. Around the same time Jones met his life partner Miss Elizabeth Reamey. She was a great-granddaughter of a couple of French Huguenots named Abram de Rémi and former Miss Mary Dupuy from the Manakin Town settlement in Powhatan County. It is thought that Elizabeth’s father, Col. Daniel Thomas de Rémi (or Reamey), took part in the French & Indian War as well as the American Revolution. 

After the war, Jones raised a large family and took an interest in property further south near the Dan River. In 1790 he purchased 550 acres of land on both sides of Little Beaver Creek in Henry County. The creek was renamed Jones Creek in his honor. Jones was hired by George Hairston to operate the Troublesome Ironworks in Rockingham County, North Carolina. At least two separate contemporary journals detail Jones as manager, including George Washington when he breakfasted there during his Southern Tour. In addition, South Carolina politician William Loughton Smith visited in 1791and wrote that he “arrived at the iron works about three o’clock.” He continued to describe the scene. “My landlord, Jones, superintends them…They are situated at the head of a creek called ‘Great Troublesome,’ in a hollow surrounded by high hills covered with wood.” He remarked that “the ore is none of the best, and the furniture is not yet in order; they make less iron here than there is a demand for…my conductor supposes there is silver in the ore,” he added.

After two years at the ironworks, the Jones family moved back to Henry County. Upon the birth of another son in 1792, they named him George Washington Jones in honor of their recent experience meeting the president. In all, Benjamin and Elizabeth Jones raised about eight children as follows: Thomas, Sanford, Gabriel, Bartlett, George, Benjamin, Permelia, and Elizabeth Jones. Three of the sons received an education from Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, PA. It was likely through a connection at the ironworks Sanford met his wife Mary Hodges, a relative of the two brothers (Constantine and Peter Perkins) who purchased Troublesome Ironworks in the early 1780s. 

Old “Poplar Foot” lived to the advanced age of ninety-one years and died on 22 August 1843. His estate inventory shows that he was a well-read man in possession of silverware, tea sets, glassware, also equipment for leatherworking, flax processing, weaving, blacksmithing, and horse riding. Among his belongings were four ovens, three plows, twenty-four hogs, about ten cows, six sheep, and three horses. His barns stored about a hundred barrels of corn and three thousand pounds of tobacco. The inventory also listed fifteen enslaved people by their first names and a monetary value assigned to them. As a widow, Elizabeth moved in with her son Gabriel and lived to be one hundred years old. She is buried next to her husband in Martinsville’s Oakwood Cemetery. One notable descendant of Benjamin and Elizbeth Jones was their grandson Decatur Jones who purchased the Bachelor’s Hall plantation near Danville. They are also ancestors to the writer, being his 7th great-grandparents. 

Final resting place of Elizabeth Reamey Jones at Oakwood Cemetery in Martinsville. 

Recommended Reading: A History of Henry County, Virginia by Judith P. A. Hill (1925).
It features brief biographical entries of prominent county residents including Benjamin Jones.