Susan Elizabeth Ellison is the daughter of Rev. Robert Dunlap Ellison, a lawyer as well as a preacher. Her mother’s name was Mary Butler Cato, both of them Citizens of Fairfield district South Carolina. Susan Elizabeth was their first born which took place at her Fathers, William Cato, February 10th A.D. 1831 26 minutes after 4 o’clock a.m. and baptized 3rd day of April Easter Sunday by Rev. Wm Holmes at Monticello meeting. Mary Pearson officiating—$2.50

This daughter was not any kin to the writer of these sketches. He only married her mother, a widow, hence she is not [reckoned] in the catalogue of his children. Her father died when she was eight months old. Her grandfather had moved to Georgia and had returned to S.C. to move him to Georgia & when he arrived at his home found him sick. He died in a few days. He took the widow out to Talbot County Georgia. After myself and widow married at her brothers R.D. Cato, Troup County, the little girl had none but the widow and him, too poor to educate the Orphan.

I sent her to school at the Mount Horeb Methodist Episcopal Church South known now as Grantville on the west point R.R. to F.M. Meadow. She learned to spell some at that place. She joined the M.E.C.S. at a protracted meeting held there in 1839. Myself and Mother attended a camp meeting in Troup County at which place we met with Dr. W.H. Ellison, her uncle and her father’s brother—who proposed to carry her through the Wesleyan Female College gratis. So I made the necessary arrangements & carried her down to Macon—her uncle was President of the College.

She had not professed conversion when she went to College but done so in about 2 years. Dr. E. H. Myers reported her conversion to be as clear as noon day light. She was truly pious, devoting much of her time to the study of the Bible, carrying its principles and practical elements into all the various circumstances of life, diffusing in her walk that piety that [sustains] all the hopeful attributes of the natural mind. Weaving into her general deportment a holy zest that revealed to others—she looked not at the things that are earthly as a source of enjoyment but at things that were within the [vale] whither the Savior she loved had entered. She graduated with respectable honors giving satisfactory evidence of an accomplished mind of no ordinary ability.

Soon after these high attainments had been demonstrated her uncle Dr. Ellison sent her on a visit to her relatives in Charleston, and to Camden and Wynnesborough & thence to her uncle near McMeekin in Fairfield near or at the place of her brother. She become acquainted with her cousin Dr. Wm W. Holmes that made arrangements to marry. She came on to Macon, Georgia and was married at her uncle Dr. Ellison on the … . She and her husband Dr. Holmes moved to Rome, Georgia and he commenced the practice of Physic. He made a good living. She gave birth to two sons at home (not doublets) [who died].

Rev. William Holmes, the Drs. Father, moved out to Georgia from Fairfield S.C. and settled at Cave Spring. He had difficulties in his financial affairs and finally the old man failed. The Dr. Wm Holmes settled at Cave Spring with his father. He got a good practice and in the course of the year Susan gave birth to a daughter. It was soon discovered that the shock of another break in her history was more than she could bear—her condition was wrecked by the previous births. She sent for her mother who lived at least 50 miles distant. She came & remained with her for a few weeks & returned home expecting to visit her again. But sad to tell she failed, her [emaciated] constitution was compelled to the laws of depraved nature—the babe died. In her turn she followed it to the house of Silence to rest till Gabriel shall sound his trump that will awake them to the judgment where rewards will be complete world without end.

Dr. Wm. W. Holmes was in a few months solicited by the Governor of Georgia [to go] with Dr. Green to the Lunatic Asylum in Millidgeville Georgia to aid in the nursing of these unfortunate individuals. He was much exposed, took cold—run into pneumonia and soon wound up his career in time—he was sent home & buried beside his wife Susan. Him & his wife and little daughter lies beside each other in the Cave Spring Cemetery.

She gave full assurance of her readiness to depart and be with Christ—to die no more. Her husband also—nothing so cheering to the bereaved than to know they [are] ready giving unscrutinizing evidence of the same. The scraps of writing found in her album showed conclusively the thoughtfulness of this subject—that she was getting ready [and] that she was in preparation all the time. Her prayers, her thoughts, her mind was absorbed in this subject. Two of the Lambs were carried over the river by the Shepherd & the mother hard by this muddy and much dreaded stream. No doubt the bleating of the lambs on the other side of the river attracted the attention of the Mother’s faith and efforts to prepare to emerge into the same clime of bliss, immortality and Eternal Life. Amen.

P.S. When we had decided to send Susan to Macon, the morning she started her mother took her into a private place to advise and pray with her before she left, enjoining upon her the importance of getting ready and keeping ready. She was always inclined to teach her the child’s prayer “Now I lay me down to sleep.” In this circumstance and these teachings she said always had a prominent place in her mind. These things she acknowledged to her mother while on her death bed.

-- William Turner Timmons in the Appendix to his Life Book.

According to William Timmons in his Life Book (see Biographical Notes), Susan’s husband was her cousin. Her first two sons were twins who died soon after birth. Her third child, a daughter, also died after birth, as did an “emaciated” Susan.

Acording to her brother Thomas Holmes Timmons in his memoir The First of Life was Made for the Last, Susan died at Cave Spring and was cared for by the wife of Major O.P. Fannin, the sister in-law of Bishop Wightman.