This file part of www.watertownhistory.org website

 

Joseph E. Davies

 

Rev. Rachel Davies

 

1955

 

(06 25) Joseph E. Davies, the 78-year-old Watertown-born diplomat and international lawyer, has made his will and has set aside his palatial estate in Washington, D.C., for the federal government to be used either as a future official residence for United States Vice Presidents or as a graduate school for students of international affairs. Davies disclosed these facts at his home in Washington Saturday night and the news was carried in press dispatches in Sunday's newspapers. He recently visited in Watertown, meeting many of his old friends and classmates. The estate includes a 20-room mansion in which he has entertained some of the world's most noted personages during his residence in Washington. He has occupied the home for the past 20 years.

 

1956

    09 27 1956

 

Joseph E. Davies, Watertown-born former U.S. ambassador to Russia, has sent a check to the sisters who operate St. Joseph's Home for the Aged in Watertown.  Mrs. Bertha Voss, a resident at the home, said she read an article in the Times some months ago about Mr. Davies' plans to turn over his Washington estate to the Federal government as an official residence for vice presidents and that this inspired her to write to Mr. Davies.  She suggested that if he wished he could do some good by helping the “good sisters who operate this home in Watertown.”  He wrote back asking to whom he has to make out the check and Mrs. Voss replied to his inquiry and today the check was received.

 

1958

    05 09 1958

Joseph E. Davies, 81, Watertown-born former ambassador to Russia and international conference maker for three Presidents, died at his home in Washington, 3029 Klingle Road, early this morning.  He passed away in his sleep, having been gravely ill for some months.  He suffered from low blood pressure and recently had been confined to bed with around the clock nursing care.  In addition to serving as United States ambassador to Russia from 1936 to 1938, he served as ambassador to Belgium and minister to Luxembourg from 1938 to 1939.

 

Rev. Rachel Davies

1847 - 1915

 

Rev. Rachel Davies was reportedly the first woman minister ordained in the state of Wisconsin, serving the Welch Congregational Church in Ixonia for several years and resided in Watertown.  In some circles, she might be better known as the mother of Joseph Davies, the U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union under President Roosevelt.

 

1915

LAST SAD RITES PERFORMED TODAY

 

Body of Mrs. Rachel Davies Laid to Rest In Oak Hill

 

BROUGHT HERE FROM WASHINGTON

 

Mrs. Davies Spent a Busy Life As An Evangelist and Missionary Worker

Was Greatly Loved by Her People

 

The body of Mrs. Rachel Davies was laid to rest beside those of her husband and daughter in Oak Hill Cemetery this afternoon, with all the honors due the memory of a noble woman whose life was one of active service from her earliest years until her declining years forced a retirement from active work.

 

The pall bearers were Edward Davies, Chicago; John L. Davies, Dix, Illinois; Morgan Lloyd Davies, Daniel S. Throne, Chicago; Morgan S. Throne, Cleveland; Victor M. Stamm, Milwaukee.  There were ten honorary pall bearers as follows:  C. A. Skinner, Dr. F. C. Werner, Owain T. Hughes, W. D. Sproesser, James W. Moore, William F. Voss, Frank E. Woodard, Ellis G. Humphrey, Oconomowoc; David Evans, Milwaukee.

 

Among those here from out of town to attend the funeral were Postmaster Devine, John A. Aylward, Mr. and Mrs. William Westerman, Miss Marian Davies and Mr. Ponny, Madison; Mrs. H. E. Evans, Clark Knight, Ashland; Percy M. Cochran, Elkhart, Indiana; Postmaster Frank Schultz, Mrs. H. E. Evans and Mr. Sawyer, Milwaukee; Mrs. J. R. McGlade, Princeton, Illinois; and Postmaster Cunningham, Janesville.

 

There were many beautiful floral designs, the offerings of friends.  Two large but simply designed casket pieces of purple and white crysanthemums, which covered the top of the casket, were the gifts of President Woodrow Wilson and his daughter, Miss Margaret Wilson.  A large wreath was the gift of Mr. Davies’ fellow members on the federal trade commission.

 

Rahel o’ Fon, as Mrs. Davies was known among the Welsh people, was for many years recognized as one of the most powerful of woman evangelists.  Rahel o’ Fon is the Welsh name for “Rachel of Anglesey”.  And Anglesey is an island close to the coast of North Wales where Mrs. Davies was born, and where she began her evangelistic work.

 

The island is also the birth place of Owain T. Hughes of this city, who though a few years younger than Mrs. Davies, watched her career with interest form the time she first became interested in religious work, at which time she was about fourteen years of age.  When she was seventeen years of age, Mrs. Hughes heard her preach before one of the largest audiences every gathered in a religious assemblage on the island.  The largest church on the island was placed at her disposal for the meeting and the young girl’s sermon was most impressive.  Not only had she a fine voice and presence, but great dramatic ability, which she used with effect.  Her meetings in Wales and other parts of the British Isles were uniformly successful, Mr. Hughes declares.

 

The young evangelist was greatly influenced in early life by one of the greatest of Welsh preachers of that day, the Rev. Henry Reese, from whom she received religious instruction while a student at Liverpool.

 

Her work in America was also wonderfully successful.  From the eastern coast to California she traveled to every large and small settlement of Welsh people.  She was a delegate to nearly all religious conventions of the Welsh people, and even in her later years, when she was widowed and burdened with a growing family, she freely answered calls to the pulpit wherever she was needed.  She often spoke at the little Welsh church in North Washington Street, though it was not of her own denomination.

 

She was renowned for her works of charity, even though but few of her charitable acts became public.  An exception was the presentation of a church building to a small and struggling congregation at Niles, Ohio, the congregation being too poor to build.  Their gratitude was expressed in the dedication of the church in her honor.

 

As Mrs. John Throne, her niece by marriage, pointed out, Mrs. Davies was alone in this country, having no immediate relatives here.  But she won the hearts of all her husband’s people, who accepted her and loved has as one of themselves.  A fact evidenced by the fact that all of them who could possibly come were here to attend the last sad rites, many of them traveling from distant points.

 

Her religious work, which included effective temperance work, was carried on almost entirely among the Welsh people, who she loved as if united by ties of blood.  It was only on rare occasions that she would consent to speak in the English language – it was always in the Welsh tongue that she preferred to state her message.