Ruth Bell Young

1864—PFC Clement Young fighting for the Union, is captured by Confederates and incarcerated at Camp Ford in Tyler, TX.

1869 – Ruth Bell Young, born to seminary student Clement Young and Trilla Bell Young, in Des Moines, Iowa.

1887 – Ruth meets and marries Durward Smith from Arlington, VA.

1888 – The couple heads to St. Louis MO via wagon train.

"I've found you a bridegroom," her father announced unceremoniously. Thus, with this pronouncement, was Ruth Bell Young's past snapped shut and her future spread out before her, broad, vast and pale.

That her father, Thomas Young, loved her in the austere way that was fashionable at the time was most certain. The fact that he had never expended energy to arrange to know her, either by visiting her at Mrs. White's Finishing School for Young Ladies or by conducting anything more than a precursory correspondence with her did not strike her as unusual. There were other girls she knew who were far less fortunate than she. Her father provided for her in every way. She attended a reputable, if not entirely fashionable, ladies' boarding school. Her tuition was fully paid and she was not forced to supplement her room and board as some were, obliged to mop the floors, change the linens, carry out the chamber pots and wait tables.