Introduction 

As I discuss in posts #14 and #15, James H. Jones came to Baltimore from Virginia in the mid-1800s to work as a coachman and waiter for Johns Hopkins. This post discusses James Jones' family after his death in 1893 - in particular, the remarkable life and career of his grandson, James Alvin Jones. 

James Jones died in 1893 at his home at 244 Pearl Street. He was survived by his wife Elizabeth and two of their children - John H. Jones and William H. Jones. (A third child, Mary, died in 1881, just shy of her 23rd birthday). In the 1900 census, William was 40 years old, single, and described as a "day laborer." He had been unemployed for at least two months over the course of the previous year. And that is where William's trail runs cold.

John H. Jones, the last of James and Elizabeth's natural children,[1] has been easier to trace in the records. John was born in August of 1864, just two months before the new Maryland Constitution outlawing slavery was ratified. The census of 1890 lists his occupation as "photographer." In 1887, John married Hattie E. Rodman, and together they had one son - James Alvin Jones. It's unclear what happened to John and Hattie. He may have died before 1910; she may have operated a boarding house. 

John H. Jones lived with his wife Hattie and brother William H. Jones at 1359 N. Calhoun Street. 

James Alvin Jones (1889 - 1981)

It's with James Alvin Jones, the grandson of James H. Jones, that things get interesting. James, who went by J. Alvin Jones, was born on November 20, 1889. Raised in Baltimore, he attended Douglass High School (Baltimore's famed "colored" high school) and then the University of Pennsylvania, graduating in 1913 with a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering (as a Black man he was barred from attending JHU). While at Penn he met Clara Baptiste, the daughter of an established African American family with deep Philly roots. Census records indicate that Clara completed one year of college. 

J. Alvin and Clara's first child was born in 1910, named James Alvin Jones after his father. After this, in 1912, Clara suffered the premature birth and death of a second male child. Finally, in 1914, she and J. Alvin had a third son, the second to survive. He was named Jerome Baptiste Jones.

Church records indicate, curiously, that J. Alvin and Clara may not have married until 1918. Were their children, therefore, born out of wedlock? The Baptistes were Catholic and would have frowned on premarital relations. Perhaps their church prohibited the young lovers' marriage while allowing the children to be baptized - J. Alvin, Jr., was baptized in 1910 and Jerome in 1914. The 1910 census recorded Clara living with her parents and attending "normal school," which may have been the Philadelphia Normal School for Girls. Whenever they married, J. Alvin, Sr.'s WWI draft card indicates that he had a "wife and two children" when he registered to serve in June of 1917.[2] 

With his military service behind him, and a wife and young children to care for, J. Alvin moved his family back to his home town of Baltimore and embarked on a lengthy career in education and public service, working at different times for the city school district, police department, Internal Revenue Service, and state government. There is much more than can be said about J. Alvin Jones' long life and professional achievements, but I want to focus now on his short - but eventful - political career. 

J. Alvin Jones in the Maryland Senate: 1958-1962

J. Alvin Jones was elected to the Maryland General Assembly for the Fourth District (on a ticket with famed legislator Verda Welcome), the only Black to serve in the Senate that term. The fourth district was a stronghold of legendary party boss Jack Pollack.[3]

Nevertheless, J. Alvin Jones made his mark. He introduced several civil rights bills, including legislation aimed at prohibiting racial discrimination in Baltimore hotels and at highway rest stops. And perhaps most significantly, Jones sponsored the joint resolution to ratify the Fourteenth Amendment, 91 years after it was proposed and struck down by the Maryland General Assembly.

The 14A to the Constitution is one of the famed Reconstruction Amendments and considered one of the most important of the group. The first clause of the amendment, the Citizenship Clause, explicitly overruled the Supreme Court's infamous Dred Scott decision. The Confederate States were forced to ratify the amendment to regain representation in Congress, but states like Maryland that never joined the "rebel states," were not. The Maryland House debated the matter in March of 1867 but ultimately decided against ratification; the Senate took no action. 

And that is why, more than nine decades after it went into constitutional effect, the 14A remained unratified by the Maryland legislature. Until, that is, Jones was elected to the Senate for Baltimore's Fourth District in 1958. The centennial of the Civil War was approaching, and the Civil Rights Movement was in full swing. The lack of ratification was a stain on the state. On April 28th, 1959, in a joint resolution spearheaded by J. Alvin Jones, the grandson of a man who had been enslaved, the Maryland General Assembly finally ratified the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Part of the resolution reads:

"Whereas, The said 14th Amendment has long been a vital part of the Constitution of the United States and should be ratified by the State of Maryland to show the concurrence of this great State with the principles therein enunciated."

Of course, ratification was merely a symbolic act. The Amendment was already sanctioned by two-thirds of the states and went into effect in 1868 without Maryland's approval. As a member state of the union, Maryland was automatically governed by all of the Reconstruction Amendments.

But sometimes symbolic acts are the most important.

Conclusion: What Is a Legacy?

Neither of J. Alvin's sons had children of their own, as far as I have been able to determine. If accurate, this means that there are no descendants of James Jones alive today.

I doubt very much that James H. Jones, a man who was born enslaved in Virginia, could have dreamt that one of his direct descendants would obtain the success enjoyed by J. Alvin Jones - that his grandson would serve as a member of the Maryland State Senate (the second Black politician ever elected), that he would champion civil rights for African Americans, and that he would lead Maryland's belated effort to ratify the Fourteenth Amendment.

It's quite a legacy, one entirely unknown until now. And it begs an important question. How should we memorialize the Jones family and the role its members played, not just in supporting Johns Hopkins’ philanthropy and helping to establish a world renowned university and hospital, but in promoting the civil rights of African Americans in Maryland? Johns Hopkins, of course, is forever memorialized in the institutions he bequeathed. There is no memorial to James H. Jones, nor to his grandson, anywhere, unless we count the stone obelisk that currently lays in ruins in an unkempt Carroll County graveyard. Maybe that should change.

Notes

[1] They also adopted a son, Joseph More, who was close in age to John.

[2] J. Alvin served in the Great War as a first lieutenant and spent two months in France before being discharged. 

[3] Anyone wanting to know more about Jack Pollack and the epoch of party bosses in 20th century Baltimore should read Matthew Crenson's epic Baltimore: A Political History.