Threads to Which I Belong

It begins on the road leading to the Reaves and McDonald slave plantations. In the sizzling, sweltering milieu of the rocky hills of northeastern Mississippi, a forbidden love between a Negro man and a White woman created more havoc than the widespread Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1878. The anti-miscegenation laws of Mississippi prohibited a Negro man and a White woman, or a White man and a Negro woman from occupying the same room without being fined up to $500, put in jail, or murdered. Despite these major concerns, this forbidden love steered the couple into the bonds of matrimony, but not without a struggle, which ultimately would lead to a legacy of activism. Eliza Jane McDonald, matriarch of the family, well-known activist and devout Christian, would protest against the harsh anti-miscegenation laws of Mississippi, leaving citizens stunned. In March of 1888, along the beautiful waterfront at Lake Reaves, Eliza Jane McDonald and Levi William Reaves were married. This marital event, known as The Wedding that Changed the South or The Greatest Ancestral Wedding of 1888 resulted in more kinfolk coming together for an event than the whole town of Ashland could tally. In 1929, Eliza Jane McDonald-Reaves died. She left a manuscript underneath the feather tick mattress of her bed, which consisted of many years of her writings. More than 80 years later, Linda Reaves sensed that her ancestors were calling. She felt a sudden impulse to return to her birthplace, to address the mystery of uninterrupted dreams and the suspense of her loved ones unexpected deaths catalysts that forced her to examine the manuscript that was taken from underneath the mattress of her grandmother s bed. Excerpts from that manuscript serve as an introduction to the book, Threads to Which I Belong.