In June of 1858, 39-year old Elijah Leming and wife Mary Ann (Pierce) and children Julia Ann, Nancy, AG and Issac K. rolled into the fertile valleys of Scott County and put down roots that would grow deep into the soil of the region and last for years to come.
Having endured the Cherokee Wars of 1836-37 in which he served beginning at the age of sixteen, Leming had come from strong Tennessee stock.
His paternal great-grandfather was a private soldier in the French Army, and was captured at Quebec. After that war, he settled in New Jersey where he was married to Elizabeth Fyan, and moved with her to the western county of North Carolina, which is now part of now Tennessee.
Elizabeth's father, Vinet Fyan commanded a fort near Newport, Tenn., and was killed near there by the Indians, on a creek still known as Fyan's Creek, in Rathnard County, North Carolina.
Dr. Leming's grandfather had soldiered in the Revolutionary War, and he had two uncles were in the War of 1812, and were with Andrew Jackson at the battle of New Orleans. Jackson at New Orleans.
His mother and father, John and Sarah, died when Elijah was a child, and he was raised by his uncle Jesse in western Tennessee.Having come from a long line of soldiers, he left Tennessee and campaigned in the Cherokee Wars, a natural extension of the traditional military service of the Leming family.
Three years later he married Mary Ann and started the study of medicine and seven years after that the little family struck out for Texas in 1940, where he had a successful practice for 13 years.
Early in 1858, the wanderlust that had always been a trait of the now veteran doctor took over again and they started back for Tennessee.
They made it as far as Scott County and decided they had found the perfect place to call home, and the final child, a son they named to Elijah, was born to the couple.
Five years later, with the War Between The States breaking out, Leming had a choice to make and cast his lot with the North.
In 1863 he entered the Federal Army, and until the close of the war served in the Fourth and Second Arkansas Infantry, Company I.
During the War, his home was burned, but at the end of hostilities he returned, rebuilt, and, in addition to his practice, began farming.
During the same period, he went to St. Louis, where he studied in the Eclectic School, graduating soon after.
Also, the Leming family tradition of military service continued when Adolphus G. joined the Second Arkansas Calvary as a fifteen-year-old.
In 1866, the good doctor was elected to the State Legislature, and in that session was one of only five lawmakers to vote for the Howard Amendment, which was one of the clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States and cause of much consternation among those who sought to limited the rights of the freed slaves.
After this measure had been rejected, and during the reconstruction period, he refused to accept office for the reason that he did not want to have his name associated with the disfranchisement of neighbors and friends, nor did he believe the Freedmen competent to vote intelligently. In 1872, he mounted a race for state senator, but was turned away by the voters and thereafter returned to a farmers life in Scott County.
For a number of years, Leming served as president of the County Medical Society and was a tireless advocate of free schools, and served as a school director for years.
His wife died in July, 1870, at Galena, Kansas while on holiday, and Dr. Leming was married in 1883 to Mrs. Gillie Winchester, widow of John Winchester, of Tennessee, who died while serving in the Federal Army in Missouri, during the Civil War.
He lived out his life as a gentleman farmer and upon his death on November 26, 1903 was buried in what was then called the Leming Cemetery.
Between 1859 and 1930 thirteen other members of the Leming extended family were laid to rest in what is now known as the Birdsview Cemetery.
From his Tennessee roots to his strong Arkansas connection, Dr. Elijah Leming was a true pioneer of Scott County.
