Conditions Governing Access

This collection is open for research

Preferred Citation

MSS 16236, Margaret Warther Jones and Thomas T. Ammons family scrapbooks of World War I and World War II, Small Special Collections, University of Virginia Library

Immediate Source of Acquisition

This collection was a gift from Thomas M. Ammons to the Small Special Collections Library at the University of Virginia Library on October 10, 2016.

Biographical / Historical

World War scrapbooks created by Miss Margaret Warthen Jones from Richmond, Virginia, who married Private Ralph R. Jones after World War I. Correspondents include Private William E. Winfrey, Private John N. Christian, George R. Tompkins, and Robert Prosser Wingfield. Margaret and Ralph Jones had a daughter Margaret T. Jones whose boyfriend and later husband was Thomas M Ammons, Jr. who served in World War II and created the content for the World War II scrapbook.

Scope and Contents

World War I and II scrapbooks containing correspondence, photographs, newspaper clippings, military orders, promotions, certificates, and ephemera (songs, flags, pins) relating to the Ammons family in 1917-1918 and 1942-1945. There are also some photographs from the Mexican Border Service in 1916-1917.

The World War I scrapbook contains many newspaper clippings documenting the military life of General Pershing and the political and military events of the war. Included are medals and military insignia belonging to Ralph R. Jones as well as correspondence from many boyfriends of Margaret Walthen Jones that give vivid descriptions of life as soldiers and an accounting of Armistice day. There is also a small handwritten diary that may have been written by Ralph R. Jones during the war.

The second scrapbook contains World War II history related to Captain Thomas M. Ammons, Jr. who was in the South Pacific and Japan. He was in the American Division that was under Douglas MacArthur which was credited with the invasion of Cebu Harbor on Mactan Island. Thomas M. Ammons, Jr. is the son-in-law of Ralph R. Jones. Included are love letters and cards between Thomas M. Ammons and his wife Margaret ("Peg") T. Jones Ammons which portray the hardships of living apart during war time.

War magazines include "Aerial Age Weekly" 1918; "The Infantry Journal" February 1945; and "The All American Paraglides" August 14, 1948. Cartoons include "The Sad Sack"

There is a leaflet guaranteeing humane treatment to Japanese desiring surrender.

Also included is a University of Virginia Graduation exercise program from 1969.

Arrangement

Loose materials from the scrapbooks are placed in folders for either World War I or World War II.