THE MINNESOTA 
HORTICULTURIST. 
On. 23 MAY, 1895. NO, 4. 
*BHiosraphy, 
JONATHAN T. GRIMES. 
(SEE FRONTISPIECE.) 
Jonathan T. Grimes, the subject of this biographical sketch, was 
born in Loudon county, Virginia, May 10, 1818, and is now seventy- 
seven years of age. His great ancestor, on his father’s side, was 
deputized by the crown of England, and sent over as Collector Gen- 
eral for the District of Virginia, which then included the Carolinas 
and all the territory tributary to the west. The name was spelled 
G-r-y-m-e-s, after the old English style of spelling at that time. 
His grandfather was born in Westmoreland Co., Virginia, near 
where Gen. Washington was born. About the time Washington 
removed to Mount Vernon, in Fairfax county, Va., his grandfather 
also removed north and settled across the river nearly opposite, in 
what was called “ Virginia on the Maryland side of the Potomac,” in 
the neighborhood of the Lees, one of whom had married Miss Lucy 
Grymes, who became the mother of Gen. Henry Lee, more commonly 
known as “Little Horse Harry,’ who was the father of Robert E. Lee, 
of confederate fame. But this is a matter of history. His grand- 
father was a soldier under Washington in the Revolutionary War 
for independence. The family afterwards removed to Leesburg, 
Loudon Co., Va., where the subject of this sketch spent his early 
life. 
His father was opposed to slavery, having adopted the principles 
ofthe Quakers; so, when theson attained his majority, he came tothe 
conclusion that, as they did not own slaves, he would not consent to 
live in a slave state, and gathering up his belongings, he started for 
the West and finally located near Terre Haute, Ind. This was in 
1840. 
He was married Sept. 20, 1843, to Miss Eliza Gordon, who still 
presides as his better half. 
