Coker Cemetery Association, San Antonio, Texas

Trustees

C.A. (Butch) Gerfers
President

Homer Olsen
Vice-President

Bob Battaglia
Secretary/Historian

David Schneider
Treasurer

Sid Autry
Carl Coker
James Coker
Tex Tomasini

V. Royce Jones
1917 - 2011
President Emeritus
Arthur Nagel
1920 - 2010
Vice-President Emeritus

Patsy Ruth Erben
March 7, 2013

click here to read the obituary

  Coker Cemetery History #29                 Top

  by Bob Battaglia


The post card below was from my father, Anthony Battaglia, to James Seaborn Jones who was son of Amos Dickens Jones. In these early days, about 3 or 4 of Amos's sons went to Nevada looking for gold. They returned empty handed about 1910. Another son, William Jones, who had first married Joseph Coker's daughter, Harriet Elvira Coker, had already left the Jones clan in 1847 for California. Harriet Elvira Coker had died 1846 in Talladega, AL. I am putting this in the beginning of this story to give some feeling to it. James Seaborn Jones first wife was Rebecca Kesterson and she died in Kyle TX about 1900.

ANTHONY MICHAEL (BRYAN) BATTAGLIA

Anthony at age 12 (1909) sent this post card to his grandfather, James Seaborn Jones, who was in Nevada with his sons prospecting for gold. Anthony's mother, Mary Jones, had died in 1908. Written on the card: "Dear Grampa, I am going to send you my picture. How is Charles and Sol (sons of Seaborn). I heard that you all are coming back in August. I sure will be glad....Bryan. It is interesting to note that "Bryan" was the middle name given to Anthony by his mother - source of the name cannot be determined. When his father Vincent married his second wife, Annie Irwin, Anthony was baptized in the Catholic Church and his middle name was changed to "Michael”. The Jones family continued to call him Bryan. Anthony used Michael as his middle name as he grew up. The location of this photo cannot be determined for sure except that it was in San Antonio. It could have been on Truehart St. where Vincent was living when his first wife died or it could have been at sister of Seaborn Jones, "Aunt Kate" who sometimes took care of Anthony between Vincent's marriages.

Anthony Michael (Bryan) Battaglia