Jones, Armistead

23 Sept. 1846–24 Sept. 1925

Armistead Jones, lawyer, was born in Vance County, the son of Protheus Epps Armistead and Mary Francis Hawkins Jones. Through his father he was descended from Matthew Jones who lived in Warwick County, Va., during the middle 1600s, and from the Armistead, Tabb, and Westward families of Virginia. His mother was a daughter of John Davis and Jane Boyd Hawkins of Vance County.

Jones attended Horner School at Oxford, but early in the Civil War—at age sixteen—he enlisted in the Confederate Army as a member of Moseley's Battery and served with that command until the fall of Fort Fisher in 1865. After the war he moved to Raleigh and, while supporting himself as a telegraph operator, studied law under Judge William H. Battle; he was licensed in 1870.

Settling in Raleigh, Jones practiced law first in partnership with his brother, William Westwood, and later with his son, William Branch. For several years Armistead was attorney for Wake County, and in 1900 he was appointed solicitor for the Judicial District which then comprised Chatham, Johnston, Wayne, and Wake counties. He was elected to the latter office on two occasions and served for eleven years. Jones declined an appointment by Governor David Fowle to the Superior Court, preferring advocacy in the courtroom. He served as chairman of the Wake County Democratic Committee for twenty years and was an outstanding figure in the political life of the state.

On 3 Jan. 1872 Jones married Nancy Haywood Branch, the daughter of Confederate General Lawrence O'Bryan Branch and his wife Nancy Haywood Blount. They had three children: Nancy Branch (m. Thomas Martin Ashe), Mary Armistead (m. Alfred McGhee Maupin), and William Branch (m. Mary Seaton Hay). Jones was an Episcopalian and a member of Christ Episcopal Church, Raleigh. He died in Raleigh where he was buried in Oakwood Cemetery.