Last Rites For Trio Drowning Victims Friday

Funeral services for the three Bailey children who were drowned near Bluffton on Wednestay(July 21) of last week were conducted at the graveside in Evergreen Cemetery in Beaufort at four o'clock Friday afternoon. Officiating was the Rev. J. E. Rogers.

The drowning victims, all the children of Mrs. Eva Bailey of Rose Dhu Plantation, near Bluffton, were Joyce, 16 Shirley, 12 and Rufus, Jr., 10.

They were all drowned within the space of a few moments about 6:00 pm when they stepped into a hole off a sandbar on which they had been playing.

The children all attended the Bluffton schools and were members of the Bluffton Tabernacle Church.

They were the grandchildren of Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Bailey of Beaufort.

Their father was the late Rufus J. Bailey, Sr.

Other survivors include one sister, Mrs. Walter C. Baggot of Columbia; three brothers, George N. and Harold Eugene Bailey, both of Bluffton and Ernest Ray Bailey of St. Louis, MO.

A fund on behalf of the bereaved family was being raised in beaufort county this week and persosns interested in contributing were advised to communicate with Waldo Martin or Charles E. Reed.

Source: Beaufort Gazette July 29, 1954