Mary Catherine Brisbane Hickox 1832 - 1913 wrote a memoir of her childhood, as she explained it "thinking that after I am gone my children may want to know some thing about their relations when there is no one to tell them".   She had two children, but only one grand child and this grand daughter, Zillah Keese Hickox 1892 - 1975, would herself die unmarried.   Mary Catherine's memoir lives on, however, and includes many delightful reminiscences of her kinsfolk including the one below.   Thanks are due to Zillah Keese Hickox who ensured the preservation of the text and to Tom Tucker who brought it to the compiler's attention.

My grandfather [James Lowndes  1769 – 1838]  and grand mother [Catherine Osborne , Mrs James Lowndes 1775 – 1853], Mr & Mrs James Lowndes, had four sons, Thomas [Thomas Osborne Lowndes 1801 – 1886]  , James [James Lowndes 1806 – 1838], Edward [Edward Rutledge Lowndes 1808 – 1852]and William [William Henry Lowndes 1816 – 1865]also two daughters, Amarinthia [Amarinthia Lowndes 1803 – 1843], after Mrs Champneys [Mrs Lewis Morris ] and Julia Hall [Julia Hall Lowndes  1811 – 1847], my mother, called after a sister [Juliet Hall] of my grandmother Brisbane [Maria Hall d 1831] who, strange to say, was an intimate friend of my grandmother Lowndes [Catherine Osborne , Mrs James Lowndes 1775 – 1853].

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My mother [Julia Hall Lowndes  1811 – 1847]  was fair with blue eyes and beautiful curling golden hair.   She was gentle and winning in manners and was very bright and pretty when young.   They married for love and were always a devoted pair.   My mother called my father Mr Brisbane, as most southern wives did at that times, but she also had many pet names for him.   From what I recollect, my father must have been a good deal a man of the world and was very fond of society, but my mother not caring as much for it and being after a time trammelled by family cares, they gradually gave up outside amusements and devoted themselves to the care of their children.   These soon began to come thick and fast and numbered eleven.   My mother, unable to stand the strain, died when her last baby was born at the early age of 36.  

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In cool weather we had an open wood fire, which added to the feeble light of the invariable sperm candles.   My mother [Julia Hall Lowndes  1811 – 1847]  was very musical, but she was never strong enough to play much after her marriage.   She sang most touchingly, playing her accompaniments by ear on piano and guitar.   Her instrument, however, was the harp, which she played very well.   My sister Aminy [probably Amarinthia Brisbane  b 1838] now has my mother’s guitar, but her harp is no longer in the family.   My sister Ruth [Harriet Ruth Brisbane  1834 – 1918]  took it from our house in Litchfield and later it was lost or stolen.   Willtown was thirty miles [48 km] from Charleston and not a shop or market within that distance, neither was there a post office nearer than five miles and mail only twice a week.   We only had a semi weekly mail here in Washington Conn., when we were married in 1856.