R. F. Jones, merchant, was born in 1857, in Alexandria, Dekalb County, Tenn., one of three children of Jas. And Martha P. (West) Jones, the former, probably of English origin, and born near Alexandria about 1825, and the latter of like ancestry, and born in the same vicinity about 1835. The father was engaged in merchandising the most of his married life at Alexandria. At the battle of Chickamauga he received a shot from which he died in a few hours. The mother died near Alexandria in 1884.
Educated at Alexandria and Liberty, our subject began clerking in 1874 for William Vick, at Liberty. After nine years here, he established himself in his present business at Dowelltown in which he has been most successful. In 1878 he married Eliza, daughter of Isaac and Nancy Whaley, of Liberty, where she was born in 1857. Their two children are Mattie and Frank. Our subject is a Democrat, first voting for Hancock. He and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church.