honorable record for valiant and faith-
ful service. He was commander of his regiment for four months during his
service, and was also in command of the Thirty-second Maine Regiment for
about a month. After the war Captain Jones returned to the West, where
he again spent a number of years, residing seven years in Rockford, Ill.
He was married, August 7, 1860, to Miss Mary E. Rhoads, who was born
in York county, Me., a daughter of Aaron and Ruth (Roberts) Rhoads,
residents of that county, where her father followed farming. There were
four children in the Rhoads family-Lydia A., Asa S., Sarah J. and Mary E.
Captain Jones's principal work throughout his life has been the making
of machinists' tools, and as an expert in that line he is known far and wide.
In 189O he receiveda bronze medal for tools made by him, from the Massa-
chusetts Charitable Mechanics' Association at Boston, Mass. He has taken
out several patents on tool work, and has designed new tools and improved
old ones, such as thread-cutting tools, diamond-nosed tools, offset thread and
cutoff tools, etc., they being used by machinists in working on lathes, planers,
shapers, etc. Captain Jones spent over fifty years at this work, and for fifteen
years made practically all the special machinist's tools used in the machine shop
of the Portsmouth Navy Yard. He is very expert on hardening and temper-
ing steel, and, although now retired, still keeps up his old interest and enthu-
siasm in this line of work.
Captain Jones is a Republican in politics but occasionally disregards party
lines in casting his vote, as he sees fitting reason.