Jacob Tucker Bagwell

Jacob Tucker Bagwell came into this world on May 19, 1999 , and left on May 26th, 2001. He lived exactly one week beyond his 2nd birthday. He was on his first family vacation, and wandered away and drowned in the family swimming pool. He lived for 10 hours.

He was visiting in Covington , Virginia with his mommy, daddy, sissy and “J.J.” (his brother and sister). All of the family lives in Spartanburg County, so you can imagine our shock to hear of Jakey’s accident. We were 5 hours away. He was in two hospitals before he left this world.

Jakey was such a beautiful, loving, smart baby. He loved everything. He loved to eat better than any baby I knew. I mean tomatoes, grapes, apples, etc.! Big people food! He made everything beautiful. Jacob was a gift to me from God. I always said he was an angel, and called him my angel baby. He touched everyone’s life; even grown men would ask to hold him because he radiated such beauty and happiness.

I decided to let Jakey’s brother and sister design the quilt square. Since his leaving we’ve always discussed that Jakey is an angel now. He lives with God, and one day we’ll see him again. So they decided to draw angels. Actually, J.J. drew the three angels. The first being Savannah , the second himself, and the little one is Jakey. They have halos and the glitter part is their wings! Savannah drew the clouds and flowers. Jakey dearly loved dandelions, which he called “flowbers”!

This has been devastating to all of us, but especially for the children. How do you explain death to a then 7 and 5 year old? We miss him so much. In closing, I just felt that Jakey’s sister and brother should have the honor to decorate the quilt square. Our lives will be forever changed due to the fact we had our own real live angel on earth for 2 blessed years.