James was raised on the family farm surrounding the old Matthew Jones house on Mulberry Island (now Ft Eustis, Va). He worked as a fireman and locomotive engineer for the C. & O. Railroad (now CSX) and the Virginian Railroad (now Norfolk Southern) in the 1910's and 20's. He was a member of the Firemans and Locomotive Engineers Union. He later worked at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard in Portsmouth, Va. James was about 5 ft 8 in tall and weighed about 160lbs. In the late 1940's he bought a farm in Isle of Wight County and raised chickens and pigs for family use. He rented the remainder of the land to a peanut grower. James was very active in religious and political activities and wrote many articles, some of which were published. He was also an inventor, but none of his inventions were pattened. He was known as "Grandaddy Jim", and he died of cancer on April 10, 1958 and is buried in Penninsula Memorial Park Cemetery in Newport News, Va. (per notes of Carl Anderson, Dec 1997)601