Barbara Ann Brann Swaim Johnston

Barbara Ann Brann Swaim Johnston passed away peacefully in South Boston, VA, on the first of January 2025.

 Born in Village, VA, to Dr. William Cralle Brann and Kathryn Luise Tuck Brann, Barbara lived all but several months of her full life in South Boston, where in November 1929,  her father established his medical practice and began his impressive, fifty-year career.

 Barbara loved her community. Throughout the years she maintained involvement in a variety of local organizations, including the Berryman-Green Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, the South Boston Garden and Junior Woman’s Clubs, the Parsons-Bruce Art Association, and the Paul Jones Cotillion and Dun Roamin’ Clubs. She was a supporter of the Halifax County Historical Society and the South Boston - Halifax County Museum of Fine Arts and History. Barbara was a life-long member of the First Presbyterian Church of South Boston, as were her parents and grandparents and where she volunteered tirelessly.

 Barbara lived her life with great enthusiasm. As a young child, she participated in several of South Boston’s renowned National Tobacco Festival’s pageants. She received her education at CH Friend High School and Westhampton College in Richmond and married her childhood sweetheart. Barbara was an avid reader, bridge player and golfer, and she possessed a talent in math, with the arts and for solving a wide variety of word puzzles. She was an accomplished seamstress and knitter, finding pleasure in creating her young daughters’ clothing and a countless number of personalized Christmas stockings for family and friends. Together with her second husband, she explored many great sites around the United States and traveled the world to South Africa, New Zealand, China and Thailand.

 Known for her big-heartedness and spirit-lifting surprises, Barbara will be remembered by many for dressing as Santa Claus during the Christmas holidays to deliver candies to Halifax County’s hospital and schools, where she enjoyed being a regular substitute teacher. Standing at a mere 5 feet, she was readily recognized and hardly fooled a soul! Barbara never forgot a birthday and delighted in honoring her friends with well-wishing cards and her home-made cheese straws.

 Preceding her in death are her parents, her siblings, Elizabeth Brann Ramsey and William Cralle Brann II, and her husbands, Vernon Monroe Swaim III and Lewis DuPuy Johnston Jr. She is survived by her daughters, Cheryl Luise Swaim (William) and Ann Monroe Jacobs (William), and her grandchildren, Luisa Tuck Cole, William Monroe Jacobs (Monica) and Barbara Brann Cole, by her step-children, Lee Johnston Foster and Lewis DuPuy Johnston II, and by her dear nieces, nephews, their children and grandchildren. She is also preceded in death by her step-daughter, Betty Johnston Miller.

 A Celebration of Life service will be held on Saturday, February 1, 2025 at 2:00 P.M. at First Presbyterian Church with the Rev. John McCarthy officiating. A reception will follow in the church fellowship hall.

 Contributions in Barbara’s memory may be made to the First Presbyterian Church of South Boston or the South Boston Public Library.

 Upon Barbara's wishes and in lieu of flowers, please consider an act of kindness to someone in need. 

 Online condolences may be directed to www.powellfuneralinc.com

 Arrangements have been entrusted to Powell Funeral Home, 1603 Wilborn Ave., South Boston, VA