USA > Alabama > Memorial record of Alabama. A concise account of the state's political, military, professional and industrial progress, together with the personal memoirs of many of its people. Volume I > Part 115
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PERSONAL MEMOIRS-ESCAMBIA COUNTY.
number of battles, including the last engagement of the war, fought at Statesboro, Ala., in 1865. In October, 1860, he contracted a matrimonial alliance with Lydia A. McCarvey, which has resulted in the birth of four children, namely: Thomas M .; William C., deceased; Annie M. and Chalmers M. Mr. and Mrs. Stevens and their two youngest children have a pleasant home in Brewton. The Stevens family is of Scotch descent, but moved to Alabama from South Carolina, of which latter state Matthew P. Stevens, father of Thomas J., was a native. The McCarveys are also of Scotch origin, and emigrated from their native country to America in the time of the colonies. The father of Mrs. Stevens was Murdock McCarvey, an early resident of Monroeville, and a soldier in the Creek war. He was a man of fine mental endowments, a teacher and planter, and for three successive sessions served Monroe county as probate judge. At the conclusion of his last official term he taught school in Monroeville, and taught the same until his death, which occurred in 1875. His son, Thomas C. McCarvey, is a distinguished edu- cator, at this time filling the chair of mental and moral philosophy in the State university at Tuscaloosa.
WILLIAM H. STRONG was born October 27, 1853, in Russell county, Ala. His father, Samuel D. Strong, was a native of Rockingham county, N. C., born in 1823, and at the age of twenty, in company with a brother, moved to Alabama, settling in Chambers county, where, in 1843, he mar- ried Miss Alletha Stillwell. Subsequently he located in the county of Russell, where he followed the occupation of planting until his death, which occurred on the 22d day of December, 1878. Mr. Strong was a man of fine mind, highly educated, and, as an old line whig, strenuously opposed the secession of the southern states in 1860. After the war broke out, however, he felt in duty bound to cast his lot with his state, and for two years he served as a gallant soldier in the army of the Con- federacy. He was at one time an extensive slave holder, but never believed in selling his slaves, and while in the army refused to exchange a number of his colored people for a lot of cotton which, the following year, was sold for $500,000. It is sufficient to say that Mr. Strong's. wealth, which consisted largely of slaves, was swept away by the war, and the close of the struggle found him comparatively a poor man. Samuel D. and Alletha Strong reared a family of seven children, whose names are as follows: John Z .; Charles D., died of yellow fever in the epidemic of 1883; Maggie, wife of John A. Tarver; Thomas J .; Louis W. ; William H. and Nannie M., -wife of. W. A. Lovelace. Owing to the unfortunate condition of affairs in the south at the breaking out of the war, the early education of William H. Strong was sadly neglected, the almost total loss of his father's property preventing him taking an intended college course. At the age of thirteen, however, he became a student in the Hollywood academy, where he pursued his studies for five years, acquiring during that time a good practical education and a fair
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knowledge of several of the higher branches of learning. At the age of eighteen he began the study of law in the office of J. B. McDonald, of Russell county, but before taking the examination requisite to admission to the bar he laid aside his books and engaged in the more remunerative lumber business, which in a short time returned him a very liberal profit. He gradually relinquished the idea of entering the legal profession, and, in 1876, in partnership with a brother, moved to Escambia county and began dealing in hewn timber, which business he conducted with success and financial profit for a period of seven years. In 1883, in partnership with James Hunter, Mr. Strong erected a large saw mill on the Alabama river in Monroe county, where the firm also purchased 10,000 acres of land, to which 2,000 were subsequently added, increasing the value to over $36,000. The firm of Hunter & Strong continued to do business until the spring of 1884, at which time Mr. Strong disposed of his inter- est and took a contract to furnish a large amount of hewn timber for the European market, which engaged his attention until the winter of 1885-6. In February, 1886, he was appointed United States commissioner for the southern district of Alabama, and discharged the duties of the office until 1890, since which date he has been engaged in various lines of spec- ulation, giving particular attention to transactions in real estate. In 1887 Mr. Strong was elected, without solicitation, a member of the common council of Brewton, which body immediately thereafter appointed 'him secretary and treasurer of the city, the duties of which positions he has since discharged in a manner highly satisfactory to all concerned. He has also served for several years as township superintendent of educa- tion, and as such has been active in promoting the efficiency of the schools under his charge. Mr. Strong and Annie Lovelace, daughter of B. M. Lovelace, were made man and wife on the 1st day of June, 1879, and their marriage has been blessed by the birth of four children, three living: Russell A., Annie V., and Willie M. Mr. Strong's popularity is second to that of no other citizen of Brewton, and as a wide-awake, energetic business man, interested in every laudable public enterprise, he stands deservedly high in the estimation of the people throughout the county. He is now engaged in the mercantile business in Brewton, Ala., whole- sale and retail business, with a good trade, and is prime mover in the , Brewton water works and electric light system, which will soon be in operation.
WALTER R. THOMPSON, M. D .- Dr. Thompson is a native of Copiah county, Miss., and son of Jesse and Nancy (Rembert) Thompson. His grandfather, Jesse Thompson, Sr., was born in Ireland, and came to the United States when a boy, settling with his parents in the state of Georgia. The wife of Jesse Thompson, Sr., was a Harvey, a family from which the distinguished supreme court judge, L. Q. C. Lamar, of Georgia, is descended, and through the Thompson branch, the relationship included the late Hon. Jacob Thompson, secretary of state under Jeffer-
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PERSONAL MEMOIRS-ESCAMBIA COUNTY.
son Davis during the continuance of the southern Confederacy. Jesse Thompson, father of the doctor, was born in Hancock county, Ga., July 1, 1812, and is now an extensive planter in Mississippi, owning about 2,000 acres of land in Copiah county, that state, where he resides. He is influ- ential in the political affairs of his state, served the Confederacy as a gallant soldier in the late Civil war, and has now reached the ripe old age of eighty years, in full possession of nearly all his faculties, physical and mental. He married, in 1835, Nancy Rembert, daughter of John Rembert, a native of Louisiana, and descendant of an old French Huguenot family, and reared eight children, namely: John W., graduate of both literary and law departments of Mississippi university, a gallant soldier in the late war, lieutenant of a company in Twelfth Mississippi cavalry, died full of promise in the latter part of 1861; Sarah, wife of Capt. Webb, of Hazelhurst, Miss .; Jesse, Jr., planter in Mississippi; William H., killed in battle at Jackson, La., July, 1863; Eudora, wife of W. D. Weems; Walter R .; Alice, wife of L. L. Fatherree. of Hazelhurst, Miss., and Cora, wife of S. F. Granberry, also of Mississippi, living at the town of Beauregard. Dr. Thompson was born March 22, 1850, and entered school at the early age of five. After a three years' preparatory course in the Summerville institute, near Macon, Miss., under the tutorship of the noted educator, Prof. L. S. Gehtright, he entered, at the age of nineteen, the Mississippi university, Oxford, where he pursued his studies till 1871, graduating that year with the degree of A. M. His collegiate course being finished, the doctor entered the teachers' profession, being first employed as principal of the schools of Hazelhurst, which position he held to the eminent satisfaction of the patrons for a period of eight years. For the succeeding two years he was principal of the Wesson schools, thence went to Birmingham, Ala., where for two years he car- ried on the mercantile business, but that calling not being to his taste, he abandonded it and again entered the educational field at Midway, Ala., where he taught one year. About this time the citizens of Brewton inaugurated a movement for the establishment in that city of an educa- tional institution of high rank, which eventually culminated in the Brew- ton institute, of which Prof. Thompson was elected principal in 1885. Entering upon the discharge of his duties, the newly elected principal was not long in bringing the school up to a high plane of efficiency and under his successful management it became, within a comparatively brief period, one of the leading educational institutions in the southern part of the state. He remained at the head of this school about three years, and then resigned for the purpose of gratifying a long felt desire of entering the medical profession, the study of which he had pursued at intervals during his entire educational experience. In the winter of 1889 he attended a course of lectures in the Alabama Medical college, at Mobile, and the succeeding year he took a course at the Medical college of Louis-
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MEMORIAL RECORD OF ALABAMA.
ville, Ky., from which he graduated in the spring of 1891. Since the latter year, he has been actively engaged in the practice of his profession at Brewton, where he has already won a prominent place among his professional brethren. The doctor was married in 1872, in Copiah county, Miss., to Ellen Hargrave, whose unfortunate death occurred after a brief wedded life of two years. The doctor married his present wife, Mary E. Coleman, at Midway, Ala., in 1876, a union blessed with the birth of two children: Jesse and Ina. Politically the doctor affiliates with the demo- cratic party, and fraternally is connected with the Knights of Honor. He and wife are members of the Methodist church.
CILBEY L. WIGGINS, one of the leading lumber manufacturers of West Florida, was born July 5, 1847, in Pike county, Ala., and is the son of Daniel and Sarah Wiggins. At the death of his father, which occurred in 1849, he went to live in the family of Mr. William Emmons of Escam- bia county, and at the age of fourteen began the battle of life upon his own responsibility, but remained with and took care of the widow of his benefactor, Mrs. Emmons, until attaining his twenty-fifth year. He then married, March 24, 1872, in Escambia county, Miss Martha Hamac, daughter of George W. and Mary Hamac, and shortly thereafter engaged in the mercantile business at Pollard, in partnership with Neil McMillan, and the firm thus continued about one year, when Mr. Wiggins withdrew. In partnership with A. M. McMillan, he subsequently embarked in the lumber milling and mercantile business, a short distance east of Pollard, but in 1881 the mill was sold, when they moved to Pine Barren, Fla., where the firm now owns a valuable plant and 44,000 acres of fine tim- bered land with over twenty-six miles of ditching. The mill, which is one of the largest and best of the kind in the lumber region, has a capac- ity of 60,000 to 75,000 feet per day, and the kilns and planing-mill ma- chinery are supplied with the latest improved appliances. Mr. Wiggins has met with success, such as few attain, and his great personal popu- larity attests the standing he occupies in the estimation of his fellow- citizens of Escambia county. He is a member of the Methodist church and the Masonic order; also the K. of H. and K. of P. fraternities, in some of which he holds important official positions. The parents of Mr. Wiggnis were Daniel and Sarah Wiggins, natives of Alabama. Daniel Wiggins was born about the year 1820, was a farmer by occupation and departed this life as already stated, in 1849. He was married in 1841 in Alabama, to Sarah Nobles, daughter of William Nobles, and raised a family of four children, namely: William, member of the Twenty-third Alabama infantry in the late war, captured at Big Black Creek, Miss., and died in prison; John; Cilbey L., and Kinard Wiggins.
DR. JAMES A. WILKINSON, physician, resident of Flomaton, is a northern man, born in La Porte county, Ind., July 30, 1842. His father, James A. Wilkinson, a distinguished physician, graduate of the Phila- delphia Medical college and for many years a successful practitioner in
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PERSONAL MEMOIRS-ESGAMBIA COUNTY.
New Orleans, La., Louisville, Ky., and La Porte, Ind., was born in the year 1797. James A. Wilkinson, Sr., married, about the year 1833, Miss Nancy Henley, daughter of Jesse Henley, an early settler of Clark county, Ind., whither he moved a great many years ago, from the state of North Carolina. Six children were born to James A. and Nancy Wil- kinson, namely: Virginia H .; Indiana M., wife of George Morris, Wash- ington, N. C .; Jefferson H .; James A., and John W. The parents of these children died at New Buffalo, Mich., the father in 1867, on his seventieth birthday, and the mother in the spring of 1865. The grand- father of Dr. James A. Wilkinson was John W. Wilkinson, an English- man, who came to America from the city of Liverpool about the year 1780. He was the son of a prominent exporter of that city, who owned a number of vessels which carried on an extensive trade with nearly all the leading seaports of the world. Desiring to see some of the world, Mr. Wilkinson, when but a mere boy, disregarding his father's wish that he should become a scholar and then engage in business, bribed one of the latter's seamen to secrete him on board a vessel bound for America, which country he had long desired to visit. The father, learning of the son's flight, pursued and overtook the vessel when but a short dis- tance from the coast, but all his entreaties to induce the son to return to shore proving fruitless, he presented the determined youth with 100 pounds sterling, told him to make good use of the money, and, when tired of rambling, to return home and engage in business. For some time after landing in New York, the boy worked in a boot and shoe house, later became traveling salesman, and while on a tour through the south, met and married a young lady, which so enraged the father that the latter disinherited the undutiful son, and refused to have any further intercourse with him. John W. Wilkinson eventually became a very successful man, and prominent and popular citizen of Fauquier county, Va. Dr. Jamse A. Wilkinson, Jr., the principal of this biography, received a common school education in his native county, and at the age of eight- een went to Chicago and obtained an assistant's position in a drug store. He was induced to leave the parental roof at this early age on account of the straitened financial circumstances of his father, who, through the failure of a friend for whom he was acting as bondsman, had lost nearly or quite all of his property. The doctor continued in the drug business until 1867, paying particular attention, in the meantime, to the study of pharmacy, in which he acquired a high degree of proficiency, having been elected a member of the pharmaceutical society of the city. He spent about one year in Madison, Wis., in the drug store of Dunning & Sumner, and while in Chicago was successively employed by H. L. Mot- tram, E. H. Sargent, Fuller, Finch & Fuller, George C. Jones and D: R. Dyche & Co. Leaving Chicago in 1871, the doctor went to Cairo, Ill., and spent four years and a half in the drug house of Barclay Bros .; then, with the intention of prosecuting his medical studies, he entered the
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medical department of the university of Virginia, where he took two courses of lectures, the first of nine months and the second of seven months, but owing to impaired health, which rendered further study at the time impossible, was compelled to withdraw without graduating. In the summer of 1877 he entered the Louisville Medical college, from which he graduated in February of the following year, after which he remained in that city several months longer, engaged in hospital practice. In August, of 1879, he located in Bath county, Ky., where he practiced nearly two years, thence, in May, 1881, changed his residence to Floma- ton, Ala., where he now resides. Dr. Wilkinson has risen rapidly in his profession, and has much more than a local reputation. The doctor and Miss Fanny Whaley became man and wife in June, 1880. Mrs. Wilkin- son is the daughter of S. P. and Mary (Smith) Whaley, the father a native of New York and for a number of years a leading commission mer- chnat of Louisville, Ky. Beside Mrs. Wilkinson, Mr. and Mrs. Whaley have the following children: Sherman P., Jr., Curtis, Smith, Dixon, James B., Laurence and John P., all living and unmarried.
ETOWAH COUNTY.
W. Y. ADAMS, one of the distinguished educators of the state of Ala- bama, was born February 4, 1848, in Blount county. The family is of Scotch descent, the grandfather, Jack Adams, having come to South Carolina in colonial times, and brought up a family in Edgefield district, and his son, the father of W. Y. Adams, came to Alabama at the age of twenty-three and was married in Blount county in 1847. He was the father of seven children, named as follows: W. Y .; Jane, wife of Samuel Gregg: Joseph G .; P. M .; Belle, wife of Joseph Shandley; Mary, wife of S. J. Cox, and J. H. The mother of these children died in about 1876. She was a daughter of Col. W. H. Musgrove., a distinguished citizen of Georgia, a Baptist minister of ability and several times a member of the Alabama state legislature. He commanded a company in the Confeder- ate service and died of a disease contracted in the time of duty in 1862. W. Y. Adams began life in Walnut Grove, where he was educated in the common schools of the county, and attended Howard college. Although not a graduate from this institution, it conferred upon him the degrees of A. M. and A. B. He has spent his life as a teacher, and in 1883, was elected president of Walnut Grove college, and has held that position continuously since. Under his administration the school has been built up from an insignificant affair to an institution of the most advanced courses, having seven teachers. In 1889 it was chartered. December 6, 1870, Mr. W. Y. Adams was married to Julia C. Price, by whom he had four children: Noah E., William, A., E. M. S. and Lillie. Mr. Adams lost his wife, in 1881, and he married in 1883, Cenie Chamblee. She also
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PERSONAL MEMOIRS-ETOWAH COUNTY.
died, and Mr. Adams married Mary E. Penny, in 1884, by whom he had four chlidren: Godfrey, Reuben, Pearl and J. B., deceased. Mr. Adams is a local Baptist preacher, a master Mason, an Odd Fellow, and in politics is a democrat.
B. L. ARCHER, one of the successful farmers of Gadsden, Ala., was born in Talladega county, Ala., October 13, 1832, the son of Philip and Artemesia (Maxwell) Archer. The early founders of the Archer family came to America in 1760 and settled in Virginia. Cornelius Archer, the grandfather of B. L., was one of them. He was a Virginian and fought with Washington at the battle of Yorktown. His son, Philip, came to Blount county, Ala., when a young man, and lived at various points in the state until 1850, when he removed to Calhoun, now Etowah county, where he died in 1869. He was a distinguished Baptist preacher, and baptized many prominent people of the state. He was twice married and had nine children, seven of whom are now living. B. L. Archer had a common school education in his youth and has devoted nearly all his life to agriculture on the old homestead at Gadsden. He was mar- ried December 20, 1865, to Lucinda J. Smith, and to the union seven chil- dren were born, named as follows: Philip T .; Laura V., wife of J. B. Usry; Walter, Lenora, Mira, Frank and Mandie. He enlisted, August 19, 1861, in company D, Nineteenth Alabama infantry, and fought at Shiloh, Murfreesboro, Chickamauga, Atlanta, Franklin, Nashville, where he was
He was twice captured and kept six months at Johnson's Island. wounded, once at Murfreesboro and once before Atlanta, and was pro- moted to the captaincy of his company for gallant and meritorious con- duct. He has been elected and served one term as a democratic member of the legislature. He is a successful farmer and owns a large farm on the Coosa river. He is a Knight of Pythias, and a member of the Baptist church.
DR. D. H. BAKER, son of Dr. N. H. and Mary J. (McAdory) Baker, was born in Alabama, January 17, 1861. His father was a native of North Carolina, born in Fayetteville, January 3, 1823. He lived there until he was fourteen years of age, when his mother died, his father having died previously, leaving him with a younger brother and two young sisters to provide for. The boy had many rich relatives, but his independent spirit would accept no assistance from any of them, and soon after the death of his mother, he brought the other children and their earthly pos- sessions, to Alabama, where the search for gold was fruitless, but where he went bravely to work, and supported and educated himself and the others by his own hard labor. He studied medicine under Dr. James Kelly, of Coosa county, and took lectures at the university of New York, where he graduated in 1849. He devoted all his life to the practice of his profession, and died April 22, 1877. He married, in 1852, in Coosa county, where his widow now survives, and he also spent his life. His family consisted of six children: Kate, deceased wife of W. A. Gamble;
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Emma D., deceased wife of B. Z. Gamble; Sallie A., deceased wife of, W. M. Neighbors; Celia E., wife of A. S. Dean; D. H., and Mary. The mother of these children lives on the homestead near Good Water, Ala. Dr. N. H. Baker was a political speaker of great power, and gave largely of his means for the prevention of the war. He was a successful business man; at the time of his death was the owner of several thousand acres of fine land. He was a man prominent in the state and local politics of his day, and a Union man in his sentiment. The father of N. H. Baker was a Scotchman, who came to America in 1798, and lived in North Carolina until his death in 1830. He was in the war of 1812. He was a great musician, and paid his way across the ocean by playing a flute and violin. Dr. D. H. Baker was educated primarily in the schools of Good Water, Ala. He attended the university of Alabama, but never graduated on account of leaving school to look after his mother, who was in failing health, leaving college six weeks before his graduation. He read medi-" cine with J. B. Kelly, M. D., and graduated at Vanderbilt college in 1881, in medicine, and located at Gadsden in 1883, where he has built up a successful practice. He is a member of the State Medical association, and is the county health officer. He was married in Tuskegee, Ala., March 23, 1886, to Miss Fannie H., daughter of the late Col. R. H. Aber- crombie, and they have three children-Fannie May. Annie Eliza, and Robert Hayden. In politics Dr. Baker is a democrat.
DR. WALTER C. BASKIN, a well-to-do farmer and prominent physician of Coat's Bend, Etowah county, Ala., was born on the 18th of October, 1832, in Carroll county, Ga., the son of James and Henrietta (Williams) Baskin. His father was a native of South Carolina, and removed when a young man to Gwinnett county, Ga. He was a well-known minister of the Methodist church. He was for many years a magistrate, and a man of ability and energy, and died in 1882, aged eighty-eight. Four of his children, out of a family of ten, are living: James L., of Carroll county, Ga .; Mary A., widow of Dr. J. D. Thompson, East Point, Ga .; W. C., and Clark W. of Carroll county, Ga. The mother died in 1872. The great- grandfather, William Baskin, was a native of Ireland, and came to America, and settled in South Carolina before the Revolutionary war. Dr. Baskin's mother was born and brought up in Columbia. S. C. At the age of twenty-four years, Dr. Baskin commenced the study of medicine with Dr. M. W. Gray, of Carroll county, and attended lectures at Macon, Ga., where he graduated in 1858 and came to Turkeytown, Etowah county, and engaged in the practice of medicine and farming. He mar- ried December 6, 1859, in Etowah county, Martha J. Prater, daughter of A. J. Prater, and they have one child-Herschel V. During the war the doctor served first as surgeon, and after the fall of Fort Donelson was made assistant surgeon. He has made a good success of life, owning a beautiful home in the valley of the Coosa river, and a farm of three
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PERSONAL MEMOIRS-ETOWAH COUNTY.
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