USA > South Carolina > History of South Carolina > Part 54
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His wife, who died in 1918, was member of the Wood family that have lived for several generations on the opposite side of the Pacolet from the Browns, near Trough Shoals. The Wood ancestors were in the Revolutionary war, in Virginia regiments, and soon after the winning of independence came to the Pacolet. One prominent member of the family is Capt. Moses Wood of Gaffney, in whose honor the Moses Wood Chapter of the Daughters of the Confederacy was named. His brother, Adolphus N. Wood, is one of the leading bankers and financiers of upper South Carolina.
Ben Hill Brown has done much to deserve the re- spect of these ancestors. After graduating from Wofford College at Spartanburg in 1902 he taught school and then entered the law department of the University of Virginia, which awarded him the LL. B. degree in 1906. He began private practice at Spar- tanburg the same year, and his unusual talents quick- ly earned him a rank with the best lawyers of upper South Carolina.
From 1908 to 1912 he represented Spartanburg County in the legislature, and notwithstanding his youth was given a place on the judiciary committee. He has never failed to respond with his aid when any matter of concern to Spartanburg was an issue. He was president of the Chamber of Commerce two years, 1916-17, and. under his leadership the Chamber advocated the advantages of Spartanburg so success- fully that the army authorities selected it as the lo- cation for Camp Wadsworth.
During the war Mr. Brown almost gave up his profession, and devoted fully ninety percent of his time to patriotic causes. He was chairman of the Spartanburg County Council of Defense, chairman of the County War Savings Committee, member of the District Legal Advisory Board, member of the War Camp Community Service Board, and a member of the Girls Protective Bureau and the local National Travelers Aid. He is also a member of the board of directors of the Young Men's Christian Associa- tion and the Country Club, and chairman of the legal department of the Chamber of Commerce. His important business interests include the position of director of the American National Bank and of the Cowpens Manufacturing Company.
Mr. Brown married Miss Clara Twitty Colcock, daughter of William H. Colcock and member of an old family of lower Carolina. They have two chil- dren, Ben Hill Jr. and Clara Colcock.
REV. GEORGE MCDUFFIE ROGERS has been a resident of Anderson County continuously for over half a century, and has grown old in good work and rela- tionships of beneficence to his community. While a farmer throughout his career, he has also rendered valuable service as a minister of the Baptist Church.
He was born in Anderson County December 24, 1833, son of Humphrey and Sarah (Rodam) Rogers.
His father was also a native of Anderson County and a son of William and Lizzic (Duckworth) Rogers. William Rogers was born in Scotland and came to America with a colony which first settled in Virginia and later in South Carolina. He spent the rest of his life in Anderson County. In his family were seven sons and four daughters. Sarah Rodam was a daughter of Robert Rodam, a native of Eng- land. He was a sailor and on account of some difficulty with his captain abandoned his ship at Charleston, South Carolina, went to Augusta, Geor- gia, where he taught school and in that city met and married Betsie Wells of a prominent family. Later he moved to Williamston, South Carolina, and con- tinued to teach for many years. Robert Rodam was buried in Abbeville County.
William Rogers spent his active life as a farmer and died in 1840. George McDuffie Rogers, one of four sons and three daughters, was about seven years old when his father died. He acquired his education in Williamston, and in early life had to assmne re- sponsibilities in advance of his years. He supported and tenderly cared for his mother, and finally took her to North Carolina for her health. While living there he had the romance of young manhood and was happily married in 1858. He continued to live in North Carolina until he went into the Confeder- ate army in 1862. He saw nearly two years of army service and then returned home.
Rev. Mr. Rogers returned to Anderson County in the fall of 1865. Since then he has made very few changes in residence, and has always been in Ander- son County. Success has attended him as a farmer. At the age of sixteen he was converted and at twenty-six joined the Baptist Church. Ten years later he was ordained a minister and for about forty years has preached in Anderson and surrounding counties and has been influential in the upbuilding of many church societies and in the construction of many church edifices.
Rev. Mr. Rogers has owed much to his noble wife and companion of his years. Mrs. Rogers was born in Transylvania County, North Carolina, January 2, 1844. a daughter of James H. and Nancy (Garren) Ducworth. Mrs. Rogers not only assumed the great responsibility of rearing four sons and six daughters but took an active part in the management of the farm while Mr. Rogers was engaged in his ministerial duties. They gave their children good educational advantages.
GEORGE CULLEN SULLIVAN, a former newspaper man and a veteran of the Spanish-American war, has en- joyed a large practice as a lawyer at Anderson for the past fourteen years.
He was born at Anderson February 9, 1878, a son of James Mattison and Mary Allice ( Wannamaker) Sullivan. His grandfather was Nimrod K. Sullivan. James Mf. Sullivan was born in Anderson County September 8, 1855, was educated in the private school of Professor W. G. Ligon at Anderson, and for a number of years was a hardware merchant in that city. being associated with the Sullivan Hardware Company of Anderson. A successful business man, he was frequently drawn into public affairs, being an ardent democrat. He was a member of the South Carolina Constitutional Convention of 1895, was a
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state Senator, and for several years mayor of An- derson, was a member of the South Carolina State Railroad Commission, and was living at Columbia when he died November 2, 1910. For several years he was president of the Anderson Chamber of Com- merce, and was a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
George Cullen Sullivan grew up in a good home and was well educated, attending public school. Patrick's Military Academy and Wofford College at Spartanburg. On leaving college he took up the newspaper business. An opportunity to vary his commonplace routine occurred with the outbreak of the Spanish-American war. He served as captain and quartermaster of the Second South Carolina Regiment of Infantry, and for three months was on the Island of Cuba. After his discharge he returned to Anderson and with G. P. Brown established the Anderson Daily Mail. A year later he abandoned newspaper work on account of ill health, and after a brief interval started to prepare himself for the practice of law. He was a student in the law depart- ment of the University of Michigan, and in 1904 graduated from the College of Law of Indiana- polis University in Indiana. He was admitted to the South Carolina bar in 1905, and has enjoyed an uninterrupted career as a successful lawyer at An- derson. For more than six years he has been city attorney, and for two years was president of the Anderson Chamber of Commerce. During the war with Germany he was chairman of the Anderson County Council of Defense for South Carolina, also government appeal agent for the largest exemption board in his county, and also was closely identified with all of the financial war drives in his state. He has been intensely interested in the encouragement of home ownership, and was president of the South Carolina League of Building and Loan Associations, and has been called upon to make several addresses on this subject before the United States League of Building and Loan Associations and before the State League of Massachusetts and other states.
Mr. Sullivan is a democrat, a member of the Knights of Pythias, and of the Rotary Club at An- derson, and is a vestryman in the Episcopal Church. He married Miss Sarah Lanius, of York, Pennsyl- vania. Their two children are Lanius Ebert and Cullen Carolyn.
ROBERT CHARLES HUDSON. This name belonging to prominent wholesale merchants of Greenville, suggests a number of well known and prominent names in South Carolina history.
Robert Charles Hudson was born at Sumter in Sumter County, a son of William Samuel and Mary Elizabeth (McNeill) Hudson, both now deceased. Through many generations the Hudsons have been a family notable for intellectual attainments and have given to the world mien distinguished by scholarship and work in the different learned professions and among these were Dr. J. W. Hudson, president of Mount Zion College of Winnsboro, South Carolina, for many years.
Mr. Hudson's grandfather was Robert Hudson, a native of Virginia and of English ancestry. After coming to South Carolina he married Miss Margaret Gregg. She was of that family which produced
Bishop Gregg of the Episcopal Church, and William Gregg, who built the first cotton mill in South Caro- lina.
The late William Samuel Hudson was one of the remarkable men of his time. He struggled upward from obscurity and poverty to rank among the most useful and widely appreciated men of his day. Cir- cumstances prevented his getting an education at school. Like other men known in history, this was no bar to his progress. He read and studied at every opportunity, possessed himself of a broad range of scholarly knowledge, and had all the marks of a man of genuine education. One of his important achievements was perfecting an improved cotton gin that became standard in use throughout the South. He also built the second railroad in South Carolina, and two other lines of railway in the lower part of the state. He had a constructive genius and excelled in his ability in administrative affairs. His later life was spent as a planter. From Marion he moved to Sumter, and for many years directed ex- tensive interests. In his reading and in his literary tastes he showed a wide range, including theology. Many learned divines often consulted him and sought his opinions on theological matters.
Mary Elizabeth McNeill, who became the wife of William Samuel Hudson, was born in Marion County, South Carolina, a daughter of William Campbell MeNeill, and granddaughter of Hector and Jane (Campbell) McNeill. Hector MeNeill was a scout in the service of the Continental army during the Revolutionary war. The MeNeills came from Scotland and settled in Robeson County, North Carolina, while Jane Campbell was descended from the Campbell elan of Argyle, Scotland, some of whom coming in pioneer times to North Carolina, founded Campelltown, now Fayetteville. These fam- ilies represented the best blood, the finest traditions and noblest characteristics of the Scotch race. Such were the people who founded the Presbyterian Church in North and South Carolina, and more than any others have stamped their character on the history of these two commonwealths.
Robert Charles Hudson has had an enviable suc- cess of his own, and his work has been no small contribution to the traditions of the family. He was first engaged in the wholesale grocery business at Bennettsville, South Carolina, and from there moved to Greenville in June, 1901. He continued in the wholesale grocery business until June or July in 1907, and on January 1, 1908, established the wholesale lumber business which has been continued under his direction for over ten years. He took up another wholesale line in 1914 when he founded the wholesale dry goods house of Hudson & Kohn. This firm specializes in handling the entire product of a number of cotton mills, and has direct rela- tions by trade with many of the important cities of the country.
Mr. Hudson has a number of other important re- lations with the business and community life of Greenville. In 1919 he was elected an elder in the Fourth Presbyterian Church. A similar post of hon- or in the Presbyterian Church had been held by some of his Scotch ancestors.
Mr. Hudson resides with his sister Mrs. Louise Mayes. Mrs. Mayes is one of the notable women
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of the Hudson family. For about four years she served as state regent of the South Carolina Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution. At Bennettsville, her former home, she organized one of the first units of the Federation of Women's Clubs in South Carolina, and in Greenville has been prominent in many philanthropic and club move- ments. She organized the Civic League, known as the Woman's Club. At the beginning of the war with Germany at the request of Governor Man- ning she organized the Women's Council of Defense for South Carolina. Most of hier time for nearly two years was devoted to the organization of War Camp Community Services. Through appointment of the governor, she is also a member of the State Board of Charities and Corrections, and in Novem- ber, 1919, was elected by the Presbyterian women of South Carolina, president of the Synodical Auxiliary. Mrs. Mayes married Francis J. Mayes, M. D., a na- tive of Mayesville, South Carolina, a prominent phy- sician and chemist, who died in the forty-first year of his age. He was vice president of the South Carolina Medical Association, and was a member of the South Carolina Legislature for a number of years. There were two children born to Mr. and Mrs. Mayes: Charles Francis, who served in the great World war as a chemist, and Mary Hudson, who served as a Red Cross worker in the City of Paris.
THOMAS DECATUR WOOD. Probably no man has come up from the ranks in Greenville County has achieved more real prominence as a doer of big things and has made his influence count for more in the life and affairs of his home county than Thom- as Decatur Wood of Fountain Inn.
Though Mr. Wood at one time knew and was in close contact with poverty, he represents one of the oldest and best families of Greenville County. His ancestors came from Virginia and have lived in Greenville County more than a century. He was born at Simpsonville in 1871, a son of T. C. and Mary E. (Allison) Wood. His grandfather T. C. Wood, Sr., lived in the Simpsonville community and died at the extreme age of a hundred and two years. T. C. Wood, the father of Thomas Decatur, was born near Simpsonville, served four years in the Confederate army in the Sixteenth Regiment of Hampton's Le- gion, was wounded at Harper's Ferry, and both he and his wife are now deceased.
Thomas Decatur Wood had the benefit of but very little schooling. He never attended school be- yond the fourth grade. Natural talent and broad ex- perience have made him a well educated man. One factor that has counted much in his advancement as a leader of men is a natural gift for genuine ora- tory. Many people have observed that when his heart is in the cause he can in a speech or in per- sonal contact present his subject so clearly and con- vincingly and in such well chosen words as to allow no successful controversion.
When Mr. Wood married in 1880 he had to borrow $60 to equip himself and his bride in setting up housekeeping. He paid the debt by work in a saw- mill. Later he was made general manager of a mercantile and manufacturing establishment at Simpsonville and finally acquired an interest. The
business grew rapidly and he and his associates made money.
Mr. Wood is best known in industrial circles for the part he has taken in the development of Foun- tain Inn and its industrial plant the Fountain Inn Oil Mill Company. He took charge in 1912, when the industry was losing money, its volume of business aggregating only $130,000 a year. The oil mill was established in the early 'gos and manufactured cot- ton seed products. Under Mr. Wood the business has grown rapidly, employs a large force of work- men, and its total business for 1918 aggregated two and three-quarters millions of dollars, and in 1919 it is estimated the business will run to nearly three million dollars.
A few years ago a commentator who had followed the career of Mr. Wood at Fountain Inin wrote of him : "He took over the oil mill when that institution was dying of dry rot and has made it one of the most successful and progressive mills in the South. He has shown many struggling farmers the way to a broader success. He has taught the value of the intelligent use of fertilizer and the folly of fertilizing indiscriminately. In community affairs he has been invariably on the side of progress and of righteous- ness. He is big hearted, liberal, charitable, slow to hate and quick to forgive and his heart is pure."
A large number of community causes in recent years has received such intelligent and vigorous par- ticipation from Mr. Wood as to make him a well known figure in the state at large. During the war he took the lead in putting the Fountain Inn com- munity over the top in various drives, including the Young Men's Christian Association campaign, and those for the relief of various nationalities. During the war he was also a district organizer for the United States Department of Labor, completing his work in that position December 1, 1918. The Fed- eral Director of the service wrote to him: "We wish to thank you for the able and efficient manner in which you have discharged the duties entrusted to you. But for your hearty and enthusiastic work the service could never have done for South Car- olina and the nation what it has done, and I wish to express to you my sincere appreciation and assure you that I will always have the most pleasant recol- lections of our association together." In this ca- pacity Mr. Wood was influential in bringing thou- sands of idle men and women to important tasks of helping win the war. It is said that in one county his efforts brought about an increased produc- tion of cotton to the extent of 10,000 bales. His work was not confined to one locality, but covered practically the entire state.
Mr. Wood has also been one of the prominent men in several of the race conferences held in Upper South Carolina. These conferences are an invaluable factor in promoting greater harmony between the white and black races, and in making adjustments which are, as many disturbances over the nation prove, of the most vital importance to the future welfare of the entire country as well as to the South.
Mr. Wood is a member of the Baptist Church. He married Miss Florence M. Hughes of Greenville County. They have eight living children named Lela, Jennie, Avery, Thomas, Fred, Sallie, Dan, Lottie.
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The older children have all received the best ad- vantages of college training.
Avery W. Wood is one of the heroes of the great war. le volunteered in the Navy when only seven- teen years old and was on the San Diego when it was blown up off the port of New York and had to float around in the water for several hours before being rescued. A hundred and sixty men lost their lives at that time. Before the war was over he had advanced to the rank of a gunner's mate, and on the basis of his record and real fitness Senator Benet of South Carolina awarded him an appointment to the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, which he entered as a cadet student in June, 1919.
HALCOTT PRIDE GREEN since 1891 has looked after the interests of a large general practice as a lawyer at Columbia, and in professional skill and attainments ranks high among the lawyers of his' native state. His family has for several generations enjoyed sim- ilar recognition among the capable and high minded citizens of this state.
He is descended from a Green family of England, two or three brothers of which came to America in colonial times. One of them settling in Virginia was the founder of the family branch from which the North and South Carolina Greens are descended. General Nathanael Greene, famous as a leader of the American forces in the Revolutionary war, was of Rhode Island and was descended from a New England branch of the same family.
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A direct ancestor of the Columbia lawyer was Farnifold Green who on coming to Eastern North Carolina settled at Newbern. He was a Quaker, and prior to the Revolutionary war was killed by the Tuscarora Indians. His son Farnifold Green was the father of Dr. James West Green, great-grand- father of Halcott Pride Green of Columbia. This Doctor Green married the eldest daughter of Gen. Allen Jones of Mt. Gallant, North Carolina. The only child of that marriage was Allen Jones Green, who was the only grandson of Gen. Allen Jones and who as a young man served in the United States Navy with the rank of Past Midshipman. He mar- ried Lucy Pride Jones, daughter of Maj. Cadwallader Jones of Monte Calloux, Prince George, Virginia, who was aide de camp to General LaFayette, by whom he was presented with a Toledo Sword Blade. Between 1805 and 1810 Allen Jones Green removed to South Carolina and located on a plantation at Landsford in Chester District on the Catawba River near the home of Gen. William R. Davie, who was a kinsman of Maj. Cadwallader Jones and had also come from North Carolina. Allen Jones Green died at Landsford and about 1832 his widow removed to Columbia to rear her children. In her family be- sides the father of Halcott Pride was Dr. Allen Jones Green, who became mayor of Columbia in April. 1859, and later removed to Alabama; also Dr. Frederick Lafayette Green, who married Mrs: Virginia Colclough who was a Miss Gnerry, and an aunt of Bishop Guerry of South Carolina.
Halcott Pride Green, Sr., married Miss Virginia Taylor, daughter of Benjamin F. Taylor of Columbia. The names of their children were Allen Jones Green, a lawyer, who married Helen Singleton; Sally Coles Green who became the wife of Albert Rhett Hey-
ward; Eliza Taylor Green, who married Richard Singleton; Mary Caroline Green, who married W. St. Julian Jetvey of Charleston; Miss Amaryllis and Halcott Pride Green.
The elder Green was a planter before the war, owning a fine property where the Olympia and Granby cotton mills now stand. From that planta- tion he furnished most of the brick that went into the building of the State House at Columbia. His home was in "town" on the corner of Senate and Pickens streets, near the property which had been purchased by his mother, and which is the block bounded hy Senate, Pickens, Pendleton, and Bull streets. It was on the lot where the McMaster School now stands that Halcott Pride Green first mentioned above was born November 3, 1866. The Green home had been used as a hospital for soldiers during the occupation of Columbia by Sherman's army. Halcott Pride Green, Sr., was one of the original members of the Grange, being secretary and treasurer when it was organized. When Gover- nor Hampton was elected in 1876 he appointed the elder Green as secretary and treasurer of the State Hospital for the Insane. He was the incumbent of that office until his death in March, 1891.
Halcott Pride Green, Jr., was educated in the Thompson and Barnwell schools of Columbia, grad- nated in the literary course from South Carolina College in 1887 and in law in 1888. He took up regular practice in 1891 after his father's death. By appointment of the governor he has on several oc- casions served as special judge in the Fourth and Sixth Judicial Circuits and by appointment of the State Supreme Court was special referee in litiga- tion involving the refunding of certain bond issues in the state.
Mr. Green married Miss Emma Boylston, a native of Charleston and a daughter of Samuel Cordes and Margaret (DuBose) Boylston. They are the parents of five children; Margaret DuBose, wife of Woods Dargan of Darlington; Miss Virginia Taylor Green, Miss Jessie Ross Green, Halcott Pride Green, Jr., and Samuel Cordes Green.
G. HEYWARD MAHON. Since early youth closely as- sociated with various phases in the great cotton in- dustry of the South, G. Heyward Mahon, who for twenty years has had his residence in Greenville, is widely known as an authority on all subjects per- taining to cotton planting, cotton manufacturing and cotton marketing. In recent years he has contrib- uted many articles to the newspapers and trade and technical journals on the subject and the range of his influence is not confined to his immediate trans- actions, though they constitute no inconsiderable volume of the cotton business of his native state. Mr. Mahon was one of the leading exponents of the cotton reduction movement that was inaugurated in the South early in the spring of 1919.
Mr. Mahon, who is also well known in the citi- zenship of Greenville as former mayor, was born at Cokesbury in Abbeville County, South Carolina, about fifty odd years ago. His parents Thomas and Harriet J. (Hodges) Mahon spent the greater part of their lives in Abbeville County. Leaving the Cokesbury High School at the age of sixteen G. Heyward Mahon went to Williamston in Anderson
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