William McDonald and Jane Lastinger McDonald, hosts of the first Lastinger Family Reunion, were the parents of Lacy McDonald.  Lacy McDonald later moved to Ray City, GA where he served as the mailman. His brother, Arthur Walton McDonald, was also connected with Ray City and a friend of Ray City Mayor, Dr. Charles X. Jones.

All six of Jane Lastingers brothers served in the Confederate States Army during the Civil War; five of them served in the Berrien Minute Men.

The Lastinger Family Reunions were held at Lacy McDonald’s home in Ray City in 1945, 1950 and 1953.

Children of Louisa English and William Lastinger. FRONT ROW (L to R): Henry Andrew Lastinger, Annis Lastinger Elliot, Elizabeth Lastinger Wilkerson, Peter Cornelius Lastinger. BACK ROW (L to R) Nebraska Lastinger, Kansas Lastinger, Joshua B. Lastinger, Arizona Lastinger, Lacy Elias Lastinger, William Hiram Lastinger, Jane Lastinger McDonald. Image courtesy of http://www.berriencountyga.com

Excerpted from the Lastinger Book:

The Lastinger Family Reunions

“In the early part of the year 1904, Mrs. Annis Elliot was visiting in the home of her sister, Mrs. Jane McDonald, at Cat Creek, (Lowndes County), Georgia, and they expressed the wish to have their brothers and sisters meet there for a family reunion.  Later, Mrs. Arizona Turner (another sister), was visiting her brother, Joshua B. Lastinger in Arcadia, Florida, when she made this wish known to him. It was fully decided that all the brothers and sisters meet on their father’s one hundredth birthday, which was October 1st, 1904. All were delighted to enter into this arrangement.  Thus the movement began with the first meeting being held at the home of William McDonald at Cat Creek in Lowndes County near the old home of William Lastinger, their father, who was born October 1, 1804 and departed this life in February of 1893 and who would have been one hundred years old at the day of this meeting.

“At this first gathering, there were present ten of the twelve children that had reached maturity. One child, Seaborn, lost his life in the Civil War, and William who lived in Texas was unable to be present. In addition there were present many grandchildren and great grandchildren, numbering more than one hundred. In a beautiful pine grove in front of the McDonald home a long table was spread and loaded with good things to eat for which South Georgia is noted.

“Henry being the oldest child was placed at the head of the table and in choice words, humbly thanked God for the happiness brought them on this occasion, and for God’s love and protection for having brought them thus far.  It was then that Cat Creek became the Ebenezer of the Lastinger Clan.  The afternoon was spent in social intercourse and at night a religious service was conducted by Henry, and ordained minister of the gospel. With a few exceptions, these reunions have been held annually and largely attended by the descendants of William Lastinger.

“All of the children of William Lastinger have ascended and live anew in the glorious world of God beyond the skies with the exception of Aunt Scrap, 84 years of age, still lives to bless nieces and nephews and spread joy and happiness wherever she goes, and to receive their love and homage.”

Thus is recorded the first Lastinger family reunion on pages one and two of the minutes book still in use (1960). Since the 1942 reunion minutes follow, this was evidently written up in that year.

Children of Louisa English and William Lastinger

1. Henry Andrew Lastinger, born November 20, 1832, Lowndes County, GA; enlisted August 1, 1861, Berrien Minute Men, Company C,  29th GA Regiment; married Emma J. Sinquefield on April 11, 1867; died December 28, 1906; buried Bold Springs Cemetery, Cairo, GA
2. Peter Cornelius Lastinger, born November 8, 1834, Lowndes County, GA; enlisted Octber 1, 1861 in Berrien Minute Men, Company D, 29th GA Regiment; married Joe Anna Sylvanah Isom on May 16, 1858 in Lowndes County, GA; died July 17, 1920 at Walkersville, Pierce County, GA; buried Ramah Cemetery, Pierce County, GA
3. Seaborn James Lastinger, born May 3, 1837, Lowndes County, GA; enlisted August 1, 1861 in  Berrien Minute Men, Company C,  29th GA Regiment; died September 15, 1863 at Charleston, SC; buried Union Primitive Baptist Church Cemetery, Lakeland, GA
4. Annis Lastinger, born September 6, 1839; married Robert Allen Elliot, June 24, 1855; neighbors of Thomas M. Ray, founder of Ray’s Mill; died June 8, 1913
5. Elizabeth Lastinger, born September 28, 1841; present May, 1861 at Grand Military Rally for Berrien Minute Men; married May 12, 1861 to William J. Wilkerson, son of William D. Wilkerson; died January 11, 1935 at Cat Creek, GA; buried at Union Primitive Baptist Church Cemetery, Lakeland, GA
6. Lacy Elias Lastinger, born August 3, 1843; enlisted Berrien Minute Men, Company D (later Co. K), 29th GA Regiment; married Sophronia J. Williams; died December 4, 1936; buried Woodlawn Cemetery, Adel, GA
7. William Hiram Lastinger, born April 23, 1845; served in Berrien Minute Men, Company C (later Company G, 29th GA Regiment); married Georgia Augusta Jones, December 13, 1866; later moved to Waco, TX. Died December 23, 1918. Buried Oakwood Cemetery, Waco, TX
8. Joshua Berrien Lastinger, born February 22, 1847; said to have served with the 5th Georgia Reserves; married Louisa Bowden, December 25, 1870; later moved to Florida; died October 15, 1931, at Arcadia, FL; buried Owens Cemetery, Arcadia, FL.
9. Jane Lastinger, born October 11, 1849; married William C. McDonald; died April 1, 1918; buried Cat Creek Cemetery.
10. Kansas Lastinger, born September 19, 1855; married Francis Marion Smith; died January 28, 1907 at Fitzgerald, GA; buried Brushy Creek Church.
11. Arizona Lastinger, born November 27, 1859; married 1) Robert K. Turner, on January 24, 1900, 2) William C. McDonald, on July 27, 1919; died February 15, 1954; buried at Cat Creek Cemetery, Lowndes County, GA.
12. Nebraska Lastinger; born October 6, 1857; married Dr. Joseph Gustavus Edie on December 13, 1888; died 1940; buried Old City Cemetery, Nashville, GA.

Related Posts:

Obituary of Mable Virginia McDonald Roberson

Billy McDonald at the University of Arizona

Grand Rally at Milltown

Berrien County in the Civil War
29th Georgia Regiment on Sapelo Island
Part 4: Berrien Minute Men and the Election of Officers

Randolph Spalding, first Colonel of the 29th Georgia Infantry Regiment, elected October, 1861

During the Civil War,  two companies of men that went forth from Berrien County, GA were known as the Berrien Minute Men.  October, 1861 to January, 1862, the campfires of the Berrien Minute Men  were made at Sapelo and Blackbeard islands protecting the approaches to Darien, GA on Doboy Sound and the Altamaha River.  The Berrien Minute Men arrived on Sapelo Island in early October.

Berrien Minute Men on Sapelo Island

1. Arrival On Sapelo
2. Place of Encampment
3. Camp Spalding
4. Election of Officers
5. Tidewater Time
6. In Regular Service

The two companies of Berrien Minute Men arrived on Sapelo Island without knowing who their regimental officers would be, or even which regiment they were in. The other companies in the no-name regiment on Sapelo were the Thomasville Guards and the Ocklocknee Light infantry, companies from Thomas County that had served with the Berrien Minute Men in the briefly constituted 13th Georgia Regiment at Brunswick, GA. Two other companies of the new regiment were still in Savannah.

The custom among the volunteer regiments of that time was that field officers were elected by popular vote of the troops, with the appointments officially made after confirmation by Army command. It was during the first few weeks on Sapelo Island, that the regiment held elections for the field officers. Among the candidates for Colonel were: Captain William H. Echols, a graduate of West Point and captain in the Engineering Corps of the Confederate Army; Cary Wentworth Styles who had commanded the 13th Regiment at Brunswick, and who, after the War founded the Atlanta Constitution;  and Randolph Spalding (1822-1862), who was master of the South-end Mansion on Sapelo Island and a son of Sapelo plantation founder Thomas Spalding.

William Holding Echols, a Captain of Engineers in the Confederate States Army, was a candidate for Colonel of the 29th GA Regiment.

The Berrien Minute Men and the Thomas county companies had experienced the leadership of Colonel Styles when they served with the 13th Georgia Regiment at Brunswick, and William W. Knight was of the opinion that they would never accept Styles as Colonel of the regiment.  The companies in Savannah preferred Echols, but the majority of the Regiment on Sapelo Island favored Randolph Spalding. The election was held on October 22, 1861.

October 23, 1861 Savannah Republican reports election of Levi J. Knight as Major of the 29th Georgia Regiment

Savannah Republican
October 23, 1861

Election of Officers. – An election for field officers of a new regiment to be composed of companies now in camp at our Parade Ground and on Sapelo Island, took place yesterday.  The vote of the Companies in this city [Savannah] show a majority of 20 votes for Echols over Spalding for Colonel.  Alexander received a large majority for Lieutenant Colonel, and L. J. Knight the same for Major. The vote from Sapelo has not been received.

October 24, 1861 Savannah Republican reports election of Levi J. Knight as Major of the 29th Georgia Regiment

Savannah Republican
October 24, 1861

Military Election. – The election of field officers for the new regiment now encamped here and at Sapelo, resulted in the choice of Randolph Spalding Colonel by a majority of 20 votes. ——- Alexander was chosen Lieutenant Colonel, and Levi J. Knight, Major.

Randolph Spalding was chosen as Colonel, perhaps due to the home field advantage. He was a successful planter on the mainland and on Sapelo Island where he was master of the Spalding’s South End mansion. In addition, he was a Representative from McIntosh County for several terms. He later served on the staff of General William H.T. Walker. (He would die in camp at Savannah in March of 1862.)

Thomas Williamson Alexander was elected Lieutenant Colonel.

Thomas Williamson Alexander was elected Lt. Colonel of the 29th Georgia Regiment

Levi J. Knight advanced to Major of the newly formed Regiment.   Thomas Spalding Wylly, a nephew of Colonel Randolph Spalding and grandson of Thomas Spalding,  became Captain of Berrien Minute Men Company C.  Wylly was educated and experienced traveler, having joined an expedition to California in 1849. (Wylly later transferred to Clinch’s 4th GA Cavalry.) John C. Lamb was elected Captain of Berrien Minute Men Company D.

Thomas Spalding Wylly succeeded Levi J. Knight as captain of the Berrien Minute Men. Image source: Wendy Wylly

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Madge Sellers Guthrie

Madge Sellers married Ray City musician John Guthrie.  The couple opened a general store on Main Street in Ray City, on the lot now occupied by City Hall.

young madge sellers?

As a young woman, Madge contracted tuberculosis. She was treated in a sanitarium in South Carolina and cured.

Madge Sellers Guthrie, long time resident of Ray City, GA grew to adulthood in South Carolina.

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Madge Sellers Guthrie, of Ray City, GA, photographed at Ruby, SC, 1966.

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Madge Guthrie, August, 1969

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June 8, 1970 Madge Guthrie, Johnny Guthrie, John Guthrie

Related Posts:

• Madge Sellers Guthrie
• Guthrie Music School at Irene Church
• John Guthrie Brought Six Decades of Music to Ray City
• John Guthrie ~ Ray City’s Musician Extraordinaire
• Samuel G. Guthrie of Ray City, GA
• Martha Guthrie: Babe of the Indian Wars
• William Guthrie and the Bloody Battle of South Mountain
• Portrait of James and Sarah Guthrie

Special thanks to Wm Lloyd Harris for contributions to this post.

Albert Douglass, of Berrien County, GA served with the 26th Georgia Regiment after desertion from the Berrien Minute Men.

On August 28, 1862 in the first engagement of the Second Battle of Manassas (Bull Run), the 26th Georgia Regiment suffered heavy casualties at Brawner’s Farm.  G.F. Agee, a soldier of the 26th Georgia reported, “We held our fire until within a hundred yards of the enemy. We dropped behind a small rail fence and poured a heavy volley into them. After firing seven or eight rounds, we raised the rebel yell and charged.”

 Albert Douglass and the 26th Georgia Regiment

Albert B. Douglass, son of  Seaborn Douglass, came with his father and siblings from Hamilton County, FL to  Lowndes County, GA sometime before 1838.   About 1851 Albert Douglass, then a young man of 19,  married Abigail Shaw,  a daughter of Martin Shaw, Sr.  In the Census of 1860 Albert and Abigail were enumerated in Berrien County, Georgia.  Albert was  28 years old, Abigail was 35.  Their daughter Francenia  Douglass was enumerated as age 6.  Also in the Douglass household was the seven-year-old boy William W. Turner.

The Douglass Family had a tradition of military service. Albert’s father and brothers served in the Indian Wars 1836-1858. Albert and his four brothers all enlisted during the Civil War.  Albert Douglass enlisted with the Berrien Minute Men, Company D (later Co. K), 29th Georgia Regiment.  He soon went absent without leave and was listed as a Confederate deserter from the 29th Regiment while they were stationed in Savannah, GA.  In actuality, he joined the 26th Georgia Regiment and went with them to Virginia in the summer of 1862.   Also serving with the 26th Georgia Regiment were: David Stone, father of Arrilla Stone Cook of Berrien County, GA;  James Brown, father of Creasy Brown Wood of Rays Mill, GA; John Jefferson Beagles served with the unit until May 1862; Benjamin P. Jones, who later opened a bank at Ray Mill, served with the 26th until the regiment departed for Virginia, at which time he hired a substitute to take his place; Andrew Jackson Liles, Adjutant of the Regiment, was a merchant and post master of Milltown, GA, and later practiced law in Valdosta, GA.

Confederate military records show Albert Douglass was admitted to Chimborazo Hospital, Richmond, Virginia, for dysentery, June 29, 1862 and returned to duty  July 10, 1862. On August 14, he was admitted to Lovingston Hospital, Winchester, VA with a complaint of fever and convulsions.  He returned to duty on August 27, 1862.

The following day, the 26th Georgia Regiment suffered  horrific casualties at the opening of the  Battle of Second Manassas (called the Second Battle of Bull Run by the Union army), when Confederate forces under the command of Stonewall Jackson met Union Brigadier General John Gibbon’s Black Hat Brigade in the late afternoon and evening of August 28, 1862 near Groveton, VA.   Earlier that same afternoon about ten miles to the west, the Berrien Light Infantry, Company I, 50th Georgia Regiment had engaged federal forces, driving them out of  Thoroughfare Gap through the Bull Run mountains, and occupying the position at the gap.

According to a historic marker placed at Groveton, Confederate General Robert E. Lee had  dispatched “Stonewall” Jackson to lure Major General John Pope’s Union army away from the Rappahannock River.  At the same time, Lincoln hoped drawing some of Lee’s troops to northern Virginia to confront Pope would weaken Lee’s position outside Richmond and help the Army of the Potomac.”

On August 28, Jackson’s force concealed itself northeast of here near Groveton atop a wooded ridge on and beyond John Brawner’s farm to await the rest of Lee’s army.  Early in the evening, as Brigadier General Rufus King’s division of Pope’s army marched by in search of Jackson, he attacked, stopping the Federal movement with heavy casualties on both sides.

The 26th Georgia Regiment suffered 74 percent casualties that bloody summer evening in the Battle of Brawner’s Farm. This engagement began the Second Battle of Manassas.

John Brawner’s farm was located on the Warrenton Turnpike, on present day U.S. Highway 29 inside Manassas National Battlefield Park.

Brawner Farm, near Groveton, VA

By the morning of August 28, Jackson had deployed his 25,000 men along Stony Ridge, behind the embankments of a railroad grade of the unfinished Manassas Gap Railroad north of the little village of Groveton, near the old First Bull Run battlefield. From there, Jackson could monitor Union activity along the Warrenton Turnpike, a strategic east-west thoroughfare, while awaiting Longstreet’s arrival. Due to the concealment of Jackson’s defensive position, Pope had completely lost track of the Rebels’ movements after the destruction of Manassas Junction on August 27. Stonewall Jackson’s 25,000 soldiers were, in effect, missing as far as the Army of Virginia was concerned.

On the evening of August 28, Gibbon’s brigade of 1,800 Westerners sluggishly marched eastward toward the village of Centreville, where the majority of Pope’s army was massing. The 2nd Wisconsin (the only regiment in the brigade that had previously seen combat, at First Bull Run), the 6th and 7th Wisconsin and the 19th Indiana were getting very close to having a chance to show their mettle in battle. –  from Civil War Trust’s Battle of Brawners Farm

 

The first exchange of fire began about 5:45 pm.  The battle raged ferociously for two hours when General Stonewall Jackson ordered the 26th and 28th Georgia regiments to advance on the Union line.

In a letter to the editor of the Savannah Republican, a soldier of the 26th Georgia Regiment reported the Southern perspective on the battle:

Savannah Republican
September 22, 1862

The Twenty-sixth Georgia in the Battle of the 28th August

          Editor Savannah Republican: – While the opportunity presents itself, I cannot refrain from writing you a few lines commemorative of the gallantry of the 26th Georgia regiment upon the bloody and well contested field of Manassas, on Thursday, the 28th of August, 1862.
Again has Georgia been illustrated by this bravery of her sons, and again is it her lot to clothe herself in the mourning garb, in memory of the gallant dead. As we marched past the graves of the lamented Bartow and of the members of the Oglethorpe Light Infantry, of Savannah, little did we think that so many of us through whose veins the warm blood was so freely flowing, would, before the dawn of day, like them, be lying in the cold embrace of death.
Just before dark, on the evening of the 28th, General A. R. Lawton’s brigade, to which the 26th belongs, was drawn up in line of battle in a skirt of woods near the battle field, and at dark was ordered to support General Trimbull’s brigade.  The 26th entered the field under the command of Lieut. Col. E.S. Griffin, Major James S. Blain and Adjutant A. J. Liles. We marched steadily across an open field for four or five hundred yards, through which the balls were flying by thousands, without firing a single shot.  Men were constantly falling from the ranks, but our brave Georgians wavered not; as a man fell, his place was immediately filled by another, and the regiment moved steadily to the front.  Not a word was uttered except the necessary commands given by officers.  As we neared the enemy, General Jackson road up behind the brigade and urged us by the memory of our noble State to one bold stroke, and the day would be ours; and gallantly did the brave men to whom he was speaking obey his orders.  Volley after volley was poured into the ranks of the enemy with terrible effect; still they held their ground and our ranks kept getting thinner and thinner. During the heavy fire, Lieut. Col. Griffin, of the 26th was wounded and the command devolved upon Major J. S. Blain.  After firing several rounds, Gen. Lawton gave orders for the brigade to fix bayonets and charge the enemy. At the command every man bounded over a fence which separated them from the enemy, and with the true Georgia yell rushed upon them.  Then it was that the 26th suffered so terribly.  Men fell from the ranks by dozens still they wavered not.  The color Sergeant fell mortally wounded; but the colors had hardly touched the ground before they were raised by Lieut. Rogers of the color company, and again waved in the advance.- Then it was that a well directed volley from the brigade, at a distance of thirty yards, sent the enemy flying in confusion over the hills to the woods.  The night being very dark no pursuit was attempted; we had accomplished our object and was content to hold the battle field.
It was a heart sickening sight to me as I gazed upon the regiment when formed after the battle.
The 26th Georgia entered the field with eighteen commissioned officers and one hundred and seventy-three non-commissioned officers and privates; and lost twelve commissioned officers and one hundred and twenty-five non-commissioned officers and privates.
I send you a list of the killed and wounded of the 26th Georgia regiment, which I hope you will publish, with the request that the Macon Telegraph and Augusta Constitutionalist copy.

Very respectfully,
Your obedient serv’t,
One of the 26th.

Letter from a soldier of the 26th Georgia Regiment describing the Battle of Brawner’s Farm, August 28, 1862.

The Northern troops had a different perspective on the fight, as described at the  Civil War Trust website on the Battle of Brawners Farm:

Jackson personally ordered Lawton’s Georgia brigade to move forward at 7:45 p.m., but once more only two regiments responded. Jackson led the Georgians toward their parlous undertaking. In the fading sunlight, the 26th and 28th Georgia advanced obliquely toward the 2nd Wisconsin. Their attack was short-lived.

As they advanced, the 7th Wisconsin and the 76th New York wheeled to the left and poured a lethal volley into the Rebels’ flank. Colonel William W. Robinson of the 7th Wisconsin wrote, ‘The evolution was executed with as much precision as they ever executed the movement on drill. This brought us within 30 yards of the enemy.’

One man in the 7th reported, ‘Our fire perfectly annihilated the rebels.’ While the Southerners received fire from their flank, the 2nd Wisconsin poured deadly volleys into the Georgians’ front. ‘No rebel of that column who escaped death will ever forget that volley. It seemed like one gun,’ said one New Yorker.

The 26th Georgia suffered 74 percent casualties in its feckless assault (134 of 181 men). One Wisconsin officer noted: ‘Our boys mowed down their ranks like grass; but they closed up and came steadily on. Our fire was so terrible and certain that after having the colors in front of us shot down twice they broke in confusion and left us in possession of the field. They left their colors upon the field.’  – from Civil War Trust’s Battle of Brawners Farm

After the decimation of the 26th Georgia Regiment, the battle raged on through sundown.  The fighting subsided after 8:00pm and at 11:00 the federal troops withdrew toward Manassas Junction.

The Savannah Republican later ran a list of the casualties suffered by the 26th Georgia Regiment.

Savannah Republican, September 22, 1862

LIST OF THE KILLED AND WOUNDED OF THE 26th GA. REG’T IN THE BATTLE OF MANASSAS, AUGUST 28th, 1862.

FIELD AND STAFF
Killed: None. Wounded: Lieut. Col. E.S. Griffin, neck and shoulder; Adjutant A.J. Liles, neck and shoulder; Serg’t Major E.H. Crawley, arm and hip.

CO. A    BRUNSWICK RIFLES, LT. N. DIXON, COMMANDING
Killed: None. Wounded: Lt. N. Dixon, shoulder; Orderly Sergeant Urbanus Dart, fore-arm; Serg’t John J. Spears, abdomen; Corp’l John Pacety, in right breast; Privates Patrick Burney, hand; Jas. Barrett, arm; Jas. G. W. Harris, thigh; George Holmes, both legs; Jos. McLemore, hand; Daniel Cronan, arm and shoulder; Jno. Niblo, abdomen; Thos. Cumming, heel; Felix F. McMermott, hand.

CO. B    McINTOSH GUARDS, LIEUT. E. BLOUNT, COM’DG.
Killed: None. Wounded: Sergeant Wm. Flauk, right breast; Serg’t Wm. B. White, arm; Private Jas. Danvergue, shoulder. Missing: Privates Geo. Rowe, Jas. Townson.

CO. C    PISCOLA VOLUNTEERS, LT. J. H. HUNTER, COM’DG.
Killed: Color Sergeant Thos. J. Durham, Orderly Sergeant W. S. Hines; Privates John Alderman, Virgil A S Edwards, John P. Hunter, Mathew Smith, Eli C. Mitchell, Robert A Jackson. Wounded: Lieut. J. H. Hunter, abdomen; Privates John Southern, abdomen; Jas. H. Southern, both thighs and hip; John M. Burch, knee; Zach McLeod, hand; Clayton Herring, thigh; S. Brannan, head and eye.

CO. D   SEABOARD GUARDS, LT. E. L. PEARCE OF THE WIRE GRASS MINUTE MEN, COM’DG.
Killed: Privates W. L. Davis, A. J. McClellan, C. B. Gray. Wounded: Corporal J. T. Cooper, hand; Privates Wesley Rowland, knee; Lewis Perdon, thigh; A. J. Herrin, head. Missing; Private David Kean.

CO. E.    WIRE GRASS MINUTE MEN, CAPT. JOHN LEE, COM’DG.
Killed: Lt. Jas. Riggins; Privates J. B. Riggins, T. S. Trowell, Jos. E. Trowell. Wounded: Capt. John Lee, hand; Lt. E. L. Pearce, arm broken; Serg’t J. A. Hogan, head; Corp’l. Wm. A. Thompson, leg; Privates Joseph E. Harper, knee; Wm. J. Morris, arm, knee, and body; E. A. Elliott, shoulder, breast, leg and hand; R. J. Joiner, arm; A. McSwain, shoulder; Mitchell Sweat, foot; W. J. Murray, hips and legs.

CO. F    WARE GUARDS, CAPT. T. C. LOTT, COM’DG.
Killed: Capt. T. C. Lott, Corp’l Jefferson Goettee, Private Lewis Williams. Wounded: Lt. J. T. Patterson, head, arm and breast; Serg’t R. Sweat, knee; Privates Daniel Patterson, leg; Henry Guess, Knee; Moses Coleman, thigh; A. Goettee, left breast and side; John Sellers, hip; R. B. Phillips, wound unknown.

CO. G.    OKEFENOKEE RIFLES, CAPT. JOHN ARNETT, COM’DG.
Killed: Corp’l A. J. Milton, Wm. Waters. Private Jesse Robinson. Wounded: Capt. J. Arnett, side and arm; Sergt. McD. M. Boothe, arm. Privates E. Johnson, thigh; H. Robinson, hand; Wm. Smith, thigh; Benj. Roach, shoulder and breast; Clemons H. Carter, abdomen; David Stone; abdomen; D. Dougherty, head; Willis McPhearson, face; Eaton Taylor, arm; Peter Spikes, wounded and in the hands of the enemy.

CO. H    BARTOW LIGHT INFANTRY, LIEUT. H. H. SMITH, COM’DG.
Killed: Privates Jennings Johnson, Langdon Turnbull, Lafayette Dees, Willet Yarborough, Madison Walker, Irwin Moore. Wounded: Lieut. H. H. Smith, arm. Privates John H. Dasher, hip and abdomen; Richard Moore, leg broken; Wm. C. Wilkinson, through the shoulder and arm broken; S. Cunningham, hand; Lawrence Lawson, leg; Toby Hewett, heel; James Allen, body; George Carter, arm; Jesse More, head; Jesse Adams, ear; Martin Knight, shoulder; Gus. Strickland, hand; W. Hunt, arm.

CO. I    FAULK INVINCIBLES, LIEUT. D. N. NELSON, COM’DG.
Killed: Sergt. Benj. Radford, Corp’l John Hammock, Privates Micajah Paulk, Thomas Saunders. Wounded: Privates Wm. Lamb, arm and thigh; R. McConnell, knee; Benj. Vincent, hand; Patrick Nolan, leg; Wm. Crawford, hip; Noell Hills, lower part of abdomen; J. P. Rickerson, thigh and arm; H. A. Pruett, leg; H. H. Manning, shoulder.

CO. K    FORREST RANGERS, LIEUT. VINCENT A. HODGES, COM’DG.
Killed: Lieut. V. A. Hodges, Sergt. Mark C. Chauncey. Privates Joel Spikes, John Griffins, John Summerlin, Thomas M. Bennett.
Wounded: Sergt. L. T. Morgan, left breast; Corp’l Wm. Smith, left breast. Privates Benj. Smith, in the leg; Wm. B. Booth, thight; J. B. Mills, neck; C. H. Hall, thigh; Wm. S. Ginn, right breast; Thompson Harris, head; J. N. McQuaig, arm and abdomen; Wm. Agu, hand; Jesse G. Booth, hand; D. H. Smith, hip; John Sweat, foot.

26th Georgia Regiment casualties at the Battle of Brawner’s Farm

The Battle of Brawner’s Farm was the opening engagement of the  Second Battle of Manassas, August 29-30.

During the battle, on August 29, 1862  both  the 26th GA and the 50th GA regiments were in positions at Groveton, VA.    A number of men serving with the 50th were from the Ray City area including Green Bullard, Fisher J. Gaskins, Lemuel Elam Gaskins, Joseph Gaskins,  John Jasper Cook and John Martin Griner.

The 26th GA Regiment was present the following month with Lawton’s Brigade at the Battle of Antietam, where they again suffered heavy casualties on September 17, 1862.

On October 19, 1862  Albert Douglass was admitted to 1st Division, General Hospital Camp Winder and transferred to Hod Hospital on December 23, 1862. He was back on the morning report of Winder Hospital on December 24, and then transferred to Ridge Hospital. While he was in the hospital  in December 1862, the 26th Georgia Regiment participated in the Battle of Fredericksburg.

In May, 1863 the 26th Georgia Regiment was at the Battle of Chancellorsville.

Albert Douglass was admitted to Receiving and Wayside Hospital (General Hospital No. 9)  on June 4, 1863 and the following day he was discharged from the Confederate States Army.

Douglas later served with the Florida Militia and the Union Navy.

Related Posts:

• Reward Offered for Confederate Deserters
• Indian War Service of the Douglass Family
• Albert Douglass: Soldier Grey and Sailor Blue
• Berrien Minute Men at Brunswick ~ July, 1861
• Berrien Minute Men on Sapelo Island: Part 1
• Campfires of the Berrien Minute Men
• 29th Georgia Regiment Soldier Killed by Fellow Soldier

One of the early roads in Berrien County described by William Green Avera was, “the road from Milltown northward to Tyson Ferry on the Alapaha River just east of the present site of Alapaha. This road pass[ed] by the residence of the late John Studstill, first sheriff of Berrien County, later the home of Joe Studstill, his son; Stony Hill, the old residence of the late Moses C. Lee; Keefe and Bullocks Turpentine still; the residence of the late J. H. Rowan [and] the residence of his widow, Mrs. Phoebe Rowan; the residence of the late William Gaskins — the grandfather of the late Alvah W. Gaskins of Nashville, GA.”    At  Tyson Ferry,  the Milltown road intersected the Coffee Road.

Monday, June 19, 2017, Julian Fields led a field trip to the site where the ferry on the old Coffee Road crossed the Alapaha River. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7_-0AzgKgw

It was the 1823 opening of the Coffee Road that led to the creation of Lowndes County, which then covered a vast area of Wiregrass Georgia including present day Berrien County, GA.   When  John Coffee first cut through the wilderness, there was no ferry or bridges.  Early travelers on Coffee road traversed the Alapaha river  at Cunningham’s Ford. With seasonally high water, the river was no doubt difficult, if not impossible to cross.

It appears that some time prior to 1836, a ferry was established over the Alapaha for the convenience of Coffee Road travelers.  Marsh’s Ferry was operated by Reuben Marsh, an early settler of Irwin County who was one of the commissioners appointed by the legislature to fix the location of the county seat, Irwinville.

THE LOPAHAW BRIDGE

In 1836 the Georgia Assembly provided partial funding for the construction of a public bridge over the Alapaha River. Later records of the Inferior Court of Irwin County indicate  Tyson Ferry was later put into service to replace this bridge .

1836 Georgia Act to construct a bridge across the Lopahaw River

       AN ACT, To appropriate the sum of eight hundred dollars, to build a Bridge across the Lopahaw.
      Whereas, it is all important that a Bridge should be built across the Lopahaw, at or near Coffee’s Road, and whereas, the citizens are unable to build the said Bridge, and whereas, a subscription is on foot to raise or contribute eight hundred dollars which is thought will be about one half of the amount necessary and requisite to build and erect a substantial Bridge, for remedy whereof:
       Sec. 1. Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the State of Georgia in General Assembly met, and it is enacted by the authority of the same, That Jacob Polk of the county of Irwin, Daniel Grantham, Sen’r. John McMillon, be and they are hereby authorized to draw and appropriate the sum of eight hundred dollars, for the purpose of building a Bridge over and across the Lopahaw, at or near where the Coffee Road crosses the said river, and for the repair of Coffee’s Road.
       Sec. 2. Be it enacted by the authority of the same, That the said Commissioners shall give bond and sufficient security for the faithful discharge of their duty, and properly to expend the aforesaid sum for the erection of said Bridge.
        Sec. 3. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, That His Excellency the Governor, be, and he is hereby authorized and required, on the receipt of said bond as before required, to pay the amount of eight hundred dollars to the said Commissioners aforesaid, out of any money in the treasury not otherwise appropriated.

JOSEPH DAY,
Speaker of the House of Representatives.
ROBERT M. ECHOLS,

President of the Senate.
Assented to, Dec. 26, 1836.
WILLIAM SCHLEY, Governor.

It appears that the Lopahaw bridge was not constructed on the direct path of Coffee Road over the Alapaha, for at the February 1838 term of the Inferior Court of Irwin County marking commissioners were appointed to lay out a route which bypassed the ford and proceeded over the public bridge, rejoining Coffee road after the crossing.

At February term, 1838, Jacob A. Bradford, John Harper and Leonard Jackson, appointed commissioners to lay out and mark road, leaving Coffee road near Cornelius Tyson’s to public bridge on Alapaha, thence to intersect Coffee road
at or near Micajah Paulk’s, Sr. 

When the  Inferior Court of Irwin County next met road commissioners were appointed for Coffee Road, to include the new routing over the public bridge.

At July term, 1838, Leonard G. Jackson, Shaderick Griffin and Andrew McClelland, appointed commissioners on road, commencing at C. Tyson’s to public bridge on Alapaha, then to intersect Coffee road near Micajah Paulk’s, they to commence at county line and ending at district line.

There is reason to question just how long this bridge remained in service, for in 1841, Georgia experienced a severe, wide-spread flood known as the Harrison Freshet:

In the early part of March, 1841, after President Harrison’s inauguration, the big fresh occurred west of the Oconee, and the Ocmulgee, Flint and Chattahoochee rivers, and all other smaller streams, contained more water and produced greater damage than ever known. In this section the last inundation was also called the Harrison freshet; hence the confusion that arose many years afterwards in distinguishing which was the proper Harrison fresh. The discrimination was, however, distinctly recorded at the time of the occurrences. The fresh of May and June, 1840, while the convention was held at Milledgeville, was named by the Democrats, “The Nomination Freshet,” and the fresh of March, 1841, was also named by the same “unterrified” authority “The Harrison Inauguration Freshet.” An iron spike was driven into the western abutment of the [Macon] city bridge by Mr. Albert G. Butts, denoting the highest water ever in the river down to that time, March, 1841. The spike still remains, and is inspected at every freshet in the Ocmulgee.

The flood of the Harrison Freshet is known to have washed away bridges on the Alapaha River.   “Few bridges on the common streams … stood the shock.” The Milledgeville Federal Union declared it a 100 year flood.  The “extraordinary flood…caused awful damage in Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina” with major erosion, land slides, “roads rendered almost impassable, and plantations disfigured with enormous gullies.”

Whether or not the Lopahaw Bridge weathered the storm is not known, but Clement’s History of Irwin County relates that “the public bridge” over the Alapaha was condemned at the January 1856 term of the Irwin County Inferior Court.

TYSON FERRY

At the same 1856 term of court according to James Bagley Clements’ History of Irwin County, “Cornelious Tyson was granted authority to erect a ferry on Alapaha River on the Coffee road at the location of the condemned bridge and he is allowed to charge the following rates: man and horse, six and one-fourth cents; horse and cart, twenty-five cents; four-horse wagon, fifty cents; horse and buggy, thirty-seven and one-half cents.” 

Cornelius Tyson was one of the five marking commissioners appointed by the state legislature in 1856 to fix the boundary lines of the newly created Berrien County.  Cornelius Tyson is enumerated in Berrien County, GA as Cornelius Tison in the Census 1860.

Leon Bradford (1905-1962)

Leon Bradford and W. B. Parrish, February, 1951, at the diner in Nashville, GA. Leon Bradford owned a barbershop in Ray City.

Leon Bradford was born December 5,1905 and raised at Ray City, GA. He was a son of Mack Talley Bradford and Margaret R. “Maggie” Gaskins.  His parents owned a farm on the Nashville & Valdosta Road, in the Connell’s Mill District near Ray City.

Leon and his brothers all attended school when they were of age. When Leon was about 13 years old, his father fell off a ladder. Although Mack Bradford’s injuries from the fall seemed minor, in just a short time he was dead.

For a time, Leon’s mother continued to farm the family place near Ray City. Leon’s older brother, Albert Bradford, worked as a farm laborer.

It appears that after the 8th grade, Leon Bradford had to give up school.  By 1930, Leon’s brother, Albert was married and had a place of his own. Leon’s mother moved with his two younger brothers to a farm at Cat Creek, GA, about ten miles southwest of Ray City. Leon moved into town at Ray City and took up the trade of barbering.  In 1930, he was boarding with Pleamon and Minnie Sirmons in their Ray City home.

About 1934, Leon married and in 1935  Leon and Dora Bradford became the parents of Patricia Bradford. The Bradford home was on Main Street in Ray City. They were neighbors of Hun and Gladys Knight, and the Knight’s boarders Hazel Tabor and Dorothy Chisholm who were both school teachers. Other neighbors of the Bradfords included George and Cynthia Swindle, Raymond and Jeanette Philipps, Marvin and Arlie Purvis, and Garth and Jessie Mae Webb. Patricia Bradford attended the Ray City School.

Leon Bradford had his own barbershop, located on the south side of Main Street just east of the tracks of the Georgia & Florida Railroad.  Just across the street was the Victory Soda Shop  and next door was the grocery store owned by Marvin and Arlie Purvis. A few doors down was another barber shop owned by Lyman Franklin Giddens.  On Saturdays, Wayne Putnal worked at Bradford’s barbershop cutting hair and giving shaves. Leon Bradford spent his career grooming the citizens of Ray City, GA.

It appears the Bradfords were Methodists. Patricia Bradford attended the Methodist retreats at Epworth on St. Simon’s Island, GA. Like his father before him, Leon Bradford was an active member of the Masons.

Leon Bradford died May 27, 1962 in Berrien County, GA. He was buried with others of the Bradford and Gaskins family connections at Fisher Gaskins Cemetery, located on Bradford Road six miles southwest of Ray City, GA.

Grave of Leon Bradford, Barber of Ray City, GA. Image source: Robert Strickland

Berrien County in the Civil War
29th Georgia Regiment on Sapelo Island
Part 5:  Tidewater Time

During the Civil War,  two companies of men that went forth from Berrien County, GA were known as the Berrien Minute Men.  From October, 1861 to January, 1862, the campfires of the Berrien Minute Men  were made at Sapelo and Blackbeard islands protecting the approaches to Darien, GA on Doboy Sound and the Altamaha River.  The Berrien Minute Men arrived in early October and were stationed on Sapelo Island along with the Thomas County Guards, Thomas County Volunteers and Ochlocknee Light Infantry.  Regimental officers were elected by the first of November. Through the fall, the men bided their time, fighting boredom and disease…

Berrien Minute Men on Sapelo Island

1. Arrival On Sapelo
2. Place of Encampment
3. Camp Spalding
4. Election of Officers
5. Tidewater Time
6. In Regular Service

The soldiers of the 29th Georgia Regiment lamented their defensive position so far from the action of the war.   William J. Lamb and Thomas L. Lamb left the Berrien Minute Men in October to join Company E, 54th GA Regiment. Moses Giddens and John F. Parrish  left camp by the end of October. Parrish was a miller and took an exemption from military duty for service essential to the war effort; he later served as a judge in Berrien County. William Anderson, Enos J. Connell and Newton A. Carter left sick, but later returned to the regiment on Sapelo.

While languishing on the tidewater, the closest the 29th Regiment came to an enemy engagement was listening to the sounds of the Battle of Port Royal on November 7, 1861. Some 60 miles from the men on Sapelo Island, cannonade sounds from Port Royal may have carried over the distance due to an acoustic refraction caused by atmospheric conditions.  In the right combination, wind direction, wind shear, and temperature inversions in the atmosphere may cause sound waves to refract upwards then be bent back towards the ground many miles away. Numerous cases of acoustic refraction and acoustic shadows in Civil War battles have been documented.

Sounds of the Battle of Port Royal were heard sixty miles away by the Berrien Minute Men on Sapelo Island, GA.

The Battle of Port Royal was one of the earliest amphibious operations of the Civil War, in which a US Navy fleet under Commodore Samuel Francis Dupont and US Army expeditionary force of 15,000 troops under General Thomas West Sherman captured Port Royal and Beaufort,  South Carolina. The Confederate forces  defending the harbor at Fort Walker on Hilton Head and Fort Beauregard in Bay Point were completely routed  after a four hour naval bombardment.

Sergeant Robert Goodwin “Bobbie” Mitchell, of the Ochlocknee Light Infantry, Company E, 29th Georgia Infantry wrote  to his sweetheart, Amaretta “Nettie” Fondren in a letter home dated November 11, 1861, “How bad did it make me feel to remain here and listen to the booming of the cannon and not knowing but what every shot was sending death to some noble Georgian’s heart…How my blood boiled to be there.”

Sergeant Mitchell’s letter also reported that Colonel Spalding had gotten “shamefully drunk.” That fact was known to Spalding’s fellow plantation owners as well.  Charles C. Jones, who was Mayor of Savannah until August, 1861, wrote  in a letter to his father on November 9, 1861, that Colonel Spalding was supposed to have taken the regiment to South Carolina to participate in the defense of Port Royal, but it was rumored he was too drunk to do so.

The Battle of Port Royal dramatically exposed the vulnerability of the Confederate coast, ultimately leading to the abandonment of the Georgia sea islands.

 “The attack on Port Royal had a major impact on General Robert E. Lee, who took command of the Confederate Department of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida on November 8, 1861. As a result of his observations of the potential of the Union naval forces, Lee determined that the dispersed garrisons and forts that protected the widely scattered inlets and rivers could not be strengthened enough to defeat Union naval forces. Accordingly, he concentrated the South’s coastal guns at Charleston and Savannah. Making use of the Confederacy’s interior lines of communication, Lee developed quick-reaction forces that could move along the coastal railroads to prevent a Union breakthrough.” – HistoryNet

For a while after the fall of Port Royal, time continued to drag for the Berrien soldiers on the Georgia tidewater. The sick roll continued to grow. Isaac Baldree, John M. Bonds, John W. Beaty, James Crawford, William W. Foster, John P. Griffin, John L. Hall, George H. Harrell, Burrell H. Howell, Bedford Mitchell James, James S. Lewis, Thomas J. Lindsey, Edward Maloy, Newton McCutcheon, Samuel Palin,Thomas Palin, A.D. Patterson, John W. Powell, William J. Powell, James S. Roberts, Jason Sapp, Sidney M. Sykes, Levi T. Smith, Charles N. Talley, James B. White  and Thomas W. Beaty of Captain Wyllys’ company of Berrien Minute Men were absent on sick leave. Hyram F. Harrell, of Captain Lamb’s Company, left sick; he died on February 4, 1862.  On November 27, Hansell H. Seward and James A. Slater of the Ochlocknee Light Infantry were discharged from service at Darien, GA.

On Sunday, December 1, 1861,  Pvt. William Washington Knight wrote his wife that the weather was unseasonably warm.  William and his brother John were recuperating from severe colds.  Several of the men in camp on Sapelo Island were sick, and measles was spreading among the men.   William and his father, Major Levi J. Knight, were  up the river at Darien, GA, where they attended church together.  The town was later described by Union officer Luis F. Emilio, “Darien, the New Inverness of early days, was a most beautiful town…A broad street extended along the river, with others running into it, all shaded with mulberry and oak trees of great size and beauty. Storehouses and mills along the river-bank held quantities of rice and resin. There might have been from seventy-five to one hundred residences in the place. There were three churches, a market-house, jail, clerk’s office, court-house, and an academy.”   Wharves and docks were along the river.

Hugh E. Benton of the Thomas County Volunteers deserted the regiment on December 4, 1861. By this time, Sergeant Mitchell was frustrated and disgusted with the long inactivity of the 29th GA Regiment on Sapelo Island.  In his letter of December 9, 1861, from Sapelo, Mitchell complained of boredom in the camp.  Historian Lesley J. Gordan summarized Mitchell’s  despondence:

Far from the front, he found himself doing “nothing exciting or encouraging.”  The army seemed “cruel and despotic in its nature,” and he grew annoyed with the antics of his fellow soldiers, whom he deemed “rough and unrefined.”  

By mid-December, Berrien Minute Men Company D were on station at Camp Security.  Little is known about this camp except that it was “near Darien, GA” which would seem to place it on the mainland, rather than on the islands. Another soldier’s letter written from Camp Security and postmarked at Darien describes Camp Security as “one of the most abominable places on earth.”

Measles were soon rampant among the men. On December 18, Pvt. William Washington Knight wrote  from Camp Security, “Nearly all of our company have the measles.     Capt [John C.] Lamb has it.   We have eighteen privates fit for duty.    Reddin B. Parrish of our company son of Ezekiel Parrish died yesterday evening at sundown.     He was one of the best steadyest young men in our company.   Capt Lamb sent him home last night to be buried.”  The body of Redding Byrd Parrish was returned to Berrien County, GA.  The internment was at Pleasant Cemetery near Ray’s Mill (now Ray City), GA.

Grave of Redding Byrd Parrish, Pleasant Cemetery near Ray City, Berrien County, GA. Parrish died of measles December 17, 1861, while serving with the Berrien Minute Men at Camp Security, McIntosh County, GA. Image source: Terrell Anderson.

There were some sixty men of the regiment sick with measles including John Knight, Ed Lamb, J.S. Roberts, Jasper M. Roberts, John Clemants, and John W. McClellan among others.

On December 14, 1861, Colonel Randolph Spaulding resigned his position for unknown reasons. In a new election, Captain William H Echols, was elected Colonel of the regiment. But the Confederate War Department declined to permit Echols to accept the position, and he remained in his position with the Confederate Corps of Engineers.  Another election was then ordered and William J. Young was elected and commissioned as Colonel of the Regiment.

Most of the men recovered from the measles. Some didn’t. Nathan B. Stephens of the Thomasville Guards died of measles on December 11, 1861, at Darien. Henry C. McCrary died of measles on Christmas Day.  On New Year’s Eve, John C. Clements was put on sick leave.  Sergeant Lewis E. Cumby of the Thomas County Volunteers was sent home with measles and pneumonia and died on New Year’s Day, 1862.  Elbert J. Chapman, known to the Berrien Minute Men as “Old Yaller,” was furloughed. Chapman later deserted the Berrien Minute Men, joined another unit, was court martialed and executed for the desertion. John A. Parrish and John M. Griffin were absent on sick leave; Griffin never returned. E. Q. Bryant of the Thomas County Volunteers was at home sick.   Harrison Jones of the Berrien Minute Men was discharged with a disability January 12, 1862. Stephen N. Roberts and James S. Roberts, kinsmen of John W. Hagan, went home sick.  James returned to the regiment by February, 1862, but Stephen never recovered; he finally succumbed to pneumonia in Lowndes County, on January 6, 1863.

On January 1, and again on January 4, 1862,  Sergeant Mitchell wrote that there was drinking and fighting among the men.   The conditions of camp life had taken their toll on the morale of the men, but soon the 29th Georgia Regiment would be reported ready for action.

About Robert Goodwin Mitchell:

Robert Goodwin Mitchell was born on a plantation in Thomas county, Georgia, July 15, 1843, a son of Richard Mitchell and Sophronia Dickey. His father had served as a state representative from Pulaski County, before settling in Thomas. After some preliminary work in the neighborhood schools, Robert Goodwin Mitchell attended Fletcher Institute, at Thomasville, and later he was a student in the preparatory department of Mercer University for one term. When but eighteen years old, he volunteered for the Confederate service at Thomasville, and was mustered in Savannah in July, 1861, as color bearer, in Company E of the 29th Regiment. Mitchell had the natural countenance of a leader; He stood 6′ 2″, with blonde hair, grey eyes and a dark complexion. He was soon  appointed sergeant and at the re-organization in 1862, was made second lieutenant. When Gen. C. C. Wilson, of the 21st Regiment, was put in command of the brigade, including the 29th Georgia Infantry, Mitchell was appointed to the General’s staff as aide-de-camp. He married Amaretta Fondren on January 21, 1864. Mitchell was serving in the trenches under fire in the battle at Atlanta on July 22, 1864, and was severely wounded on the line southwest of the city, August 9, 1864. It was while Robert G. Mitchell was disabled from the wound he received in the war that he began the study of law. In 1865, he established a home south of Thomasville which grew to be a 2000 acre plantation. He went into a law partnership with his brother for a while before being appointed Solicitor General of the Southern Circuit. He was elected a state representative, then a state senator.   After serving his term as senator, Mitchell resumed his law practice until 1903, when he was elected judge of the superior court of the southern circuit of Georgia, to succeed Judge Augustin Hansell. The letters of Robert Goodwin Mitchell are part of the Robert Goodwin Mitchell Papers, Hargrett Rare Books & Manuscript Library, University of Georgia Libraries, Athens, GA.

Joshua Berrien Lastinger

Joshua Berrien Lastinger. Image detail courtesy of http://www.berriencountyga.com

Joshua Berrien Lastinger was born February 22, 1847 at the community then known as Allapaha, but later renamed Milltown and today known as Lakeland, GA. He was  a son of William Lastinger and Louisa English. In 1848 his father made a deal with Joshua Lee to acquire approximately 2225 acres of land to the west of the town with a large millpond partly on the lands, gin and gristmills operated by water power, and several farms and dwellings. To these William Lastinger added a sawmill, also powered by water. The mills became know as Lastinger’s Mills.

Joshua and his siblings grew up in a life of privilege at Stony Hill, the plantation his father established about six miles from the town. It is said that William Lastinger was the largest land owner, largest taxpayer and largest slaveholder in Berrien and Lowndes counties, owning over 100 slaves who worked on the Stony Hill plantation. The plantation house was a big two-story affair, and there was also an office building where Joshua’s father managed his agricultural interests.

According to William Green Avera, Stony Hill was on the road from Milltown [now Lakeland] to Tyson Ferry  where Coffee Road crossed the Alapaha River.  This road, one of the earliest in the county, passed the residences of John Studstill, first Sheriff of Berrien County. Stony Hill was later the residence of Moses C. Lee.

In 1862, Joshua’s father traded the Lastinger holdings to Henry Banks, of Atlanta, in exchange for 252 bales of cotton, 100 of which he sold for Confederate currency. Acquiring a new farm at Cat Creek, his father purchased more slaves to raise cotton. Thus, with their assets in slaves, cotton and Confederate currency, the Lastingers were fully invested in the future of the Confederate States of America. At the outbreak of the Civil War, all five of Joshua’s brothers joined the Berrien Minute Men and became enlisted in the 29th Georgia Volunteer Infantry Regiment. Joshua, being the youngest, joined the 5th Georgia Reserves. His sister, Elizabeth Lastinger, took up a collection for the Berrien Minute Men at a Grand Military Rally held at Milltown (now Lakeland) in May, 1861.

According to an article in the Highland County News-Sun:

Joshua Berrien Lastinger moved his family to Florida after the War Between the States. Their covered wagon, pulled by a team of oxen, carried Lastinger’s wife, Louisa, six daughters and necessities along with a few nursery trees to plant. After camping in tents a few nights along the way they stayed temporarily in the small settlement of Owens near Arcadia. Their stove was unloaded from the wagon and set up with the stovepipe tied to a tree.
Lastinger traveled inland on a hunting trip to an area near present Lake Placid. Upon his return to his family in Owens, he announced to his wife that he had found the garden spot of the world. So they packed up the girls and the wagon and headed out.
As they made their way through Henscratch en route to their new homesite, Lastinger noticed a sawmill. This sawmill would later provide the lumber for him to build a raft that he would use to float lumber across the lake for the construction of the family home. Before the home was completed they fought off mosquitoes by draping netting from tree to tree over their bedding.
By 1891, they were homesteading 160 acres in the area of the northeast shore of Lake Stearns, now called Lake June. This homesite is still known as Lastinger Cove and some of the trees he planted are still living near the lake.He was able to donate a sizable strip of land for the railroad right of way in 1916 when the Atlantic Coast Line was extended from Sebring, FL. Lastinger was born February 27, 1847, in Ware County, GA. He served in the 5th Georgia Infantry Reserves and was discharged in May 1865.
Joshua Berrien Lastinger died in Arcadia, FL October 15, 1931. He is buried in Mt Ephram Baptist Cemetery  [also known as Owen Cemetery] in Arcadia.

Death of Mack Talley Bradford (1874-1919)

Mack Talley Bradford was a son of Thomas Bradford and Martha Connell. His father was a native of Lowndes County, GA but as a young man had moved to Sumter County, Florida.  After serving in the Florida Cavalry in the Civil War, his father returned to Berrien County, GA where Mack Talley Bradford was born on July 7, 1874.

Mack Talley Bradford grew up on his father’s one-horse farm in the 1157th Georgia Militia District, Berrien County, GA. As a man, he was of medium height and build, with blue eyes and black hair.

On September 29, 1901, Mack Talley Bradford married Maggie R. Gaskins in Berrien County, GA. She was a daughter of Fisher H. Gaskins.  The marriage was performed by H. B. Peeples.

Mack Talley Bradford and Maggie R. Gaskins marriage certificate, September 29, 1901, Berrien County, GA

Mack and Maggie Bradford made their home on a farm in Connells Mill District on the Nashville & Valdosta Road, not far from the farms of Flemming B. Gaskins and Harmon Gaskins.

Children of Mack Talley Bradford and Margaret R. “Maggie” Gaskins

1. James Albert Bradford (1902 – 1990)
2. Leon Bradford (1905 – 1962)
3. Cora Bradford Strawder (1907 – 1994)
4. Perry E. Bradford (1910 – 1936)
5. W Henry Bradford (1912 – 1913)
6. Olan Jackson Bradford (1914 – 1962)

Mack served as a traverse juror at spring ad-term, 1905, Berrien superior court, which met on the second Monday in June.  M.T. Bradford was a member of Woodmen of the World, a Mason, and a  southern Baptist. In 1909 Mack Talley Bradford attended the Program Union Meeting of the Southern District Mell Baptist Association held at Staunton church, January 29-31. The Saturday morning sermon at that meeting was delivered by Reverend Perry Thomas Knight. Mack Talley Bradford delivered the Sunday morning Devotional.

M.T. Bradford  was among the Ray City investors who received a State Bank Charter  to open the Bank of Ray’s Mill. The bank opened for business on August 14, 1911.  The principal bankers were Benjamin Perry Jones, President of the Valdosta Bank and Trust, and Vice President Clarence L. Smith.  The other investors were J.S. Swindle, J.H. Swindle,  W.H.E. Terry, Riley M. Green, and J. F. Sutton, all of Berrien county, and Charles Lee Jones and  J.B. Griffin, of Lowndes county. The Bank of Ray’s Mill  would later be known as the Citizens Bank of Ray City.

On September 12, 1918, Mack Bradford registered for the draft in Nashville, GA.  He gave his address as RFD Route #2, Ray City, GA.

Mack Talley Bradford, WWI draft registration, Berrien County, GA

Tifton Gazette August 29, 1919 reports death of Mack Talley Bradford.

Tifton Gazette
August 29, 1919

Fall From Ladder Kills Berrien Farmer

Mack Bradford a young Berrien county farmer is dead from injuries that he received a day or so ago when he fell from a ladder. Mr. Bradford did not know his injuries were serious and in a short time after the accident he walked out into a field where he had some men at work. Later he complained of feeling badly and sat down to rest. Not feeling any better he sen his small boy who was with him to a nearby branch for some water. When the boy returned he found his father in a dying condition and before he could summon help Mr. Bradford was dead.

Grave of Mack Talley Bradford (1874-1919), Pleasant Cemetery, near Ray City, GA

Related Posts:

• Leon Bradford, Ray City Barber
• In 1934 Ray City was Noted Section of Berrien County
• Smith and Jones Open Bank at Ray’s Mill
• 1922 Spring Fever Hits Ray City
• Lyman F. Giddens’ Barbershop
• Virdie Futch and the National Elastic Shortage
• Marsh’s Ferry, the Lopahaw Bridge and Tyson Ferry

Otranto Survivor Describes Disaster

When the troopship Otranto went down on October 6, 1918 near the end of World War I,  Ray City and Berrien County, GA paid a heavy toll.  Ralph Knight and Shellie Webb, of Ray City, GA were among the Berrien County men who were drowned.

Before she broke up on the rocks many men were taken off the sinking Otranto  in a daring rescue by the H.M.S. Mounsey, Lt. Francis Craven commanding.  James Marvin DeLoach,  with many Ray City connections, James Grady Wright of Adel, GA, Henry Elmo DeLaney of Nashville, GA and Ange Wetherington  were among nearly 600 men who attempted the leap from the rails of the Otranto to the deck of the rescue ship.

Survivors were ferried by the Mounsey to Belfast, Ireland where the American Red Cross was  waiting for their arrival. Not knowing when or where the disaster would come, The American Red Cross had prepared in advance for disaster.  Of those who succeeded in leaping to the deck of Mounsey, some perished from injuries or exposure and were buried in Belfast, Ireland.

Many, many bodies washed ashore on Islay, Scotland and were buried in mass graves. Berrien men among the hundreds of Otranto dead  included  Benjamin F. McCranie, Jim Melvin Boyett, John Guy Coppage, Hiram Marcus Bennett, Lafayett Gaskins,  William C. Zeigler and other men.  Early Steward of Nashville, GA was among the very few who washed up on the rocky coast of Islay still living.   The lost Georgian soldiers would later be honored in the Georgia WWI Memorial Book, (SEE Also Ray City, GA Veterans of World War I), and Berrien County, GA would commission the first monument to commemorate American soldiers killed in the Great War.

In the U.S., the first news of the Otranto Disaster broke in the New York Times,  in page after page of reporting.  For weeks official news of the disaster trickled in, until finally in early 1919, returning Otranto survivors were able to tell their own stories.

Charles Vogt, a soldier from Allentown, PA  had boarded the steamship Otranto at the Port of Embarkation at Hoboken, NJ with the Berrien County men and other replacement recruits from Fort Screven, Georgia.  The Embarkation Service reported the steamship Otranto had sailed for England from New York, NY on September 25, 1918 at 12:40 PM with 699 military passengers. The Otranto joined Convoy HX50 transporting troops across the Atlantic to the war in Europe. But on the trip over, the HMS Kashmir collided with the Otranto, resulting in the sinking of the latter.  Charles Vogt’s harrowing story was published February 3, 1919 in the Allentown Morning Call:

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Allentown Morning Call
February 3, 1919

Allentown Soldier Home After Having Seen Hard Service. Was on the Otranto.

      Now that the boys of the 57th Field Artillery are home little by little some of the experiences they have gone thru are coming to earth. Charles Vogt, son of C. C. Vogt, the jeweler, who returned with the other Allentown boys who were members of the 57th F. A. told a Morning Call reporter of the story of his trip across on the ill-fated Otranto.
      He did not leave this country with the members of the 57th Field Artillery but left this country late in September of 1917 with replacement troops from Fort Screven. On the trip across there were two troop ships, the Otranto and the Casmir [HMS Kashmir], and the convoy [HX50]. The trip across had been without incident of notice until within twelve miles of the coast of Ireland, when they were caught in the worst storm in nineteen years.
     The Casmir which was to the left of the Otranto suddenly turned about at 8:40 a. m. in the heavy sea and bore down upon the Otranto. It was lifted to the crest of a huge roller and then descended on the Otranto, catching it aft of midships on the port side and ripping the Otranto from the B-deck to below the water line, cutting a hole in the Otranto below the water line thru which a large sized touring car could be driven without trouble. The water poured into the Otranto and silenced its engines. At the same time the convoy seemed to have been swallowed in the storm and nothing was heard of it until after the storm had calmed.
      The calmness with which the Americans took things was remarkable. None of the men on board was seized with fear but calmly stood by and waited for orders. Few of the soldiers realized the serious position they were in. All imagined that a large number of boats would set out from shore and come to the rescue immediately.
      Sixteen coast destroyers set out from shore to help the damaged ship. But owing to the heavy sea only one of them was able to get within reach where she could lend assistance. That was the H.M.S.G.I.A. Mouncy [ HMS Mounsey G1A] in command of Lt. Commander Craven. Thru the semaphore system the condition of the Otranto was made known to the commander of the destroyer. He ordered that the lifeboats on the starboard side of the Otranto be lowered so that they might act as fenders and he would draw close to the Otranto. The Otranto’s commander replied that such a course would be foolhardy. The destroyer’s commander said that it was the only chance. And they took it.
The boats were lowered, strung out along the starboard side of the Otranto. The destroyer neared to a distance of one hundred feet and then caught by the tide was thrown hard against the Otranto’s side crashing the life boats. With the striking of the side of the boats the sailors of the Otranto set the example for the soldiers aboard by leaping to the deck of the destroyer. This leap was made from heights ranging from twenty to fifty feet. Many of the men missed the deck of the destroyer and went into the sea.
        The shock lasted but a short space of time when the destroyer was caught by the tide and drawn away from the Otranto’s side. The Otranto was going down rapidly and was in the trough of the waves. This was at 10:30 a. m. It was again caught by the tide and sent against the side of the Otranto and more men leaped, among them Vogt. This bumping against the side of the Otranto happened four times during which six hundred of the eleven hundred aboard the Otranto made the leap of which one hundred and fifty were killed in the leap and one hundred and fifty badly injured, the injuries ranging from split skulls to broken ribs, broken legs and the like.
        During the excitement of the leaping for life Vogt saw many horrifying sight. One man who had missed the deck of the destroyer was holding on to a rope ladder on the side of the Otranto when the destroyer crashed against the side of the boat and crushed him as a fly is crushed by a finger. Another who was holding to the rail of the destroyer had his head caught in a wire and when the destroyer was washed from the side of the Otranto his head was torn from his shoulders. Shortly before his leap, Vogt saw John Geiger, of this city [Allentown, PA], who was lost in the sea. Geiger was formerly employed by the Lehigh Portland Cement Company in its office.
         At eleven a. m. the destroyer was not in condition to stand another trip to the side of the Otranto and pulled away. The men who boarded here from the Otranto were sent below to prevent the destroyer from capsizing. The funnels filled with water and the boat many times rode at an angle of forty-five degrees. The men in the hold sat for ten hours in water three feet deep and when the ship would lunge would almost be submerged. One man was dragged for three hours in the sea hanging to a rope from the destroyer. Many who were afraid of going below lashed themselves to the deck of the destroyer and suffered from exposure, some dying from it. While the destroyer was within sight of the Otranto the latter was washed upon a reef and split in two, the five hundred who had remained aboard being cast into the sea.
        Of the five hundred who remained aboard the Otranto only seventeen reached shore alive and only sixteen survived. One of the men surviving was Sgt. MacDonald who had been chased from deck to deck as the boat gradually listed and who with three others got hold of a piece of wreckage and started on their journey. During the trip the three companions were washed away and he continued alone. He was washed into a cleft in the rocks after four hours of drifting but was carried out again by the tide. He then evidently lost consciousness for when he opened his eyes he was on the top of the rocks looking into the faces of a group of Irish peasants.
         The destroyer docked at Belfast, Ireland at 8:55 p. m. Before the men were allowed to leave the boat the boat was lifted out of the water. So bad was her condition that ten miles more of sea would have finished her. The people of Belfast were well prepared to meet the issue. The men who were a sorry shoeless lot, were put into every kind of vehicle that could be pressed into service and taken to the Victoria barracks. Many of the men were forced to walk the five miles to the barracks as the supply of taxis and the like was inadequate.
        The men were here divided into two sections some sleeping in the chapel, others in the gym. The American Red Cross supplied the men with clean underwear and socks and bedding while the British troops saw that they had plenty to eat, sacrificing bread and eating hard tack in order that the Americans might be fed. The society folk and the Lord Mayor of the city gave them everything and anything that was necessary that was in the city.
        During the night, the storm continued without showing signs of abating. The men were nervous wrecks. The least sound or noise such as the breaking of the limbs of a tree near the barracks would cause them to jump from their beds shouting while many of the men repeated in nightmare the incidents which meant the saving of their lives.
       The commander of the destroyer which managed to make one of the most memorable rescues in the history of the world was loudly praised and cited by the British government for bravery as was his crew. Owing to the fact that it was not done in the face of enemy fire he was not awarded the much coveted cross. After the boat had set off from the Otranto he had to be carried below where for thirty-five minutes his men worked on him to bring him back to his senses, so hard had been the nervous strain during action.
        Howard Strohm, Vogt and Geiger were the only Lehigh county boys aboard. Strohm, hails from Emaus. He and Vogt were saved while Geiger was lost and buried with the first two hundred who were found dead among the wreckage of the ship.

Related Posts:

• William C. Zeigler
• Berrien County Paid Terrible Toll on the Otranto
• Seeking Descendants of HMS Otranto Disaster Victims and Survivors
• HMS Otranto Sank Ninety-four Years Ago
• OTRANTO SUNK IN COLLISION
• Oct 12, 1918 ~ 372 U.S. Soldiers Lost in Sinking of Otranto
• October 13-15, 1918 ~ RECOVERING CORPSES FROM OTRANTO WRECK
• The American Red Cross and the Otranto Rescue
• J.M. DeLoach Jumped from the HMS OTRANTO
• Ralph Knight ~ Otranto Disaster
• Shellie Loyd Webb – Lost at Sea
• The Long Trip Home
• Ralph Knight ~ Ray City Soldier ~ WWI
• Thomas Jefferson Sirmons Rests at Mount Pleasant Church Cemetery
• Alvin Claude Bozeman and the Sinking of the HMS Otranto
• Burial of the Otranto Victims
• Bivouac of the Dead
• Red Cross was at the Ready for HMS Otranto Survivors
• The American Red Cross and the Otranto Rescue
• Islay Remembered Otranto Soldiers at Christmas Time
• Let Us Unveil
• Hero of Otranto Rescue Shot Dead
• Armistice Day Memorial to Soldiers from Berrien County, GA Killed During WWI
• Ray City, GA Veterans of World War I
• On the Home Front, Ray City, GA, 1918
• Thomas Jefferson Sirmons Rests at Mount Pleasant Church Cemetery

Otranto Doctor Writes of Ship’s Final Hours

In November, 1918, a few weeks after the  Otranto disaster in the closing months of WWI, survivor Dr. Charles A. Dixon, a Captain of the U.S. Medical Corps from Akron, OH, wrote a letter home to his wife describing the voyage of the ill-fated vessel.

Dr. Dixon’s harrowing escape from the doomed Otranto mirrors that of Berrien county men James Marvin DeLoach,  James Grady Wright, Henry Elmo DeLaney,  and Ange Wetherington.  Early Steward of Nashville, GA was among the very few who went into the sea and survived the swim to the rocky coast of Islay.   Almost two dozen Berrien County men  were among the hundreds of soldiers who perished in the sinking, including  Ralph Knight and Shellie Webb, of Ray City, GA.

Dr. Charles A. Dixon sailed on the ill-fated Otranto.

In a daring rescue the H.M.S. Mounsey, pulled alongside the Otranto allowing men to jump from the sinking ship to  the deck of the  destroyer. The Mounsey carried the survivors to Belfast, Ireland where the American Red Cross was  waiting for their arrival.  Some of the rescued succumbed to exposure or mortal injuries and were buried in Belfast, Ireland.

Many, many bodies washed ashore on Islay, Scotland. Among the hundreds of Otranto dead  were Benjamin F. McCranie, Jim Melvin Boyett, John Guy Coppage, Hiram Marcus Bennett, Lafayett Gaskins,  William C. Zeigler and other men.  The lost Georgian soldiers were buried in mass graves  would later be honored in the Georgia WWI Memorial Book, (SEE Also Ray City, GA Veterans of World War I), and Berrien County, GA would commission the first monument to commemorate American soldiers killed in the Great War. and .

Dr. Charles A. Dixon  had boarded the Otranto at the Port of Embarkation at Hoboken, NJ with the Berrien County men and other replacement recruits from Fort Screven, Georgia.  The Embarkation Service reported the steamship Otranto had sailed for England from New York, NY on September 25, 1918 at 12:40 PM with 699 military passengers. The Otranto joined Convoy HX50 transporting troops across the Atlantic to the war in Europe. But on the trip over, the HMS Kashmir collided with the Otranto, resulting in the sinking of the latter.  Charles Vogt’s harrowing story was published February 3, 1919 in the Allentown Morning Call:

Akron Beacon Journal
November 30, 1918

Dr. C. A. Dixon, Akron Physician Writes
Detailed Story of Sinking of H.M.S. Otranto
Off Irish Coast

         Dr. Charles A. Dixon, Akron captain of the United States Medical Corps, one of the hundreds who passed through the thrills and dangers of the sinking on Oct. 6 of the British naval vessel Otranto as a result of a collision at sea with the Kashmir, another vessel of the same convoy party, has written a long letter to his wife, residing at 143 Lods St., in which he gives some of the intimate details of the disaster from which he escaped so fortunately.
        Opening his letter with an account of the early days of the trip, during which he was very busy with an outbreak on board of the flu, he comes down to the morning of the disaster. He continues:

        “I had breakfast at 8:30 and I guess because it was Sunday, I didn’t go right into C hold as I usually did, but went up on B deck, in the officers smoking room, and was smoking a cigar and talking to the naval paymaster, when one of our army lieutenants ran from port deck into the smoking room door and yelled for us to “look out,” and sprinted away.
        “We ran to the smoking room door, which was open, and through which we could see outside on B deck, and there about a hundred yards away was the Kashmir (next boat on our port side) headed straight toward us, and looked as if it was going to hit right where we stood. The paymaster let out a yell and ran to to the starboard side deck and grabbed a stanchion, me following a close second. The crash came a moment later and did not seem to jar us greatly; in fact, so little that I sort of smiled at the way we ran.
       Then I walked around to the port side and met one of the ship’s crew who told me how badly we were damaged. It had cut us from B deck clear down to the water line, about 30 feet, anywhere from ten to 20 feet wide. Cut right into the after boiler room in such a way that the boilers were out of commission inside of ten minutes. Those who were in the stoke hold were either killed or drowned. One of our soldiers had his right foot mashed clear off at the ankle, and three non-commissioned officers in a state room were all killed. In ten minutes all lights were out, but I had rushed to my stateroom, secured my overseas orders and my life belt and got back to B deck. (My stateroom was down on D deck).
         “I then gave the soldier with the smashed foot a hypodermic and first dressing. (I forgot to say that before the collision we sighted land off starboard bow; we thought it was Tory Island on the northeast coast of Ireland.) By this time the ship had lost steerage and was wallowing in the trough of those mountain high billows. The deck was such a slant that we could not walk, except as we hung on. At the time of the collision our captain signaled the convoy to move on, as per rules of convoys. The Kashmir, with her bow all stove in, had drifted out of sight.
         The weather was so thick that we could not see very far, but it was estimated that we were six miles off shore when in collision and now we were only two miles from shore. (It sure was a rocky one.)
         The sea was so rough that it was impossible for a boat to live in it or to even launch one.  One roll of the the ship and our starboard deck at ‘B would be about ten feet from the sea, and when she rolled the other way, it was at least 50 feet. At 10:20 (the collision was about 9:20) we saw a little torpedo boat destroyer off port side, and the first leftenant came to the smoking room window and called out, “Abandon ship, every man to his boat or raft station.
          “I never hated to do anything so badly in my life as to go to C deck for my boat position (Boat No. 5) for I knew we never could launch them in that awful sea, but I thought we were all bound to swim anyhow, so went. When we got to our stations we were ordered to get out of our overcoats and take off our shoes, which we did. By that time, the crew were lowering boats on A deck and by the time they were down even with B deck they would swing out 15 feet or more when our side rolled down.  Then I saw the torpedo boat coming up on the starboard side, about 150 feet away.
         And then I thought we were to jump into the sea and she would try to throw the line out and haul us on board, but no, that daredevil of a commander had signaled to us to lower life boats to act as a buffer and he came right up to us and yelled for us to jump. Life boats were splintered like egg shells, but saved the torpedo boat’s side as she bumped. Well believe me we jumped as we got the chance. Sometimes way up forward of me then perhaps way back aft, for you must know every time she bumped, the impact with the high seas would throw the two vessels apart, and then he would either reverse his engines or go ahead and steer her back against us.
         “About the fourth time we bumped together it was favorable to our position and I had an easy leap for life. But while I was waiting for my chance I saw many leap too late or too early – either fall into the sea between the two vessels and later be crushed, or dash themselves on a rising deck from such a distance they were killed or maimed. Then again after reaching the deck of the Moundsy [HMS Mounsey], every sea was washing clear over her and many were washed off her decks into the sea and lost that way.
         After reaching the Moundsy deck, I passed aft on Starboard side, hanging on with others to anything stable enough to be safe and was repeatedly submerged by waves that would have washed me overboard had I not hung on like grim death. Our position became so crowded that we were finally shown the way into the inside of the destroyer. Manholes about the size of a sewer opening were raised up and they crowded us down into these holes as thick as we could stand, in our compartment in an engine room that seemed to be some kind of an auxiliary, anyhow, neither the boilers or engine were working, but the seas when they broke overhead would run streams down over us after taking up grease or oil from the pipes until we were sights to behold. “But it was warmer than above decks and we fared infinitely better than those on the decks who were not only wet to the skin like ourselves, but were being submerged regularly and exposed to the cold gale. Of
course, after going below we knew nothing of what went on above, but they told us that she stood by until the poor old Otranto bit the reefs and then staggered away, loaded far past the limits of safety, trying to make three different havens, but on account of the high seas could not do so and finally brought us clear to Belfast, about 140 miles distance. We landed there soon after 8 o’clock in the evening about nine hours after taking us off. The Moundsy was in command of Lieutenant Craven who is a perfect daredevil.
       “The rescue is one of the most thrilling known to the marine world and what makes it more remarkable is the fact
that our commander (Captain Davidson, who went down with his ship), ordered him not to attempt the rescue as he considered it would only mean the foundering of the Moundsy, which, by the way, was badly damaged and had to go into dry docks for repairs. Her plates were only three-eights inch steel and were loosened up so that it took three pumps all the time to keep her from filling up. Three hundred and ten soldiers and officers and about 200 of the crew were rescued, making a loss of life of a little over 600.
        “The storm held with unabating fury until Tuesday, and when boats were able to land on Isley (pronounced Iley) off the coast of Scotland they found the natives had rescued but 20 alive (17 soldiers and three sailors.) They say the Otranto had all broken up and disappeared by Monday morning, and the shore covered with wreckage 20 feet high. About 200 dead bodies were recovered, the rest were carried to sea by the tides which run very swiftly between Scotland and Ireland.
          “I lost everything, even my shoes, but have no regrets as I consider that I am indeed very lucky to be alive to enjoy the damnable weather which prevails here. I had my money belt on and so am able to buy things as I need them, except uniform, I am still wearing that greasy and dirty. When I am relieved, will no doubt be allowed to re-equip in either Liverpool or London. At each place we have quartermaster stores, and then I can draw my pay which I still have coming for September.
          “Everybody is mighty nice to me here and in a way will be sorry to leave Belfast (which by the frequency of the name leads me to suspect, must be the home of my ancestors), but I am anxious to get on to France before our victorious armies have the boches all killed or captured.
             “I did not even take a cold from my exposure, lost all my remedies and my dear little high potency case, so have not taken a dose of any kind of medicine since the collision. Never felt better in my life and now after all I have been through I do not believe I will have any more bad luck.
           “The ‘subs’ got the Irish mail steamer between Dublin and Kingstown a week ago today with a large loss of life, mostly due to high seas though, and I find that the popular idea at home that our convoys have all come through unscathed is all bunk. They have been getting some right along but no serious losses yet. War news makes very good reading these days and maybe we are licking them but I cannot believe the war is anywhere near over.
          “This letter started last night has run over into another day. It is now Saturday morning and I have to be chief mourner for another funeral which I think will be our last one as the rest are doing nicely. This makes 20 burials here (one a captain of artillery from Nebraska) and each one makes a three mile march at slow time to the cemetery.
          “I might say here that the steamer Kashmir, who rammed us, finally made port at Glascow and she was very bad with pneumonia; had signalled us Sunday morning before the collision that she had six dead on board and I hear she buried about 50 in Glascow. We think the accident was due to her having some sort of trouble with her steering gear, but I do not know.
        “But I must close and get this down to the city to the man who says he will carry it across to you.”

Related Posts:

• Otranto Survivor Describes Disaster
• An Otranto Funeral in Belfast
• William C. Zeigler
• Berrien County Paid Terrible Toll on the Otranto
• Seeking Descendants of HMS Otranto Disaster Victims and Survivors
• HMS Otranto Sank Ninety-four Years Ago
• OTRANTO SUNK IN COLLISION
• Oct 12, 1918 ~ 372 U.S. Soldiers Lost in Sinking of Otranto
• October 13-15, 1918 ~ RECOVERING CORPSES FROM OTRANTO WRECK
• The American Red Cross and the Otranto Rescue
• J.M. DeLoach Jumped from the HMS OTRANTO
• Ralph Knight ~ Otranto Disaster
• Shellie Loyd Webb – Lost at Sea
• The Long Trip Home
• Ralph Knight ~ Ray City Soldier ~ WWI
• Thomas Jefferson Sirmons Rests at Mount Pleasant Church Cemetery
• Alvin Claude Bozeman and the Sinking of the HMS Otranto
• Burial of the Otranto Victims
• Bivouac of the Dead
• Red Cross was at the Ready for HMS Otranto Survivors
• The American Red Cross and the Otranto Rescue
• Islay Remembered Otranto Soldiers at Christmas Time
• Let Us Unveil
• Hero of Otranto Rescue Shot Dead
• Armistice Day Memorial to Soldiers from Berrien County, GA Killed During WWI
• Ray City, GA Veterans of World War I
• On the Home Front, Ray City, GA, 1918
• Thomas Jefferson Sirmons Rests at Mount Pleasant Church Cemetery

An Otranto Funeral in Belfast

Perhaps no county paid a greater toll in WWI than Berrien County, Georgia. Twenty-three of her young men perished in the sinking of the H.M. S. Otranto just weeks before the war ended.

When survivors of the Otranto shipwreck  were ferried by the H.M.S. Mounsey to Belfast, Ireland  the American Red Cross was there waiting for their arrival.  James Marvin DeLoach,  with many Ray City GA, connections, and James Grady Wright of Adel, GA, Henry Elmo DeLaney of Nashville, GA and Ange Wetherington  were among nearly 450 men who had managed to leap from the rails of the Otranto to the deck of the rescue ship Mounsey and were landed in Belfast.

A hundred and fifty of the survivors  had been badly injured in the jump, the injuries ranging from split skulls to broken ribs, broken legs and the like.  On the decks of the dangerously overloaded Mounsey, the men clung for their lives to whatever handholds they could grab.  Many suffered from exposure on the trip to Belfast, some perished. Others contracted pneumonia and died after reaching Belfast.

Most of the hundreds of soldiers who were left behind on the Otranto perished in the sea. A scant 17 managed to survive the swim to the rocky coast of Islay, Scotland, among them Early Stewart of Berrien County, GA. For the hundreds of dead who washed ashore, two funerals were held on Islay.

A Third funeral for American soldiers from the Otranto occurred at Belfast, Ireland on October 11, 1918. Seventeen of the men of the Otranto were interred in the city cemetery in Belfast, victims of the Otranto Disaster and men who had died from Pneumonia after reaching Belfast.   Belfast stopped in respect as the funeral procession passed from the Victoria barracks, through Royal Ave, to the City Cemetery. Everywhere the streets were crowded with people who gathered to pay tribute to the honored dead. The flag-draped coffins were carried on open hearses, two on each conveyance, with a guard of honor composed of British soldiers marching alongside.  There were many floral wreaths, sent by the American Red Cross, the Belfast Care Committee, and other Belfast civic organizations. The band of mourners who marched behind the coffins included the Lord Mayor of Belfast, the American Consul, and representatives of the American and British army and navy,  the Red Cross, and various local civic organizations.

An American military funeral in Belfast, Ireland. On Oct. 11, twelve American soldier victims of the Otranto Disaster and men who had died from Pneumonia after being landed from a troopship were buried in the City Cemetery. The photograph shows the funeral procession passing through Royal Ave. The wreaths shown in the picture were chiefly gifts of the Belfast Care Committee of the American Red Cross http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10185a

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An American military funeral in Belfast, Ireland. On Oct. 11, a public funeral was held in Belfast for twelve American soldiers, victims of the Otranto disaster, and men who died from pneumonia after being landed in Ireland. The march through the city, from the Victoria barracks to the City Cemetery. Everywhere the streets were crowded with people who had gathered to pay tribute to the honored dead. The coffins were carried on open hearses, two on each conveyance, with a guard of honor composed of British soldiers, marching beside the coffins, each of which was covered with an American flag
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10184a

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British soldiers escorting American flag draped coffins
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.01511a

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An American military funeral in Belfast, Ireland. On Oct. 11, twelve American soldiers, victims of the Otranto and also several pneumonia cases, were buried in the City Cemetery. The band of mourners who marched behind the coffins included representatives of the American and British army and navy, of the Red Cross, and various local civic organizations. There was also the Lord Mayor, the American Consul and others
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10186a

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An American military funeral in Belfast, Ireland. On Oct. 11, twelve American soldiers, victims of the Otranto and also several pneumonia cases, were buried in the City Cemetery. British soldiers formed the guard of honor for the coffins, as they were carried through the principal streets of Belfast. The photograph shows the procession entering the gates of the cemetery
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10187a

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An American military funeral at Belfast, Ireland. Reading the funeral service for twelve American soldiers in the City Cemetery. The officiating clergymen were the Rev. William Maguire and the Rev. Father O’Kelly, CC. Eight of the soldiers belonged to the Roman Catholic Church, three to the Methodist church, one to the Baptist. American and British army officers and American Red Cross officers were the official chief mourners
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10188a

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An American military funeral at Belfast, Ireland. Burying a Coffin. http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.01512

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An American military funeral at Belfast, Ireland. The buglers sound the last salute to the dead. The graves are those of American soldiers from the sinking troopship HMS Otranto who died of injuries received in the rescue, or of pneumonia in Belfast hospitals, after being landed.
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10189a

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An American military funeral at Belfast, Ireland. Firing squad from the British army (Northumberland Fusiliers) fires the last salute at the graveside. The funeral was of twenty American soldiers on Oct. 11. Part of the men were victims of the Otranto disaster, others were men who died of pneumonia in Belfast hospitals shortly after arriving in Europe http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10190a

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A Third funeral for American soldiers from the Otranto occurred at Belfast, Ireland. The men interred in the city cemetery in Belfast, there were many floral wreaths, sent by the Red Cross and by Belfast civic organizations. On this occasion, one of the finest was inscribed “A token of esteem and sympathy from their comrades of the British army” http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10121a

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Graves in Belfast, Ireland, of American soldiers who died of Pneumonia after being rescued from the ill-fated troopship Otranto. Seventeen of the men of the Otranto are buried in this plot in the City Cemetery, Belfast. The officers are shown in front of the graves are Lieut. Horace O’Higgins of New York and Lieut. R.E. Condon of Kansas City, two of the most indefatigable workers in the task of relief and recovery after the disaster
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.10120a

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City Cemetery, Belfast, Ireland; American soldiers graves
http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/anrc.01521a

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General Biddle thanks Belfast for honors paid to victims of the Otranto Disaster

New York Times
October 29, 1918

BIDDLE THANKS BELFAST.

General Acknowledges the Funeral Honors to Otranto Victims.

Special Cable to the New York Times.

Belfast, Oct. 28 – Major Gen Biddle, writing to the Secretary of the Belfast Chamber of Trade, has expressed deep appreciation for the many kindly acts shown by Belfast citizens to American survivors of the Otranto. The letter says:

“Reports reaching us of the splendid funeral honors accorded to our dead soldiers in Belfast indicate that your authorities and citizens have been more than kind. Thanks also are due to those Belfst ladies and others who sent floral tributes and in other ways showed such a generous and sympathetic spirit.”

Related Posts:

• Otranto Doctor Writes of Ship’s Final Hours
• Otranto Survivor Describes Disaster
• William C. Zeigler
• Berrien County Paid Terrible Toll on the Otranto
• Seeking Descendants of HMS Otranto Disaster Victims and Survivors
• HMS Otranto Sank Ninety-four Years Ago
• OTRANTO SUNK IN COLLISION
• Oct 12, 1918 ~ 372 U.S. Soldiers Lost in Sinking of Otranto
• October 13-15, 1918 ~ RECOVERING CORPSES FROM OTRANTO WRECK
• The American Red Cross and the Otranto Rescue
• J.M. DeLoach Jumped from the HMS OTRANTO
• Ralph Knight ~ Otranto Disaster
• Shellie Loyd Webb – Lost at Sea
• The Long Trip Home
• Ralph Knight ~ Ray City Soldier ~ WWI
• Thomas Jefferson Sirmons Rests at Mount Pleasant Church Cemetery
• Alvin Claude Bozeman and the Sinking of the HMS Otranto
• Burial of the Otranto Victims
• Bivouac of the Dead
• Red Cross was at the Ready for HMS Otranto Survivors
• The American Red Cross and the Otranto Rescue
• Islay Remembered Otranto Soldiers at Christmas Time
• Let Us Unveil
• Hero of Otranto Rescue Shot Dead
• Armistice Day Memorial to Soldiers from Berrien County, GA Killed During WWI
• Ray City, GA Veterans of World War I
• On the Home Front, Ray City, GA, 1918

Before the Civil War, some 32 percent of the population of Lowndes and Berrien County, Georgia were enslaved African-Americans.  In neighboring Thomas County, 51 percent of the people were enslaved. These numbers paled in comparison with the slave population of the coastal counties, where as much as 86 percent of the population toiled in bondage on the sea island cotton and rice plantations of Georgia’s tidewater.  In all, the State of Georgia estimated its citizens owned  three billion dollars worth of slaves.

Almost immediately after the election of Abraham Lincoln,  Levi J. Knight formed the Berrien Minute Men, a company of 103 volunteer infantrymen. Levi J. Knight, original pioneer settler of Ray City, GA was the military leader of the community and a slave owner. He had served as a captain of the local militia company in the Indian Wars, and as a general in the state militia.

The Berrien Minute Men drilled and paraded in the local communities before being called up for deployment. By May, 1861 newspapers reported, “the county is alive with volunteers, and all eager for a fight with the Abolitionists. Our citizens have liberally contributed funds to equip and prepare for service the poor men connected with the companies, and also to supply with provisions and clothing the destitute families of those who shall enter the service.”

In 1888 a visitor to Nashville, GA met with surviving veterans of the Berrien Minute Men. A brief passage on their reminiscences was printed in the Atlanta Constitution.

Berrien Minute Men in formation at Nashville, GA
About the Illustration: The Berrien Minute Men of the Georgia 29th Regiment in an 1861 pre-deployment ceremony at the Nashville, Georgia courthouse square. The mounted officer depicts Captain Levi J. Knight (1803-1870) a prominent leader in the area and retired major general of the Georgia militia. The building in the background represents the Berrien County Courthouse, the only known structure from Civil War era Nashville, GA which is documented in photographs. The balcony shown on the courthouse was actually not present until the building was converted to a hotel in 1898. Illustrator: Alan H. Archambault. Image courtesy of Jim Griffin.

The writer of the 1888 news clipping recalled the company of men in their uniforms on the courthouse square.

April 6,1888 Atlanta Constitution. A visitor to Nashville, GA recalls the formation of the Berrien Minute Men during the Civil War.

Atlanta Constitution
Friday April 6, 1888. Pg. 2.

A Brave Band of Men.

Berrien Correspondence Quitman, Ga., Herald.  May the brain that dictates and the hand that indites this sentence be paralyzed if we ever forget our friends and comrades in the days that tried men’s souls. From this county went forth the “Berrien Minute Men” to battle for the lost cause. They were the finest body of men we ever saw in line, and they belonged to the old Twenty-ninth Georgia. Twenty-five or thirty of them on the right of the company were over six feet high. They wore a grey uniform, cut on the claw-hammer style, with a black breast, and trimmed with large gilt buttons. They were a dangerous looking set, and truer, braver, manlier hearts never beat beneath the confederate grey.

Where are these stalwart forms now? We did not see them on the courthouse square at Nashville, where they once mustered so bravely.

Alas! nearly all of this gallant band have passed over the river and are resting under the shade of the trees. We met Henry Knight, John Knight, Lacy Lastinger, Jim Roberts, Jack Parrish, Frank Parrish, and a few others that we knew in the long ago, and we were welcomed, aye, thrice welcomed.

About the Courthouse

According to the Berrien Historical Foundation, the Berrien Courthouse was a two-story wooden structure that served the county’s judicial needs from 1858 until around 1897.  The courthouse occupied the square in Nashville, on lands purchased from pioneer, Daniel Griner, and chosen by a commission appointed by the Judge of the Inferior Court.

New Hansell Hotel. Image courtesy of http://www.berriencountyga.com

When the present brick courthouse was to be constructed, the two story wood structure was purchased by Dr. William Bryan Goodman, who moved it to the northeast side of the square and converted it into a hotel.

September 20, 1901 Tifton Gazette reported a new hotel in Nashville, GA

Tifton Gazette
September 20, 1901

At the entertainment given by Dr. and Mrs. W. B. Goodman in Nashville Thursday evening last, at which a voting contest for a name for the new Nashville hotel was held, about $20 was realized for the Nashville Methodist church fund. The name “Hotel Hansell,” was selected, in honor of the Southern circuit’s veteran judge.

October 25, 1901 Tifton Gazette reports Hotel Hansell under new management.

Related Posts:

• Berrien Readied for Civil War, May, 1861
• Grand Rally at Milltown
• Berrien Minute Men at Brunswick ~ July, 1861
• Berrien Minute Men on Sapelo Island: Part 1
• Campfires of the Berrien Minute Men
• Resolutions of the Berrien Minute Men

Brigadier General A. R. Lawton letter of January 14, 1862 to Adjutant Inspector General Samuel Cooper confirming readiness of the 29th GA Infantry.  (In 1864, General Cooper stayed the execution of Confederate deserter Burrell Douglass. Cooper is credited for the preservation of Confederate service records after the war).

A Regimental Surgeon, William P. Clower, was finally appointed on January 18, 1862. Surgeon Clower’s brother, John T. Clower, would later serve as the doctor in Ray’s Mill (now Ray City, GA). The surgeon was a welcome addition, but the health conditions of the Regiment did not immediately improve.  James Madison Harrell was sent home sick.  Alfred B. Finley, who joined the Berrien Minute Men at Darien, contracted measles and lost an eye to complications; despite that disability he would continue to serve with the 29th Regiment.  Hiram F. Harrell contracted measles and died at Darien, GA.  Edward Morris contracted measles and “camp fever” and never recovered; he died a few weeks later at Savannah, GA.

The 29th Regiment’s tenure on Sapelo would soon be over.  Before the end of January, the 29th GA regiment would be called up to the coastal defenses at Savannah.  When the regiment finally left Darien, John Lindsey, William Hall, and James Newman and John R. Langdale were left behind, sick. William Anderson, who had been on sick leave in October, had a relapse and was also left in Darien.  Thomas J. Lindsey, David D. Mahon and Robert H. Goodman were detailed to Darien as  nurses. John W. McClellan was also detailed to remain at Darien. Malcolm McCranie died of measles at Darien on February 2, 1862 and Ellis H. Hogan  died February 25, 1862. In the Ochlocknee Light Infantry, George Harlan was disabled and discharged at Darien on February 17, 1862 and Francis M. Dixon died of typhoid pneumonia at Darien the following day.

Current navigational chart showing Sapelo Island, Blackbeard Island, Doboy Island, Queens Island, Wolf Island, GA. The Berrien Minute Men, Companies G & K, 29th Georgia Regiment, were stationed at Sapelo Island and Blackbeard Island during 1861, defending the Altamaha River delta from Union forces.

Related Posts:

• Richard Ault, Blacksmith for the Berrien Minute Men
• Campfires of the Berrien Minute Men
• Resolutions of the Berrien Minute Men
• Berrien Minute Men and Civil War Stories
• 29th Georgia Regiment Soldier Killed by Fellow Soldier
• William W. Knight Writes Home About Old Yellow and Men of the 29th Georgia Infantry
• Grand Rally at Milltown
• Reward Offered for Confederate Deserters
• Berrien Readied for Civil War, May, 1861
• Confederate Letters of John William Hagan
• John W. Hagan Witnessed “Unholy War” and the Execution of Elbert J. Chapman
• John Carroll Lamb

Ben Furlong (circa 1854-1886), Desperado of Berrien County, GA

As Halloween approaches we revisit the scene of Ben Furlong, who was perhaps  most famous ghost ever to haunt Berrien County.

After the 1886 death of Ben Furlong some said his ghost still haunted the scene of his final, heinous crime. In life, Ben Furlong may have been Berrien County’s  most notorious outlaw.  Furlong, a sawmill man when he wasn’t on the bottle, frequented the communities along the tracks of the Brunswick & Western Railroad – Alapaha, Vanceville and Sniff.   He was a wife beater and a murderer wanted for dozens of criminal charges. His infamous deeds were published around the globe.

Furlong died on Friday, September 24, 1886 from an overdose of laudanum, also known as tincture of opium. The compound was commonly available in the drug stores of Berrien County and elsewhere for just five cents a bottle.

Laudanum bottle

Certainly by  the time of Furlong’s death, the dangerous potency of opioids was well known. Still, some thought Furlong’s laudanum overdose was accidental.

The prevailing opinion in Alapaha, GA, the community that perhaps knew Furlong best, was that he intended to take his own life, either out of a guilty conscience or to escape the hangman.

The October 2, 1886 edition of the Alapaha Star examined the question:

Alapaha Star, October 2, 1886 questions death of Ben Furlong

Alapaha Star
October 2, 1886

Was it Suicide?

    There is a difference of opinion as to whether B. W. Furlong committed suicide, but the preponderating belief is that he did. The murder of the colored man, the closing of his mill by his creditors and the effects of a severe spell of drinking were amply sufficient to —- —– —-perate step of his life – that of self-destruction.
    It is reported that he drank two bottles of laudanum Thursday night, about twenty hours before he died, and that when he sank into the last sleep, his breathing indicated poisoning. Every effort was made to arouse him. He was walked about, slapped and rubbed vigorously, but the seal of death was upon him, and he breathed his last about four hours after he fell asleep.
    We are satisfied that Furlong while temporarily insane from the causes we have mentioned, took his own life.

Related Posts:

• The Ghost of Ben Furlong, Berrien County Desperado
• More on Berrien County, GA Desperado, Benjamin William Furlong
• Back Story on Benjamin William Furlong
• The Vanceville Affair
• Ben Furlong’s Ghost Haunted Conscience of Berrien Residents
• Southern Georgia: Railroad Pamphlet
• Dr. Julian ~ Railway Surgeon

A sign on the tracks of the Georgia & Florida Railroad indicates the town of Ray City, GA to passing trains. The trains no longer stop at Ray City, although the town once had a bustling depot.

Times Union
1978

Ray City
The town is smaller now, but folks are coming back home

RAY CITY, Ga. – Before the turn of the century there were more than 27 businesses, five doctors, a pharmacy, corn mill, sawmill and several thousand people.

Ray City has changed.

The town now has a population of 725. What remains are a few stores and churches, the remnants of the corn mill – now a restaurant and fish camp – and Victory Soda Shop and General Store, where people meet to exchange news and gossip.

Billy Clements, owner of The Victory and long-time Ray City resident, said the closing of the sawmill and the Depression drove most of the people away, but old residents are “gradually creeping back.”

People come from all over to listen to John Guthrie play his guitar or just talk.
“I could talk all day about music, Guthrie said.

Guthrie teaches music to anyone who wants to learn, and musicians from all over the country meet in Ray City for jam sessions.

Lamar Booth, who runs the fish camp, points out that the Old Mill Pond draws a number of out-of-town fishermen during the summer. The lake is more than a mile wide but only 5 to 7 feet deep.

Booth’s mother, Mrs. Ann Campbell, owns a cafe, which is the main attraction at the pond. People say she serves the best fish dinners in the area.

The original post office and general store were at the lake during the late 1800s, and the corn mill (it opened in 1863) was once the heart of Ray City’s economy.

The town limits form a one-mile circle, located on Highway 37, 15 miles east of Adel between Nashville and Valdosta.

Farming is the main occupation in Ray City now, though many of the town’s people travel to Valdosta, Adel, Lakeland and Nashville for work, according to Mrs. Don Wilson, the town clerk said. Many residents also own or work in local businesses, she said.

Clements said there is not much for people to do after work except hunt or fish and many young people go to other places for entertainment.

He said he likes it there, because “people care for each other and pitch in and help each other when they need it, like a big family.”

Rossie Futch celebrates Christmas 1959 with his grand daughter Lee, and her new baby doll.

Rossie Futch and his granddaughter on Christmas Day, 1959.

Rossie Futch (1899-1968) was a native of Berrien County and a resident of Ray City, GA for 50 years.  His second wife was Lessie Guthrie Miley.  After 1950, the Futch Residence was at 406 J0nes Street (now 507 Jones Street).

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• A Skinner Family Christmas
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• Glee Club Gave 1939 Christmas Cantata
• A Christmas Wedding for Mary Catherine Hill
• King’s Chapel Football, 1905
• Delilah Drawdy ~ Centenarian
• Maxie Snead Patten, Youth Leader
• Dr. A. L. Johnston and the 1913 Possum Supper
• Accidental Death of William Crawford Webb
• Harriet Swindle Moore ~ First Lady of Ray City

In the 1940s Aubrey Sizemore, of Nashville, GA, worked as a truck driver and salesman on a “rolling store” for Harveys Supermarket.

Aubrey Sizemore (1910-1974)

Census records show that Aubrey Sizemore worked as a grocery salesman during that time period.  At the time of enumeration he was living with his wife, Maude Griner, and sons, Joe Sizemore and Bobby Sizemore in Nashville, GA. Also residing in the Sizemore household was his mother-in-law, Sarah Griner.

The 1940 census enumeration of Aubrey Sizemore shows he worked as a grocery salesman.

Family members recall that Aubrey Sizemore drove a rolling store for Harveys Supermarket.

Harveys Supermarket, Nashville, GA. In addition to the location in Nashville, Harveys served rural residents with “rolling stores.” Image courtesy of http://www.berriencountyga.org

The Harveys Supermarket chain was founded by J. M. and Iris Harvey in Nashville, GA in 1924. Their son, Joe H. Harvey, took over the chain in 1950.  The rolling stores served rural residents all over the area, including the families residing in the Ray City area.

The Harveys Fleet
Harveys Supermarket once operated a fleet of “rolling stores” – trucks that brought groceries and dry goods to shoppers in rural areas.

The Rolling Store, once a celebrated fixture in town and country alike, has also been a victim of these dramatically changing times.

A rolling store is exactly what its name suggests.  Although mobile vendors have existed since well before the nation’s founding, these vendors were limited by the distance their horses or feet could carry them. That changed with the spread of the diesel engine in the early 20th century. Rural families who lacked access to these mechanized forms of rapid transportation could still only make it into town maybe three or four times in an entire year to do their essential shopping, but now the store could come to them, often in the form of a brightly painted truck or retrofitted bus that would stop at the same places at the same time each week.

Everything was available from a rolling store’s efficiently stocked shelves: fresh fruits and vegetables, bread, canned goods, wheat flour, lard, kerosene and tools, pre-made underwear, overalls, shirts. Come early Spring, the trucks would be stocked with Easter dresses for little girls, and come autumn, that same shelf space would be filled with school supplies for the new academic year. Even with their hodge-podge of goods, these moving stores could easily sell out of everything each time they hit the country roads, which could amount to some 9,000 to 10,000 pounds of goods in a single day.  — Time Magazine

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In Berrien County, GA Aubrey Sizemore drove a daily route of 50 miles or more, stopping at houses all along the way. Many of these people didn’t have any way of getting to town unless they walked. He would slow and blow the horn and people came running out.  He would stop and let up the sides of the truck where you could see in to see the merchandise. 

The children came running for the penny candy the rolling store carried. They sold little syrup candies wrapped in wax paper.  The chewy candy was made from sugar cane and had a distinct taste. 

Some of the women would ask for goods and if the driver didn’t have them on the rolling truck he would bring them on the next round.

If you had something you wanted to barter, if you had a chicken, or eggs, or butter you could trade out for goods or for a “due bill” – a promissory note you could use for store credit at Harveys store in Nashville or from the rolling store. 

The Harveys rolling store had groceries and some dry goods.  You could buy needle and thread and other sewing supplies. You could buy yard goods – cloth – in three yard bundles.  A woman could make a dress from three yards.  Anything Harveys had in their store in Nashville you could find on the rolling store.   – Sizemore Recollections

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Many a rolling store’s motto was also “We Buy Anything, We sell Everything,” meaning rural families could also barter with the store, trading “eggs, chickens and pecans” for items like flour, shoes, or chewing tobacco. As a result, in addition to the children’s joyful cries of “Here it comes! Here it comes!” and the honking of the store’s horn, a municipality could often tell if a rolling store was on its way by the cacophony of squawking emanating from the overloaded chicken coops on the top or back of the truck. (This bartering policy also meant that many a child raided their family’s chicken house the morning of the rolling store’s scheduled arrival for an egg or two to exchange for a stick of gum or a piece of candy.)  While those who grew up running to greet the drivers of rolling stores remember these enterprises with great fondness, these endeavors could not withstand the rise of the personal automobile. – Time Magazine

During WWII, Aubrey Sizemore entered the US Navy.

Related Posts:

• Joe and Diane Sizemore at Statesboro
• Sizemores’ First Teaching Job
• Ray City Christmas 1959
• Death of Sarah Griner
• Vitamin Kaye Patten
• Virgil Griner receives teaching license from W. G. Avera, 1915

Lucious Norman Gillham was a veteran of World War II and came to Ray City, GA with his wife after the war. He was born in Jackson County, GA on January 5, 1908, a son of George Washington Gillham and Estelle Mae Gillham.

Lucious N. Gillham enlisted April 24, 1943 at Ft. McPherson, Atlanta, GA.  At the time of enlistment he was living in Fulton County, GA, and was employed as a textile mill worker.  His father and older siblings had all been mill workers at the Porterdale Mill at Newton County, GA since before 1920s.  Lucious was only educated through the 5th grade, after which he left school to take up work. After the death of his father in 1925, Lucious went to work at a textile mill in Varennes, SC but by 1935 he was back at the Porterdale Mill working as a doffer.

Porterdale Mill belonged to the Bibb Manufacturing Company,  one of the largest employers in the state.  “The City of Porterdale is located 35 miles east of Atlanta on the Yellow River in Newton County, Georgia.  In 1899 the Bibb Manufacturing Company built a twine mill on the river and named it Porterdale Mill after a founder of the community, Oliver Porter.  The community of mill homes attracted workers looking for jobs and a better life.”

Porterdale Mill, Georgia

People came from all over the state to work in the Porterdale mill.  Among the many workers enumerated at Porterdale in the 1940 census  were Pasco Olandro Hall, of Ray City, GA; Tom Sirmans Jones, of Nashville, GA;  Grady Bloodworth, from the upper 10th District of Berrien County; Jesse Franklin Bennett of Adel, GA; Lois, Jessie Mae, James and Elmer Black, four teenage siblings from Lowndes County, GA.  One wonders if Lucious Gillham and the mill workers from South Georgia knew each other, and if their association later influenced Lucious to come to Ray City. At any rate, Lucious  and Jeanette Gillham moved about 1947 to Ray City,  where for 18 years they worked a farm on Route 1.

Lucious Gillham died on May 28, 1965 and was buried at Pleasant Cemetery, near Ray City, GA.  His obituary appeared in the Nashville Herald.

Obituary of Lucious Norman Gillham, of Ray City, GA

Nashville Herald
June 3, 1965

Lucious Gillham Dies On Friday Morning

        Lucious N. Gillham, who made his home on Route One, Ray City, and was for the past eighteen years a resident of that area, succumbed to a lengthy illness early Friday morning, May 28. Mr. Gillham was confined to Berrien County Hospital at the time of his passing.
        Born on January 5, 1908, the deceased was 57 years of age.  A native Georgian, he was the son of the late George W. and Stella Mae Lowrey Gillham. He was married on December 31, 1935 to the former Miss Jeanette Dorsey, by whom he is survived. Mr. Gillham saw service in the United States Army during World War II, and before declining health curtailed his activity he was a farmer.
        Funeral services were conducted from the Pleasant Primitive Baptist Church at 2 o’clock on Sunday afternoon, May 30, with Elder Howard Weaver officiating. In accordance with Primitive Baptist doctrine, an unaccompanied choir sang three time-honored hymns of consolation, Amazing Grace, Rock of Ages, and In the Sweet Bye and Bye. Laid to rest in the churchyard cemetery, Mr. Gillham was accompanied to his place of last repose by a cortege of military men from nearby Moody Air Force Base.
        Besides his widow, Mr. Gillham leaves three sisters, Mrs. Doris Dix, of Griffin, and Mrs. Mildred West and Mrs. Beatrice Goode, both of Douglasville. There are also a number of nices and nephews.
       All details were completed under the direction of Lovein Funeral Home.

Grave of Lucious N. Gillham and Jeanette Dorsey Gillham, Pleasant Cemetery near Ray City, GA

John Guthrie, folk musician and merchant of Ray City, GA relates the story of the Berrien Tiger.

John Elwood Guthrie (1911-1985) , folk musician and merchant of Ray City, GA. Image courtesy Library of Congress.

The legendary Berrien Tiger was a large panther that attacked two Wiregrass victims in 1849, before the creation of Berrien county, GA.  Guthrie was a nephew of Hamp Guthrie, who was mauled by the big cat, and grandson of Martha Newbern Guthrie, who was an eyewitness.

John Elwood Guthrie was a son of Arren H. Guthrie and Elizabeth Lucinda “Lucy” Newbern Guthrie.  He moved with his family to Ray City in 1922 and attended the Ray City School. He and his parents and siblings resided on the the farm of his sister, Effie Guthrie Knight on Park Street.  As a boy he attended the Primitive Baptist Church but later attended the Ray City Methodist Church.  He married Madge Sellers and they made their home on North Street in Ray City.

John Elwood Guthrie (1911-1985)
Ray City, Georgia,
August 20, 1977

I was borned out on the Alapaha River.

You want me to tell you a little story about the Alapaha River?

OK. Now, believe it or not, now…if you want do a little research you can go back and find this story.

Now my grandmother…she was about ninety year old when she first began to come to our house. She’d sit in a rockin’ chair and all of us kids would gather up around her, and she would begin to tell us stories about the Civil War and things that happened back during that time.

Here’s a story…now you can believe it or not. Now, it did appear in the Valdosta paper, the Valdosta Times, and also in the Berrien Press. If you want to do a little research you can look it up. But, it happened.

A young boy back in those days, he went down on the Alapaha River a lookin’ for some hogs down there at was lost. And whiles he was down there they was some animal. Now, they said it was a tiger – now you can believe it or not – they said it was a tiger. But it appeared, now, in both these papers. They said it was a tiger.

He jumped on this boy’s back, and he clawed him up, and bit ‘im, and he thought he had killed ‘im. And he tried to drag ‘im back in the river swamps down there. But he’s too heavy. He couldn’t carry ‘im. Instead, he covered ‘im up with leaves. Covered ‘im up with leaves.

So this boy, when he came concious again, he was almost dead, but he got back ta house an he told his brothers and sisters and his parents an’ everything about it. Well, they formed a search party and they went down there lookin’ for this animal. They had their dogs, and their guns, and everything. That’s on Alapaha River, now, right over here.

When they got down to the swamp, the dogs, the first thing, they began to bark, you know, and run all down the river swamps. Well, it wasn’t very long before all them dogs came back, and their hair was standin’ right straight up on their backs, up there, and they just whimperin’, the dogs.

So, the men decided they’d go down there an’ see what had happened. Well, they went down there, and an ol’ uncle o’ mine, his name was Hamp -now, this is history, now if you don’t believe it you can go back and search. His name was Hamp.  And, he was a little bit behind all the rest. Well, this animal, whatever it was, jumped on his back. Jumped on his back and he began to claw ‘im an’ bite ‘im, an’ almost killed ‘im.

Some of the rest of the fellas in the search party looked around back there, and they saw what was happenin’ and they had a gun and they just shot whatever it was, if it was a tiger or whatever it was. They shot ‘im and killed ‘im. And when they killed ‘im, they had to pull his claws out of Uncle Hamp’s back, back there.

Now, this is history, now if you won’t believe it, all right. If you don’t, you can go back an’ search the records, and that’s part of the history.

Adler, T. A. & Guthrie, J. (1977) John Guthrie tells stories and plays guitar, Ray City, Georgia. Ray City, Georgia. [Audio] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/afc1982010_afs20900/ .

Related Posts:

• Eyewitness Accounts of the Berrien Tiger
• Early account of the Berrien Tiger, 1849.
• 1849 Adventures With A Panther in Berrien County, GA
• The Misadventures of Mr. Stewart
• Martha Guthrie: Babe of the Indian Wars
• Year of the Tiger
• Guthrie Music School at Irene Church
• John Guthrie ~ Ray City’s Musician Extraordinaire
• Martha Guthrie: Babe of the Indian Wars
• Madge Sellers Guthrie as a Young Woman
• John Guthrie Brought Six Decades of Music to Ray City
• Guthrie Music School at Irene Church