| Notes |
- H.B. Boon appeared before W.R. DeLoach,Judge of the Probate, in the county
of Sumter, Al. on July 1,1889. Being duly sworn in, Boon stated that when
a private in Co.E of 7th Regiment of N.C. Infantry and while in the discharge
of his duty in September of 1864, near Petersburg,Va. he lost his left
leg. He also state that on the 28th. of February, 1889,he is a resident
of Al. engaged in farming and that his taxable property does not exceed
four hundred dollars in value.
(Research):CAPT. WILLIAM R. DELOACH.
Comrade William R. DeLoach was born June 4, 1842, and reared in Sumter County, Ala., and died in Memphis August 5, 1910 At the age of eighteen DeLoach enlisted as a private in the 5th Alabama Regiment, commanded by Col. (afterwards Maj. Gen.) R. E. Rodes. His service throughout the war was of the very best type. An old comrade once pointed to him. as the only man he ever knew who was absolutely devoid of personal fear. This statement is not literally true. DeLoach's intelligence recognized the hazard of battle, but his true moral courage rose above it. To him "duty" to himself and family and love of country were higher than all else, and made him bear himself as if ignorant of fear. He served with honor in Virginia, being badly wounded at Sharpsburg while climbing over the Federal breastworks, and later on was shot down at Mine Run while voluntarily leading a charge which was the duty of superior officers. He fell at the head of his men, with a jagged hole in the neck, which!
kept him out of the service for three months. Receiving his promotion at his return, he was assigned to Forrest's Cavalry and made captain of a company of independent scouts. Near Decatur, Ala., he was captured and kept on Johnson's Island until July, 1865.
The hardships of war bore lightly upon the youthful soldiers of the South. Their courage was inherited, the strength and joy of comradeship were theirs, and, like their ancestors, they met the foes of their country with inborn steadfastness. It was natural for DeLoach to fight, he had a knowledge of the questions at issue.
But it was after he returned home in 1865 that the real test of manhood came to DeLoach and to the men of his class. How he met this trial is known only to those who touched shoulders and divided counsel with him at that time. From that day till 1873, when the white people of Sumter came into their own again, was the time that tried men's souls in the Southland. From the town of Livingston, DeLoach's home, to the northern boundary of the county the proportion of blacks to whites was larger than in any other county in Alabama. The negroes almost from the first were under the control of aliens and renegades, and the struggle for existence was on in earnest. Reconstruction, with its deliberate plan to subject the native white people to their former slaves, was an unspeakable horror, to be resisted to the death. If the true story of reconstruction in the Black Belt of Alabama should ever be told, DeLoach's name would be written high up on the roll of honor. His judgment and courage were with him under all conditions. When the struggle was over, his kindliness made him resist any cruelty to, or oppression of, the negroes, when control was absolutely in the hands of the whites. He acted steadily upon this principle during his long service as judge, and no court was ever administered more fairly than his. His reelection time after time, making his term of office thirty four years, was a tribute to his integrity and intelligence.
The writer of this sketch states "Of all the men whom I have known and of all the comrades I have loved, DeLoach came nearest the right life, and his surviving friends will join me in this judgment of his character."
In 1867 Capt. W. R. DeLoach was married to Miss Susan Gibbs, a daughter of Col, Charles R. Gibbs, an officer of the War of 1812. Theirs was an ideal union. Will DeLoach and Sue Gibbs loved each other from youth through a long life, and parted only through that inevitable decree which "happeneth to all."
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1843 - 1910 (67 years)
