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William James Purdy
b: October 18 1825 South Carolina
d: January 6 1898 Rash, Alabama
He was 66” tall, weighed 130 lbs., had red hair and blue eyes.
His education was limited.
He was a farmer, a grist mill operator and a Baptist.
In 1846, he volunteered for service in the Mexican War.
After the war, the state of Texas gave land grants to any soldiers who would settle in the state. W. J.’s grant was west of the village of Houston, TX. Sometime about 1848/49, he visited the site and said, “A man cannot make a living in this prairie of mud and buffalo grass.”
He then headed east and settled in Alabama.
He was married in Cross Plains (now Jacksonville) to Sarah Dobbs.
Sarah was 64” tall, weighed 110 lbs, had black hair and blue eyes. She was the smallest of the Dobbs family.
They raised their family in northeastern Alabama.
He died of a heart attack and she died of pneumonia.
Both are buried in Longacre Cemetary, Rash, Alabama.
CIVIL WAR RECORD
Enlisted 30 April 1862, at Cedar Bluff, AL.
Company “E” 40th Regiment Infantry Confederate States of America.
Received a gunshot wound in the hip on 6th of May 1864, at the Battle of the Wilderness in Virginia. Furloughed home 30th January 1865, for 60 days.
He was on the rolls 31st of October 1864 to 28th of February 1865. Discharged August 1865. (See Southern Historical Society Papers, August 1978, page 219, volume 1, 1927 The Cross of Military Service. Compiled by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.
A member of:
Army of Northern Virginia May – August 1864
General Robert E. Lee
I Corps – Lt. Gen. James Longstreet
Pickets Division – Major General George E. Pickett
Laws Brigade - Brig. Gen. Jenkins Anderson
40th Regiment Alabama Infantry CSA – Col. M J Bulger
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