Aunts & Uncles~Mary R. (Sellers) (Gaddy) Burkley (1789-1884)

The “Aunts & Uncles” series of biographical sketches are Artificial Intelligence (AI) compiled narratives of selected individuals from my Genealogical database.  The selected AI will used the RootsMagic Individual Summary from my Genealogical Software, Roots Magic. All genealogical data is my research material acquired over the past 46 years of research. Today's Biography of The Life of Mary R. (Sellers) (Gaddy) Burkley (1789-1884) was compiled with the assistance of Claude Sonnett 4 and is entitled: 

                                                               The Life of

Mary R. Sellers

Gaddy · Burkley

circa 1789 – aft 1884

A Life Well Lived

Mary R. Sellers was born around 1789 in Chesterfield County, South Carolina, into a family with deep roots in the Carolina backcountry. She would go on to outlive nearly everyone she knew — two husbands, most of her children, and an entire era of American history. By the time she passed away after February 1884, at the remarkable age of 89 plus, she had witnessed the birth of a new nation, the trauma of the Civil War, and the dawn of the Gilded Age. Her long life wove together the threads of colonial settlement, westward migration, frontier farming, and family resilience across South Carolina and Georgia.

The records that survive paint a picture of a determined and capable woman — one who owned property, sold land in her eighties, and kept close ties to the Sellers family name throughout her life, even after two marriages. She is remembered in family records under the names Mary Gaddy and Mary Burkley, but she signed her last known legal document simply as Mary R. Sellers, perhaps a quiet declaration of the identity she carried from birth.

 

Family Origins & Early Life

Her Parents

Mary's father, Hardy Sellers (1757–1835), was a veteran of the American Revolutionary War — a proud distinction that would have shaped the family's sense of identity and patriotism. Hardy was born around 1757, likely in North Carolina, and established himself as a farmer and landowner in the Cheraws District of South Carolina. He appears in the 1790 census in St. Thomas, Cheraws District, with a household that included his wife, several sons, and at least three daughters, including young Mary. He lived to age 77 or 78, dying on or about January 17, 1835.

Mary's mother was Mary Cook (1760–1820), who appears in household census records alongside Hardy through 1810. She passed away around 1820, roughly a decade before her husband. Together, Hardy and Mary Cook raised a large family of children from what appears to have been more than one marriage on Hardy's part.

Growing Up in the Carolinas

Mary grew up in Chesterfield County, South Carolina, a region of rolling pine forests, river-bottom farms, and scattered homesteads settled largely by Scots-Irish and English families in the decades following the Revolution. Life in this part of the South centered on subsistence farming, community church life, and close-knit extended families. The nearest town of note was Cheraw, a small but active trading center on the Pee Dee River.

As the country itself was just finding its footing — the U.S. Constitution was ratified in 1788, the year before Mary's birth — Mary grew up in an era of profound national change. She would have been aware of the War of 1812, the rise of the cotton economy that transformed the South, and the steady westward push of American settlement.

Her Siblings

Mary was one of several children in the Sellers household. Based on census records and Hardy Sellers' probate proceedings, her known siblings included:

John Sellers (circa 1782–1844) — an older brother

Philip Sellers (circa 1774–1835) — an older brother

Abraham Sellers — a brother, present in early census records

Richard Sellers — a brother, mentioned in Hardy's will

Phoebe Sellers — a sister who predeceased her father Hardy; her children (Elijah, James, and Phoebe Gulledge) were named in his will

Jane Sellers — a sister who also predeceased Hardy; her son Iverson L. Briley was named in his will

Hardy Huntley Sellers (1829–1857) — a much younger half-sibling from Hardy's second marriage to Levinia

Zilphia Ann Sellers (1830–1913) — another younger half-sibling, also from Hardy's second marriage

The generational spread of these siblings — some much younger than Mary — reflects the reality of Hardy Sellers' having children across multiple marriages or relationships. Mary, as one of the older children from his first family, would have been well into adulthood by the time her youngest half-siblings were born.

 

First Marriage: Thomas Gaddy

The Gaddy Family

Around 1813, when she was about 24 years old, Mary married Thomas Gaddy (1789–1849). Thomas was born in the same year as Mary, and the two appear to have been a good match — both from the same region of South Carolina, both of farming stock. The marriage would last over three decades and produce at least seven children.

The 1810s and 1820s were a time of tremendous westward movement in America, as families from the Carolinas and Virginia pushed into Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, and beyond. It appears that at some point — likely in the 1820s or early 1830s — Thomas and Mary made the decision to join this migration and head to Georgia, eventually settling in DeKalb County, in the area known as Shallowford, just northeast of the young city of Atlanta.

Life in Georgia

Georgia in this era was frontier country being rapidly transformed. DeKalb County was established in 1822, carved from land that had only recently been ceded by the Creek Nation. Families like the Gaddys arrived to clear land, plant crops, and build communities from scratch. It was hard, physical work, but the promise of fertile land and fresh opportunity drew thousands of families southward and westward.

Thomas Gaddy appears in the 1850 Georgia Property Tax Digests for DeKalb County (Militia District No. 69), and Mary is listed in the 1850 Agriculture Census — suggesting the family operated a farm of some size. Tragically, Thomas died in October 1849, his death recorded in the 1850 Mortality Schedule. He was about 60 years old.

Their Children

Thomas and Mary raised a large family together. Their known children were:

Hardy Sellers Gaddy (1815–1895) — their eldest son, named in honor of Mary's father

Anne Gaddy (born circa 1819) — daughter; she later married into the Steen family

Phillip Samuel Gaddy (1825–1902) — son; he married Anne Steen, sister of John J. Steen

Henrietta Gaddy (1827–1870) — daughter

George Washington Gaddy (1827–1862) — son; born the same year as Henrietta, likely twins; he died during the Civil War era

Phebe A. Gaddy (born circa 1830) — daughter

Mary Malissa Gaddy (1834–1899) — their youngest known child

The 1850 census for Shallowford, DeKalb County captures a poignant family moment: the recently widowed Mary Gaddy, age 61, is living in the household of John J. Steen — who was the brother of Anne Steen, wife of Mary's son Phillip. So after Thomas's death, Mary was essentially sheltering with her in-law extended family, surrounded by her adult children who were also listed in the household: Hardy, Anne, Henrietta, Philip, Phebe, and Mary Malissa.

 

Second Marriage: William M. Burkley

At some point after Thomas Gaddy's death in 1849, Mary made the remarkable decision to marry again — and to return to her home state. She wed William M. Burkley (also spelled Berkley or Brinkley in various records), who was born around 1790 in Georgia. He was approximately the same age as Mary, and the two appear together in the 1860 Chesterfield County, South Carolina census, listed as William M. Berkley (age 61, farmer) and Mary Berkley (age 70).

It is worth noting that some family researchers have suggested that William Burkley's wife may have been a different Mary — specifically a Mary Rivers, daughter of Isaac Rivers and Nancy Parker. However, genealogist Marie Wiggins's records identify her as Mary Sellers, and the broader documentary evidence strongly supports this identification. The couple appear together in the 1850, 1860 and 1870 Chesterfield County censuses, and Mary's continued use of the surname Sellers in her 1884 property deed further connects her to that family line.

William M. Burkley died sometime between the 1870 and 1880 censuses — he is present in 1870 (listed as head of household, age 80) but absent in 1880, when Mary is listed as the head of household at age 92, with a young woman named Queen Sellars serving as her nurse.

The Burkleys are believed to be buried on their farm, near the Old Sellers Graveyard in Chesterfield County — a fitting resting place, returning Mary to the landscape of her childhood.

 

Later Life & Independence

Mary's later years are a testament to her extraordinary longevity and continued independence. By 1870, she was approximately 81 years old and living with her husband William in Chesterfield. By 1880, widowed once again, she was 92 and heading her own household, cared for by a nurse.

What makes the later records particularly striking is a legal deed from February 8, 1884. At approximately 95 years of age, Mary R. Sellers — as she signed herself — sold a 200-acre tract of land in Chesterfield County to Elizabeth Sellers for fifty dollars. The land, situated on the north side of Golphurs Branch on the waters of Deep Creek, had formerly belonged to a Sarah Hancock. The deed was witnessed by Hardy J. Allen and Robert H. M. Hancock, and officially recorded on February 12, 1884. That a woman in her mid-nineties was independently transacting property in a formal legal proceeding speaks volumes about her mental sharpness and sense of agency.

Mary R. Sellers Gaddy Burkley died sometime after February 1884, in Chesterfield County, South Carolina. She was approximately 95 years old. Her Find A Grave memorial (No. 46153898) records her burial location as the Berkley Family Cemetery, though family tradition suggests she rests near the Old Sellers Graveyard on the family farm.

 

Mary's World: A Century of American History

Mary R. Sellers was born the year the United States government first went into operation under President George Washington. She died just three years before the close of the nineteenth century. The span of her life encompassed almost the entire history of the young republic:

1789 — The year of Mary's birth; George Washington inaugurated as first President

1812–1815 — The War of 1812; Mary was a young married woman

1830s — Indian Removal Act (1830) cleared DeKalb County, Georgia, where Mary's family would later settle

1835 — Death of her father, Hardy Sellers; probate proceedings involve Mary and her siblings

1849 — Death of her first husband, Thomas Gaddy, in Georgia

1861–1865 — The Civil War; Mary was in her 70s; her son George Washington Gaddy died in 1862

1865 — Emancipation and Reconstruction; Mary living in Chesterfield, SC

1884 — Mary, at approximately 95, signs a legal land deed in her own name

Aft 1884 — Mary's death, aged approximately 95

The Civil War would have been a particularly painful chapter for Mary. Living in Chesterfield County, South Carolina — one of the Confederate states — she would have experienced the war's hardships firsthand. Her son George Washington Gaddy died in 1862, likely a casualty of the conflict. Sherman's army marched through the Carolinas in early 1865, and communities like Chesterfield suffered significant destruction. Mary endured all of it.

 

Family Legacy

Mary R. Sellers spent her life at the intersection of two prominent Upcountry South Carolina families — the Sellers and the Gaddys — and left descendants scattered across South Carolina and Georgia. Her seven children with Thomas Gaddy carried the family name westward and back again, and her connection to the Sellers family never truly faded, as evidenced by her lifelong use of that surname in formal contexts.

Her father Hardy Sellers' status as a Revolutionary War patriot would have been a point of family pride passed down through generations. Mary herself was living proof of that founding generation's legacy — born in the infancy of the republic, she outlived nearly the entire nineteenth century.

Mary R. (Sellers) (Gaddy) Burkley is my 4th Great GrandAunt. 

_____________________________

Sources & Notes

1. Find A Grave, Inc., Find A Grave, database and digital images, (http://www.findagrave.com : accessed ); Memorial page for Mary Berkley; (1790–12 October 1879); Find a Grave memorial # 46153898, Citing Berkley Family Cemete; Chesterfield, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, USA.

2. 1790 U. S. Census, Cheraw District, South Carolina, population schedule, St Thomas, Cheraws District, South Carolina, Page: 373; Line 939, Household of Hardy SELLERS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://ancestry.com : viewed 11 January 2012); citing National Archives Microfilm M637_11.

3. 1800 U S Census, Chesterfield, Chesterfield, South Carolina, population schedule, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, Page: 106; Line 16, Household of Hardy SELLERS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 11 January 2012); citing NARA microfilm publication M32, Roll 47.

4. 1810 U S Census, Chesterfield, Chesterfield, South Carolina, population schedule, Chesterfield, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, Page: 578; Line 23, Household of Hardy SELLERS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 11 January 2012); citing  National Archives Microfilm M252_60.

5. Hardy Sellers Equity Notice, The Cheraw Gazette, Cheraw, Chesterfield, South Carolina, 30 August 1836, page 167, Image 3, column 2.

6. 1850 U. S. Census, DeKalb County, Georgia, population schedule, Shallowford, DeKalb County, Georgia, Page: 117A(stamped); Line 25, Dwelling 26, Family 26, Household of  John STEEN; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 9 February 2014); citing NARA publication Roll: M432_67.

7. 1850 U. S. Census, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Chesterfield, Chesterfield, South Carolina, Page: 131A(Stamped); Line:#5, Dwelling:#500; Family:#500, Household of William M. BURKLEY; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : online August 2025); citing  National Archives Microfilm M432 Roll 851.

8. 1850 U. S. Census, DeKalb County, Georgia, agriculture schedule, Shallowford, DeKalb, Georgia, USA, enumeration district (ED) 21 Aug 1850, Page:# 63; Line:#21, Mary Gaddy; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed ); citing NARA publication Roll: T1137:2.

9. Thomas Gaddy, District 69, Kees, Image 88 of 124, , 1850; , Georgia, Property Tax Digests, 1793-1893; Georgia Archives, Morrow, Georgia.

10. 1860 U. S. Census, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, Page: 144B(Stamped); Line:#26, Dwelling:#715; Family:#713, Household of Wm. M. BURKLEY; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : online August 2025); citing National Archives Microfilm M653_1217.

11. 1870 U. S. Census, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Court House, Chesterfield, South Carolina, Page:#292 (Stamped), Line:#8,, Dwelling:#89, Family:#89, Household of W. M. BURKLEY; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : online August 2025); citing  National Archives Microfilm M593_1491.

12. 1880 U. S. Census, Chesterfield, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Court House, Chesterfield, South Carolina, enumeration district (ED) 005, Page: 312B(stamped); Line 14, Dwelling 49, Family 49, Household of Mary BURKLEY; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 10 June 2017); citing  National Archives Microfilm T9-1225.

13. Land Deed - Mary Sellers to Elizabeth Sellers Deed; 8 February 1884; Deed Book #7; Page(s) 566 & 567; Register of Deeds; Chesterfield, Chesterfield, South Carolina; July 2024.

14. Lee G. Barrow, Cheraw District, South Carolina, Court of Equity: Volume 1: Minutes, 1801-1823S (Gainesville, Georgia: Bargraphica, 2012), 118.

15. Hardy Sellers Equity Notice, The Cheraw Gazette, 30 August 1836.

16. 1850 U. S. Census, Dekalb County, Georgia, mortality schedule, DeKalb County, Georgia, Page: 165, THOMAS GADDY; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 2 November 2014); citing  National Archives Microfilm T655-07.

This biography was compiled from U.S. Federal Census records (1790–1880), Georgia and South Carolina property and tax records, Find A Grave memorial #6153898, the Chesterfield District Court of Common Pleas equity records (1851), the Cheraw Gazette (1836), and family research notes by Marie Wiggins and others. All genealogical details are drawn directly from primary and secondary sources; no details have been added or embellished beyond historical context.

52 Cousins~ John Rufus Eddins

The “52 Cousins” series of biographical sketches are Artificial Intelligence (AI) compiled narratives of selected individuals from my Genealogical database.  The selected AI will used documents and data from my RootsMagic Genealogical Software. All genealogical data is my research material acquired over the past 46+ years of research. Today's Biography of John Rufus Eddins (1837-1921) was compiled with the assistance of Claude Sonnett 4 and is entitled:

"John Rufus Eddins"

1837 – 1921

Wilcox County, Alabama  •  Falls County, Texas

 

Overview

John Rufus Eddins was born on 15 November 1837 in Wilcox County, Alabama — a rural, heavily forested corner of the Deep South where cotton was king and small farming families carved out a living from the rich Black Belt soil. He lived through one of the most turbulent eras in American history: the antebellum South, the Civil War, Reconstruction, and the long transition into the early twentieth century. A farmer for virtually his entire working life, John married young, raised a large family, survived imprisonment as a Confederate soldier, and eventually followed his children westward to Texas, where he spent his final decades. He died peacefully in December 1921 at the remarkable age of 84, remembered by his community as a pioneer and a man of steady, quiet vitality.

Parents and Early Life

John was the son of William Riley Eddins (born 1793 in South Carolina, died 1878) and Nancy Manning (born 1810 in North Carolina, died 1840). His father William was already 44 years old when John was born — a seasoned farmer who had made his way from South Carolina to Alabama, part of the great migration of settlers who flooded into the newly opened lands of the Deep South in the early 1800s. Sadly, John's mother Nancy died in 1840, when he was only about three years old, leaving William to raise the family without her.

The 1850 census captures a snapshot of the Eddins household in Wilcox County when John was about 13 years old. Living under William's roof were several siblings: Abner W. (age 23), James R. (age 19), Francis M. (age 9), Riley H. (age 5), Amanda (age 3), Davis (age 1), and Christianna (age 19). It was a full and lively house — a frontier farming family navigating life in the American South in the years just before the Civil War would tear everything apart.

Alabama in the 1830s and 1840s was still in many ways a frontier state. Wilcox County, situated in the heart of the Black Belt region, had been organized just a generation earlier in 1819 — the same year Alabama achieved statehood. The economy revolved around cotton cultivation, and the landscape was dotted with farms large and small. For the Eddins family, like most white Southern farmers of modest means, life meant hard work, close community ties, and deep roots in the land.

Starting Out: Land and Property

By the time he was 20, John was already making moves to establish himself. On 3 December 1857, James T. Eddins, A.W. Eddins, and wife, Christianna Eddins sold him a parcel of land in Wilcox County for $350. The deed conveyed the SE¼ of SW¼ and SW¼ of NW¼ of Section 15, Township 10, Range 11, recorded in Deed Book "N", page 487. That $350 was no small sum in 1857 — roughly equivalent to several thousand dollars today — and it speaks to a young man with serious intentions and enough savings or credit to buy land outright from his own family.

This land purchase came just two years before his marriage, suggesting John was deliberately setting himself up for the next chapter of his life. It also reflects a common pattern of the era: land within extended families changing hands as younger generations established their own households, keeping the community and the acres close together.

Marriage and Family

Emeline Lucretia Beard (1842–1916)

On 12 January 1860, John married Emeline Lucretia Beard in Camden, the county seat of Wilcox County. She was 17 and he was 22. Emeline (also spelled Emaline in various records) was born in Alabama in April 1842 and would prove to be a steadfast partner through the upheavals that followed. Their marriage lasted 56 years, until Emeline's death in 1916, five years before John's own passing.

Together they had nine children, though not all survived childhood — a heartbreaking but commonplace reality of nineteenth-century family life. Their children were:

• Baby Boy Eddins (1861–1861) — an infant son lost in his first year, almost certainly in the turmoil of the Civil War's opening months.

• Abner William Eddins (1866–1942) — born after the war, Abner lived a long life of 76 years.

• Leonidas Polk Eddins (1869–1942) — named perhaps in honor of Confederate General Leonidas Polk, killed in the Atlanta Campaign in 1864.

• Marcus Elbert "Pink" Eddins (1872–1938)

• Kate Eliza "Pinke Lou" Eddins (1874–1944) — who later married Frank Anding and settled in Falls County, Texas.

• Charles Floyd Eddins (1875–1940) — who would later become John's caretaker in old age, with John living in Charles's home in Marlin, Texas, as recorded in the 1920 census.

• Curtis Ramsey Eddins (1878–1949)

• Baby Girl Eddins (1880–1880) — another infant lost, this time in the difficult post-Reconstruction years.

• Claude C. Eddins (1882–1882) — a third child who did not survive infancy.

The 1900 census notes that Emeline had borne 8 children and 6 were still living — a testament to both the size of the family and the sorrows they carried. By 1910, after another decade, the count had risen to 9 children total, reflecting what was likely little Claude, the last baby.

The Civil War: Soldier and Prisoner

Just months after his marriage and only a year after buying his land, the world John Eddins had been building was turned upside down. When the Civil War broke out in April 1861, Alabama quickly seceded and began raising troops. John enlisted in the Confederate Army and was mustered into Company H of the 17th Alabama Infantry Regiment — recorded as "Jno R Eddins" on the muster rolls dated 25 September 1861. He held the rank of Corporal.

The 17th Alabama Infantry was a fighting unit from the very beginning of the war. Organized in the summer of 1861, the regiment saw action in some of the conflict's most brutal campaigns across the Western Theater, including operations in Tennessee, Mississippi, and Georgia. For four years, John served as the war ground on and the casualties mounted on both sides.

On 20 July 1864, John was captured near Atlanta, Georgia. This was during the Atlanta Campaign — General William Sherman's relentless push toward Atlanta, one of the most significant Union offensives of the entire war. Atlanta was a crucial Confederate railroad hub and industrial center, and its defense was fiercely contested. John's capture came just days before Sherman's forces finally encircled the city; Atlanta fell on 2 September 1864, a blow that many historians credit with ensuring Abraham Lincoln's re-election that November.

As a prisoner of war, John was transported all the way to Camp Douglas in Chicago, Illinois — one of the Union's largest and most notorious POW camps. Camp Douglas held tens of thousands of Confederate prisoners over the course of the war. Conditions there were grim: overcrowding, inadequate food and shelter, brutal winters for men accustomed to the Deep South, and rampant disease. An estimated 4,000 or more prisoners died at Camp Douglas, earning it a dark reputation in Southern memory. That John survived his imprisonment — and lived to age 84 — was no small feat.

He was also present early enough in the war to have witnessed the land he and Emeline had worked slipping through their fingers. On 31 October 1861, just weeks after mustering in, John and Emeline sold their Wilcox County land to one Hamblinton Johnston for $1,200 — more than three times what John had paid for it four years earlier. Whatever the reason for the sale — the uncertainty of wartime, a need for cash, or simply practicality — it marked the end of their first attempt at putting down permanent roots.

Reconstruction and Rebuilding

When the war ended in April 1865, John would have made his way back to Wilcox County, Alabama, to Emeline and whatever remained of their life together. The Reconstruction era (1865–1877) was an extraordinarily difficult time for the white rural South. The old agricultural order had collapsed with the end of slavery, labor arrangements were in flux, and economic depression settled over the region for years. Cotton prices fluctuated wildly, and small farmers struggled to stay afloat.

Despite everything, John and Emeline rebuilt. By the time of the 1880 census, they were living in Pine Apple, Wilcox County, with five children at home: Abner (13), Leonidas (10), Marcus (8), Kate (6), Charles (5), and baby Ramsey (1). John, now 42, listed his occupation as Farmer. A woman named Masuira White, age 26, also lived with the household — likely a domestic helper or farmhand's family member. The family had survived the war, survived Reconstruction, and was once again putting down roots in familiar Alabama soil.

The post-war South was slowly changing. Sharecropping and tenant farming had replaced the plantation system for many, while railroads began stitching the region together and opening up new possibilities. It was in this environment that John and Emeline began to think about the future — not just in Alabama, but perhaps farther afield.

A New Chapter: Texas

Sometime around 1880 — the same year as the last Alabama census record — John and Emeline made the significant decision to move the family to Texas. His obituary states that he "had resided in Falls County since 1880, coming to Texas in that year from Conecah County, Ala." (Conecah County borders Wilcox County to the south, suggesting the family may have spent time there before departing.) In Texas, John purchased a home on Blue Ridge in Falls County, and it is there that he would spend the final four decades of his life.

The move to Texas was part of a larger wave of migration in the late nineteenth century. Texas was growing rapidly — Reconstruction had ended, railroads were expanding, and land in central Texas was relatively affordable compared to the worn-out soils of the older Southern states. Falls County, situated along the Brazos River in central Texas, was prime farming country, and many former Alabamians and other Southerners were settling there.

By the time of the 1900 census, John and Emeline were living in Justice Precinct 2, Falls County, with their adult sons Charles (24) and Ramsey (21) still at home, along with daughter Katie (who appears to have been counted as age 2 — likely a recording error given she was born in 1874). John was 62 years old and still working as a farmer. The census notes the couple had been married 40 years.

A decade later, the 1910 census finds them in Justice Precinct 1, Falls County, still farming. John was 71 and Emeline 68, having marked 50 years of marriage. Six of their nine children were still living.

Emeline died in 1916, after more than half a century beside her husband. John was 78 years old. In his final years, John moved to Marlin — the county seat of Falls County — to live with his son Charles and Charles's wife Phoebe. The 1920 census shows him there, listed as "Father," age 82, in Charles's household along with grandchildren Susie (18), John (15), and Percival (11).

Death and Legacy

John Rufus Eddins died on the night of Tuesday, 21 December 1921, in Marlin, Falls County, Texas. He was 84 years old. His obituary in The Rosebud News, published 30 December 1921, captured the gentle manner of his passing:

"At the advanced age of 84 years the end came to the life of John R. Eddins during the night of Tuesday, the hour no one definitely knows, as life was extinct Wednesday morning when a member of the family went to his room to wake him. Mr. Eddins was in a bright and cheerful mood Tuesday night and chatted with the family and a friend until his usual bedtime, retiring in apparently as good health as he has had in some time. Due to decrepitude of age, he had not been active for several years, but his remarkable vitality was evident until the last."

He was buried on 22 December 1921 at Stranger Cemetery in Stranger, Falls County, Texas — a small rural community just outside Marlin. His wife Emeline rests beside him there. His daughter, Mrs. Frank Anding (Kate Eliza Eddins), was living nearby in Falls County at the time of his death.

John Rufus Eddins was a man shaped by extraordinary times. He was born into a slave-holding Southern society, survived the catastrophic Civil War as both a soldier and a prisoner, rebuilt his life through the hard years of Reconstruction, uprooted his family for a new beginning in Texas, and quietly outlived most of his generation. The obituary called him a "pioneer" — and in both the literal and figurative sense, he was. A farmer to the end, a husband for 56 years, and a father of nine, his life traced the arc of an entire era in American history.

 

Quick Reference: Key Dates

15 November 1837 — Born, Wilcox County, Alabama

3 December 1857 — Purchased land in Wilcox County for $350

12 January 1860 — Married Emeline Lucretia Beard, Camden, Alabama

31 October 1861 — Sold Wilcox County land for $1,200

25 September 1861 — Enlisted, 17th Alabama Infantry, Company H, as Corporal

20 July 1864 — Captured near Atlanta, Georgia; sent to Camp Douglas, Chicago

c. 1880 — Family relocated to Falls County, Texas; settled on Blue Ridge

1916 — Wife Emeline died after 56 years of marriage

21 December 1921 — Died, Marlin, Falls County, Texas, age 84

22 December 1921 — Buried, Stranger Cemetery, Stranger, Falls County, Texas

John Rufus Eddins is my 1st Couisn 4X Removed.

 ______________________________

1. Jno R Eddins, compiled military record (Company: H; 17th Alabama Infantry Regiment), U.S. Civil War Soldier Records and Profiles, U.S. Civil War Soldiers, 1861-1865 (Provo, Utah: www.ancestry.com), N/A.

2. 1850 U. S. Census, Wilcox County, Alabama, population schedule, Wilcox County, Alabama, ; Page: 360A (stamped); Line 31, Dwelling 218, Family 218, Househoild of Wm J. EDINGS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 3 May 2022); citing  National Archives Microfilm M432 Roll 16.

3. Land Deed - James T. Eddins and A.W. Eddins and Christianna Eddins  to John R. Eddins; 3 December 1857; Deed Book #"N"; Page(s) 487; Register of Deeds; Camden,  Wilcox County, Alabama; July 2024.

4. Corp. John R Eddins, compiled military record (Company H; Regiment 17 Ala. Inft), US CIVIL WAR PRISONER OF WAR RECORDS, 1861-1865, U.S. Civil War Soldiers, 1861-1865 (Provo, Utah: www.ancestry.com), N/A.

5. Land Deed - John R. Eddins & Emaline L. Eddins to Hamblinton Johnston; 31 October 1861; Deed Book # "O"; page(s)183.

6. 1880 U. S. Census, Wilcox County, Alabama, population schedule, Pine Apple, Wilcox, Alabama, enumeration district (ED) #184, Page:#238A (Stamped); Line:#26, Dwelling:#456; Family:#466, Household of John EDDINS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://ancestry.com : online July 2025); citing National Archives Microfilm T9_0035.

7. 1900  U. S. Census, Fall County, Texas, population schedule, Justice Precinct 2, Falls, Texas;, enumeration district (ED) #18, Page:#94B (Stamped); Line:#90, Dwelling:#140; Family:#140, Household of  John EDDINS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : online July 2025); citing National Archives Microfilm T623, Roll 1634.

8. 1910  U. S. Census, Falls County, Texas, population schedule, Justice Precinct 1, Falls, Texas, enumeration district (ED) 45-46, Page:#61A (Stamped); Line:#39, Dwelling:#10; Family:#10, Household of John EDDINS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : online July 2025); citing National Archives Microfilm T624, Roll 1552.

9. 1920  U. S. Census, Falls County, Texas, population schedule, Marlin, Falls, Texas;, enumeration district (ED) #70, Page:#51B (Stamped); Line:#94, Dwelling:#64; Family:#65, Household of Charles EDDINS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : online July 2025); citing National Archives Microfilm T625, Roll.

10. John Rufus Eddins, death certificate #33619 (21 December 1921), Vital Records, Department of Health, Austin, Travis County, Texas.

11. Find A Grave, Inc., Find A Grave, database and digital images, (http://www.findagrave.com : accessed  3 May 2022); Memorial page for John R Eddins; (15 November 1837–21 December 1921); Find a Grave memorial # 27310076, Citing Stranger Cemetery; Stranger, Falls County, Texas, USA.

12. PIONEER GONE - John Rufus Eddins obituary, The Rosebud News, Rosebud,Falls County, Texas, 30 December 1921. Courtesy of Fran Hargrove.

13. "Alabama Marriages, 1816-1942," database, Ancestry (http://www.ancestry.com : online August 2024), Marriage:  John R. Eddins & Emiline L. Beard; Marriage Date: 12 Jan 1860.

14. Emeline L Eddins, Martin, Falls, Texas, USA death certificate #340 (31 December 1916).

15. 1880 U. S. Census, Wilcox County, Alabama, population schedule, Pine Apple, Wilcox, Alabama, ED #184, Page:#238A (Stamped); Line:#26, Dwelling:#456; Family:#466, Household of John EDDINS.

16. Emeline L Eddins, Martin, Falls, Texas, USA death certificate #340 (31 December 1916).

17. Find A Grave, Inc., Find A Grave, database, "Record, Emeline Lucretia Beard Eddins (17 April 1842–31 December 1916), Memorial # 27310160.

 

Aunts & Uncles~The Life of Dempsey Rivers (1830 – 1861)

The “Aunts & Uncles” series of biographical sketches are Artificial Intelligence (AI) compiled narratives of selected individuals from my Genealogical database.  The selected AI will used the RootsMagic Individual Summary from my Genealogical Software, Roots Magic. All genealogical data is my research material acquired over the past 46 years of research. Today's Biography of The Life of Dempsey Rivers (1830-1861) was compiled with the assistance of Claude Sonnett 4 and is entitled: 

"The Life of Dempsey Rivers"

1830 – 1861

Chesterfield County, South Carolina

 

 

Introduction

Dempsey Rivers was born in 1830 in Chesterfield County, South Carolina, into a farming family with deep roots in that corner of the state. His life was brief — barely thirty-one years — but it was full enough to leave a paper trail that tells us something real about the man: a son, a husband (twice over), a father, a farmer, a neighbor who co-signed a debt, and finally a soldier who never came home. His story is inseparable from the turbulent era he lived through, from the cotton-belt world of antebellum South Carolina to the opening months of the Civil War.

This biography draws on census records, military service records, probate files, and courthouse documents to piece together the arc of Dempsey's short life and the family he left behind.

 

Parents and Early Family

Dempsey was one of several children born to William Rivers (born about 1776) and his wife Elizabeth "Betsy" Rivers (maiden name unknown, died before 1847). William Rivers was an aging farmer by the time Dempsey came along — already in his mid-fifties at the time of Dempsey's birth — and the household he ran was a busy one.

The 1850 federal census gives us a snapshot of the Rivers home in Chesterfield District. At that point, William Rivers was 75 years old and still listed as head of household. Living with him were several of his children, including:

Nancy Rivers, age 26

William A. Rivers, age 22

Dempsey Rivers, age 20

James Rivers, age 15

Also living in the household were a Sarah Davis (age 31) and her children Frederick, Hannah, and Elijah Davis — likely a widowed sister or relative who had moved in. The Rivers were a typical Chesterfield farming family, working the land and looking out for one another the way rural Southern families did.

Dempsey's mother, Elizabeth "Betsy," had died by 1847, so she was not around to see her son grow into adulthood.

 

The World Dempsey Grew Up In

Antebellum Chesterfield County

Chesterfield County in the 1830s–1850s was a world of small farms, pine forests, and red clay soil. Cotton was king across much of the Carolina Piedmont, and families like the Rivers worked hard to carve a living out of the land. The county seat of Chesterfield (also known as Chesterfield Court House) was a small but active community with a courthouse, churches, and the social rhythms of rural Southern life.

The 1850s were a decade of mounting political tension across the South. South Carolina, in particular, was a hotbed of states' rights sentiment and fire-eating secessionist politics. The Compromise of 1850, the publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin in 1852, and the violent battles over slavery in "Bleeding Kansas" (1854–1858) kept the country on edge. By the time Dempsey was a young man, secession was a topic discussed in every courthouse and church in the state.

A telling note survives from family correspondence: Dempsey co-signed a document with his brother William Alfred in 1855, agreeing to pay Edward Malloy $36.00 for the hire of a enslaved boy. This single detail confirms that, like many Chesterfield County families of modest means, the Rivers were part of the slave economy even without being large planters — hiring enslaved labor for seasonal work was common.

 

First Marriage: Eliza Ann Dozier

Around 1854, Dempsey married Eliza Ann Dozier, born on April 8, 1836, in Chesterfield County. Eliza Ann had been living in the household of John Isaac Huntley as a young girl, as shown in the 1850 census, where she appears at age 13. She was the daughter of James Dozier (died 1848) and Britten Dozier (died 1852), and had likely been taken in by the Huntley family after losing both parents.

The marriage produced one child, a daughter named Georgia Ann Rivers, born around December 1855. Tragedy followed swiftly. Eliza Ann died on December 11, 1856, at only 20 years, 8 months, and 3 days of age — her tombstone in Kite Cemetery records this with precision. Family notes suggest it is quite possible that both mother and infant daughter died as a result of childbirth complications. Georgia Ann survived her mother by just two days, dying on December 13, 1856. She is buried beside her mother at Kite Cemetery in Chesterfield County. Her tombstone reads: "age 1 year, daughter of D. R. and E. A. Rivers."

Dempsey found himself a widower at around age 26, having lost both his wife and his only child within the span of two days. It was a devastating blow, and one that makes his decision to start again — and the family he built with Sarah Ann Massey — all the more poignant.

 

Second Marriage: Sarah Ann Massey

About 1858, Dempsey married for the second time, this time to Sarah Ann Massey, who was born in 1844 in Chesterfield County — making her about 14 or 15 years old at the time of their marriage. Child marriages of this kind were not unusual in mid-19th-century rural South Carolina, particularly when a family was comfortable with the match.

Sarah Ann was the daughter of William Lawrence Massey (1815–1862) and Huldah Elizabeth Meadows (1811–1886), a large and well-connected Chesterfield family. Sarah had numerous siblings, including sisters Mary Ann (who married into the Rivers family herself, wedding a Phillip Rivers) and Lydia (who married a William J. Rivers). It seems the Massey and Rivers families were closely intertwined.

The 1860 federal census — taken just a year before the war — gives us our clearest picture of Dempsey's household. He appears there under the name "Duncan Rivers" (likely a census taker's error or a nickname), listed as a 30-year-old male born in South Carolina. Living with him are Sarah, age 16, and their infant son James W. T. Rivers, listed as just six months old.

1860 Census, Chesterfield, South Carolina: Duncan Rivers, 30, male, SC; Sarah Rivers, 16, female, SC; James W. T. Rivers, 6/12, male, SC.

It was a young, growing family. By all appearances, life was going along as expected for a Chesterfield farming couple — until April 1861 changed everything.

 

Children

Georgia Ann Rivers (abt. December 1855 – December 13, 1856)

Georgia Ann was the only child of Dempsey's first marriage, to Eliza Ann Dozier. She was born around December 1855 and lived for approximately one year. She died on December 13, 1856 — just two days after her mother — and is buried alongside Eliza Ann at Kite Cemetery in Chesterfield, South Carolina. Her small tombstone, recorded in the Chesterfield County Cemetery Survey, identifies her simply as "age 1 year, daughter of D. R. and E. A. Rivers." She never had the chance to know her father, and Dempsey never had the chance to watch her grow up. Both mother and child are memorialized on Find A Grave (Memorial #40202633 and #40202722).

James William Thomas "Catfish" Rivers (1859–1931)

James was born on November 19, 1859, making him just a baby when his father left for the war. He grew up in Chesterfield County, raised by his widowed mother and later in the household of his uncle Phillip Rivers (as shown in the 1880 census, where he appears as a nephew). Despite losing his father so young, James built a full life. He married Mary Eliza Davis on March 23, 1879, and they had eight children together, six of whom survived to adulthood. He was a faithful member of Zoar United Methodist Church for fifty years, serving thirty years as a church steward.

His obituary in The Chesterfield Advertiser, February 4, 1932, remembered him warmly: the son of Dempsey and Sarah Massey Rivers, a churchman, a husband, a father. He died on December 7, 1931, and was buried at Zoar United Methodist Church Cemetery in Brocks Mill, Chesterfield County.

Sarah Elizabeth "Lizzie" Rivers (1861–1926)

Sarah Elizabeth was born on September 4, 1861 — just months before her father died in November of that year. She never knew him. She was raised by her mother and, after her mother's tragic death in 1871, came under the guardianship of her uncle Phillip Rivers.

Lizzie married James Hampton Tucker around 1878 and eventually made her way to Union Parish, Louisiana, where she and James raised their family. She appears in the 1900, 1910, and 1920 censuses in Louisiana, building a life far from Chesterfield. She died on June 26, 1926, and was buried at Brantley Cemetery in Union Parish, Louisiana.

 

Civil War Service and Death

Enlisting in Company B, 8th South Carolina Infantry

On April 13, 1861 — just two days after Confederate forces opened fire on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor — Dempsey Rivers enlisted as a private in Company B of the 8th Regiment, South Carolina Infantry. The timing was nearly simultaneous with the very opening shots of the war, reflecting the intense wave of enlistment that swept through South Carolina in the spring of 1861.

South Carolina had been the first state to secede from the Union, doing so on December 20, 1860. By April 1861, war fever was running high, and thousands of young men across the state rushed to enlist. For Dempsey, who was 30 years old and the father of a baby boy with another child on the way, the decision to enlist may have been a matter of community pressure, personal conviction, or both.

Disease in the Confederate Army

Dempsey's military service was heartbreakingly brief. He never saw a major battle. On October 29, 1861 — just six and a half months after he enlisted — he was admitted to a hospital suffering from chronic dysentery. He was transferred to Union Hills on November 1, 1861.

Disease was by far the greatest killer of Civil War soldiers on both sides. In the Confederate Army, for every soldier who died in combat, roughly two died of illness. Typhoid fever, dysentery, pneumonia, and measles swept through the camps with devastating efficiency. Dempsey had barely been in the army long enough to fire a shot before disease caught up with him.

Death

Dempsey Rivers died of typhoid fever, somewhere around Petersburg, Virginia, in November 1861. The exact date is recorded slightly differently across sources — the Confederate States Treasury document gives November 9, 1861, while his Civil War Service Record states November 13, 1861. The book Broken Fortunes: South Carolina Soldiers, Sailors and Citizens Who Died in the Service of Their Country (compiled by Randolph W. Kirkland Jr. and published by the South Carolina Historical Society) lists him among the Roll of the Dead for Company B, 8th South Carolina Infantry.

He was 31 years old. His son James was not yet two years old. His daughter Sarah Elizabeth would be born just weeks later, in September — meaning Dempsey died before he ever knew he had a daughter.

 

The Widow Sarah Ann Massey Rivers

Sarah Ann was barely 17 years old when she became a widow with an infant son. The years that followed were hard ones for South Carolina families left behind by the war. She raised her two young children — James and the newborn Sarah Elizabeth — through the chaos of the war years and Reconstruction.

At some point between 1861 and 1867, Sarah Ann remarried, this time to a man named Leander Sweat (also written as Sweatt). The 1870 census shows the family in Chesterfield Court House: Sarah Sweat, age 28; J. Sweat (James Rivers), age 11; S. Sweat (Sarah Elizabeth Rivers), age 9; and H. Sweat (Henry Sweat), age 4 — the last name, Henry, likely being a child of her second marriage.

The legal records from Dempsey's estate are complicated and tell their own story of the chaos that followed wartime death. William L. Massey — Sarah's own father — had been named administrator of Dempsey's estate after the latter's death, but Massey himself died in May 1862. A second administrator, Thomas P. Davis, was eventually named on August 10, 1866. The estate wasn't sorted out for years.

A Tragic End

Sarah Ann's story ended in violence on February 4, 1871. She was found dead in her yard at sunrise, and a coroner's inquest was immediately convened: "The State vs. The Dead Body of Sarah Sweat." The official finding was death "by the visitation of Providence," but the testimony gathered at the inquest painted a much darker picture.

Multiple witnesses reported that a man named Stephen Talbert had been terrorizing Sarah for more than a year. He had shot at her, grabbed her, threatened to kill her, and told her repeatedly that she should not marry anyone else — that if she did, he would kill any man he saw talking to her. Sarah had reportedly told witnesses she was afraid to go to the authorities because she feared he would kill her. The perpetrator named in the inquest record is Stephen Talbert.

Sarah Ann Massey Rivers Sweat died at approximately 27 years of age, leaving behind her two children from her first marriage and at least one child from her second marriage. She is remembered in the probate records of Chesterfield County as Estate Folder #535.

 

Legacy

Dempsey Rivers lived for only about 31 years, and his direct impact on the world around him was necessarily limited by that brevity. But the family he helped bring into existence carried on. His son James — nicknamed "Catfish" — lived to 72 years of age and built a full life as a churchman and family man in Chesterfield County. His daughter Sarah Elizabeth crossed state lines to Louisiana and raised a family there.

The documents that survive about Dempsey — census pages, a military service record, probate folders, a courthouse lawsuit — are the quiet traces of an ordinary life caught in an extraordinary moment in American history. He was not a general or a politician. He was a farmer from Chesterfield County who enlisted in the opening days of a catastrophic war and was dead within seven months, taken not by a bullet but by disease.

His widow and children struggled through a generation of upheaval — war, Reconstruction, a violent death, legal battles over an estate that took years to settle. And yet the family persisted. That persistence is Dempsey Rivers's real legacy.

Dempsey Rivers is my 3rd Great Grand Uncle. 

_____________________________

1. 1850 U. S. Census, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Chesterfield District, South Carolina, Page 179B, Line 16, family  1242, dwelling 1242, Household of William Rivers; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 2010); citing  National Archives Microfilm M432 Roll 851.

3. 1860 U. S. Census, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Chesterfield, South Carolina, Page: 115 (stamped); Line 27, Dwelling 299, Family 299, Household of Duncan RIVERS; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 31 July 2013); citing National Archives Microfilm M653_1217.

4. Randolph W. Kirkland Jr., Broken Fortunes: South Carolina Soldiers, Sailors and Citizens Who Died in the Service of Their Country and State in the War for Southern Independence, 1861-1865 (Columbia, South Carolina: University of South Carolina, 1997), page 298.

5. Ancestry, "Civil War Service Records" database, Military Service Records (https://www.fold3.com/ : accessed 31 July 2013), entry for Dempsey RIVERS, Private; Co. B, 8th Infantry, South Carolina Volunteers; Confederate.

6. William J. Rivers, Roll of the Dead: South Carolina Troops, Confederate States Service (Columbia, South Carolina: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, 1994), Dempsey Rivers.

7. Kirkland, Broken Fortunes, page 298.

8. James C. Pigg, Cheraw/Chesterfield District Wills, 1750-1865: Abstracts from the Court of Common Pleas 1823-1869 (Tega Cay, South Carolina: Self-published, 1995), page 133.

9. "South Carolina Probate Records, Files and Loose Papers, 1732-1964," Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints, Family Search (https://www.familysearch.org/ : viewed 3 August 2011), images, "Dempsey RIVERS, Probate Folder #11," Images 159-172.

10. Find A Grave, Inc., Find A Grave, database and digital images, (http://www.findagrave.com : accessed  5 June 2012); Memorial page for Eliza A. Rivers; (8 April 1836–11 December 1856); Find a Grave memorial # 40202633, Citing Kite Cemetery; Chesterfield, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, USA.

11. 1850 U. S. Census, Chesterfield, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Chesterfield, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, Page: 175B; Line 11, Dwelling 1182, Family 1182, Household of  John HUNTLY; digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 14 February 2015); citing  National Archives Microfilm M432 Roll 851.

12. Find A Grave, Inc., Find A Grave, database, "Record, Eliza A. Rivers (8 April 1836–11 December 1856), Memorial # 40202633.

13. James C. Pigg, Chesterfield County Cemetery Survey; Chesterfield County Genealogical Services, 1995, page 1129. Tombstone of Georgia A. RIVERS; Unk. - Dec. 13, 1856., Kite Cemetery, Chesterfield County, South Carolina.

14. Find A Grave, Inc., Find A Grave, database, "Record, Georgia A. Rivers (Unk. - Dec. 13, 1856), Memorial # 40202722.

15. Chesterfield County, South Carolina, Probate Files & Loose papers, Dempsey Rivers; digital images, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, FamilySearch (http://www.familysearch.org: online November 2024); 11.

16. Pigg, Cheraw/Chesterfield District Wills, 1750-1865, page 133.

17. 1870 U. S. Census, Court House, Chesterfield County, South Carolina, population schedule, Court House, Chesterfield, South Carolina, Page 30/302B(stamped); Line 5, Dwelling 294, Family 294, Household of S. SWEET; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : viewed 31 July 2013); citing National Archive  Microfilm M593, Roll 1491.

18. Chesterfield County, South Carolina, Estate Folder #535, Sarah [Massey Rivers] Sweat; SC Archives & History, Columbia, South Carolina.

19. Chesterfield County, South Carolina, Corners Inquest https://csidixie.org/inquests/4092, THE STATE VS. THE DEAD BODY OF SARAH SWEAT, Death of Sarah Sweat, 4 February 1871; South Carolina Department of Archives & History, Columbia, Richland, South Carolina.

20. Chesterfield County, South Carolina Estate Folder #535.