John C. Fears

A 23 year old farmer in Chesterville, he enlisted as Private, Company H, 2nd Mississippi Infantry on 29 April 1861. He was elected Junior 2nd Lieutenant on 23 April 1862.

He was wounded in the side in action at Sharpsburg on 17 September 1862.

He was promoted to First Lieutenant on 28 December 1863. He resigned (resignation accepted to date from 23 January 1864) to take a commission about 1 May 1864 as Captain, Company C (or B), Ashcraft's 3rd Battalion, Mississippi Cavalry. He was appointed Captain of Company F when the unit became Ashcraft's Regiment - aka 11th Mississippi Cavalry - by consolidation with Lowry's and Ham's regiments in March 1865.

He moved to Morgan Mill, TX in about 1879 and had one of the early Hereford cattle ranches in the area.

His service from a casualty list/roster for the Campaign provided by Michael Brasher, from his research in Compiled Service Records, Company rolls, and other period sources. Further details from Don Ernsberger's Also for Glory Muster: The Story of the Pettigrew Trimble Charge at Gettysburg (2008), Director Dunbar Rowland's list of muster rolls at the Mississippi State Archives via his First Annual Report (1902) to the Mississippi Historical Society, and in Rowland's Official and Statistical Register of the State of Mississippi (Vol. 2, 1908). His resignation from the 2nd Infantry documented in General Order #58 of 4 July 1864 from the Adjutant and Inspector-General's Office, Confederate States Army [online]. His wound detail from a list in the Jackson Daily Mississippian of 1 November 1862. Personal information from family genealogists. His gravesite is on Findagrave.

He married Louisa Holmer (1843-1912).

02/26/1837; Lawrence County, AL

03/11/1889; Erath County, TX; burial in Morgan Mill Cemetery, Morgan Mill, TX