William Henley Burton

Son of a Baptist minister, beginning in 1856-57 he edited and published The American Eagle, a weekly newspaper, in Wedowee, AL. He studied the law and was admitted to the bar in 1857, and briefly practiced law in Homer, TX. He returned east in 1859 and by 1860 was a 26 year old teacher in the common school at Bowdon in Carroll County, GA.

He enlisted at Yorktown, VA on 12 April 1862 and mustered as a Private in Company K, 13th Alabama Infantry.

He was with his company in action at Turner's Gap on South Mountain on 14 September and was wounded by a piece of shell to his hip at Sharpsburg on 17 September 1862.

He was admitted to Chimborazo Hospital #2 in Richmond, VA on 28 (or 30) September and furloughed for 25 days to Bowdon, GA on 18 (or 21) October 1862. He was appointed First Lieutenant on 10 March 1863 - recommended by his Captain and the two 2nd Lieutenants over whom he was raised - for his conduct at Sharpsburg. He was promoted to Captain on 28 April and was wounded again, in the right shoulder at Chancellorsville, VA on 3 May. He was afterward on furlough and resigned his commission due to "physical inability" for field service on 25 September 1863.

By 1870 he was again teaching school, at Copper Mine in Clay County, AL. In 1880 he was a teacher at Pleasant Gap in Cherokee County. He was editor and publisher of the Cedar Bluff (AL) Telephone at his death in 1889; he was addressed as the Reverend W.H. Burton at that time.

His service from his Compiled Service Records,1 online from fold3, and the Archives.2 Personal details from family genealogists, the US Census of 1860-1880, and the Telephone of 24 May 1889. His gravesite is on Findagrave.

He married Alabama-born Martha Berry Alexander (1839-1904) in 1854 and they had 13 children between 1855 and 1881.

10/15/1835; Columbus, GA

05/18/1889; Cedar Bluff, AL; burial in Pleasant Gap Cemetery, Pleasant Gap, AL