William W. Beasley

He was an unmarried 19 year old printer at the Selma Times, Selma, AL when he enlisted as Private on 8 March 1862 in Company A, 4th Alabama Infantry.

Present in action on South Mountain.

Wounded on the Wilderness, VA Campaign:

He distinguished himself on May 12, 1864, in one of the fights of the Wilderness [at Spotsylvania Court Hosue], known as the "bloody angle". Hancock's corps charged against Gordon's line under a terrific fire. The battle was fierce, and the dead and wounded were literally piled up all around. The fire was so severe that the line wavered for a while, and the color sergeant was shot down. Beasley, who was then a private, sprang forward and gathered up the flag with its broken staff in one hand, and, swinging his cap in the other, advanced about twenty yards, while the men rallied around him. This was his last fight, for he was shot though both hips and was permanently disabled ...

He moved to Louisville, KY about 1886 and kept a cigar and news stand at Fifth and Market Streets there until his death.

Basic information from State of Alabama1. His gravesite is on Findagrave; his stone indicates he was a Sergeant. The quote above from his obituary in the Indianapolis (Indiana) News of 7 March 1898. Further details from a notice of his hospitalization in the Louisville Courier-Journal of 5 March 1898. Military records also note: "Prison Record is Tenn., Dandridge, Tenn., Deep Bottom, Va." - meaning unknown.

c. 1843 in AL

03/06/1898; Louisville, KY; burial in Cave Hill Cemetery, Louisville, KY