William Columbus Hart

From Franklin County, he enlisted in Company E, 15th North Carolina Infantry and mustered as Private on 16 May 1861. He was promoted to Corporal in February 1862.

He was captured in action at Crampton's Gap on South Mountain on 14 September 1862.

He was held at Fort Delaware until transferred 2 October to Aiken's Landing, VA where he was exchanged on 10 November 1862. He returned to duty at about the end of 1862. He was promoted again, to Sergeant on 11 December 1863 and was wounded by gunshot to the chest (probably at Spotsylvania Court House, VA) on 10 May 1864. He was with his company when it was surrendered at Appomattox Courthouse, VA on 9 April 1865.

A farmer in Franklin County, NC, he married Annie Bennett Hill (1849-1905) in 1866 and they had 10 children together. He died of pneumonia at age 45 (or 42); his youngest child, daughter Martha "Mattie" Gertrude (1884-1941) was not yet one year old.

Service information from the Roster1. The chest wound detail from his bio display at the museum in Gathland State Park, MD. Other details from his death notice in the Raleigh News and Observer of 19 February 1885. His gravesite is on Findagrave, source also of his picture, from a photograph provided by Sharon Shown. Family genealogists have him born in 1843, which would put his age at death at about 42, as stated in the death notice.

1840; Wilson, Wake County, NC

02/14/1885; Youngville, NC; burial in Flat Rock Baptist Church Cemetery, Louisburg, NC