George Perry Williams

In October 1843, when he was 5, his father Rev. Martin Jones Williams was murdered - poisoned by arsenic. His mother Sarah Kearse Williams was tried for the crime but not convicted, for lack of evidence to prove it was her. On 2 January 1862, by then a 24 year old farmer living with his mother and younger siblings in the Barnwell District, George enlisted as Private, Company G, 17th South Carolina Infantry.

He was in action at Turner's Gap on South Mountain, MD on 14 September and at Sharpsburg on 17 September 1862.

He "deserted his command" on 16 April 1864 enroute to Wilmington, NC but had returned by October 1864. He was captured near Petersburg, VA on 25 March 1865 and held at Point Lookout, MD. He was sent to the Armory Square Hospital in Washington, DC by way of the USA Hospital Steamer Connecticut and was admitted on 24 July with "partial paralysis of left side of body" but was discharged and released on 16 August 1865 after taking the oath of allegiance.

His service from his Compiled Service Records, with his presence at "Boonsboro" and Sharpsburg from Colonel McMaster's list for the 17th South Carolina (Confederate States Army Casualty Lists and Narrative Reports, RG 109, NARA), online from fold3. Thanks to Charles L.D. Carlson for his middle name and burial place. Personal details from a family genealogist.

He married Harriet S Priester (1833-1908) in about 1866 and they had 4 children.

See a little more about the steamer Connecticut and George's family in a post on behind AotW.

04/12/1838; Barnwell District, SC

10/08/1911; burial in Old Saint Nicholas Lutheran Church Cemetery, Ulmer, SC