Real Story in Macon County, NC

I like to read but sometimes I just don’t like to read fiction, so I dip into a history book or something of that nature.

Currently I am reading THE HERITAGE OF MACON COUNTY, NORTH CAROLINA. I have been through it before, plucking out relatives from the index but this time I am reading family histories whether they are related are not. There are some very interesting reading – sometimes the truth is, well, you just couldn’t make up stuff like this:

This is a very chopped down version of a story of one family.

Joseph Morgan (1838 – 1919), his two brothers, and uncle joined the Confederate Calvary June 1862 and were in Company C, 7th Battalion, which became 2nd Co, G, 65th Regiment, NC.

His brothers and his uncles were killed and George was wounded at the Battle of Chickamauga, September, 1863. He was wounded the same day he saw “up close” his Confederate Cavalry hero General Nathan Bedford Forrest. He was awed over seeing the general. The wound in his left hand was somewhat mangled and several pieces of shot under the skin of his right arm. He never had the shot taken out because he got it the day he saw Forest, which gave him bragging rights when telling his grandchildren about it.

Joe accidentally his shot his eye out with a muzzle-loading gun. It backfired.

In 1886, his oldest son Albert accidentally killed his mother Ethel (Joe’s wife) while shooting at a chicken with the same gun that put Joe’s eye out. Albert was devastated. He went west for a short time then in the 1890s went to the Alaska Gold Rush.

Joe’s married the second time to Lillie. She and Joe had nine children. Lillie died in 1927 after collapsing with a heart attack in the Burningtown Road.

This article was submitted by David C. Duvall.