Coffee County AlArchives Biographies.....Wise, William B. May 10 1848 - living in 1893
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Ann Anderson alabammygrammy@aol.com May 16, 2004, 1:11 pm

Author: Brant & Fuller (1893)
    WILLIAM B. WISE, lumberman and general merchant at Penn post-office, four
miles southeast of Elba, was born near Elba, May 10, 1848. He is a son of Harron
and Mary (Davis) Wise, the former of whom was a native of Georgia, and the
latter of South Carolina. When quite young they came to Alabama and married in
Montgomery county, where Mrs. Wise lives, about sixty-eight years old. Mr. Wise
followed farming all his life, and in 1869 he and his son, William B. Wise,
established a saw and grist mill on the present site, which they operated
together until the father died, in 1882, at the age of sixty-one. He was a
member of the Primitive Baptist church, was an honest, industrious and capable
man, and when the war came, had a good property, which was mostly swept away.
Early in 1861 he joined company E, Fifty-fourth Alabama infantry, was captured
at Island No. 10, and spent about six months at Camp Douglas. He was at length
exchanged and continued then in active service most of the time until the close
of the war. After the fall of Vicksburg he was one of those not subject to
parole, and so furnished a substitute in the person of his son, William B., for
about three months. The son was then but fifteen years old. At the end of three
months he again returned to his command and fought in the battles around
Chattanooga and in other battles; but in the spring of 1864, at the beginning of
the Georgia campaign, William B. again took his father's place in the ranks, and
fought bravely on that campaign to Resaca, where he was shot through the groin,
and was taken to the hospital in the blind school building at Macon, Ga., where
he remained from April to July, during which time his life was frequently
despaired of, he having taken measles soon after arriving at the hospital. In
July he came home and was not again fit for active service during the war. Soon
after, he was wounded his father returned to the command and fought through the
rest of the campaign until near Atlanta, when he was captured and held a
prisoner until just before the time of the final surrender. Although he was in
many severe battles, yet he was never wounded nor sick enough to go to the
hospital. He was one of a large family born to Harron Wise, who was probably a
native of Georgia, where he was raised and married, but came to Coffee county in
the twenties. He settled in the woods about sixteen miles below where Elba is
now situated, at what is known as Holly's Ferry. Here he improved a farm, but
later he removed to near where Elba now is. He died in 1862, and his widow about
1866. He was in the Indian war of 1836, and had seven sons in the late war,
viz.: George W., of Geneva; Traverse, who was killed at Shiloh; Franklin, who
lost an arm, and is now living in Texas; John V.; Andrew Jackson, both now of
Coffee county; Floyd, who was in a Florida regiment, now deceased, and Harron.
The grandfather, Daniel Wise, also cane to Alabama with his son, and the three
generations lie buried in the family burying ground, Isaac Davis, the maternal
grandfather of W. B. Wise, was probably a native of South Carolina, where he
married, and at a very early day came to Alabama, settling first in Montgomery
county, and later in Coffee county, where he died about 1868. His widow died in
1891, aged about eighty-six. They had a family of three sons and ten daughters;
all the sons served in the late war, viz.: William T., killed at Perryville,
Ky., a member of the Thirty-third Alabama; Levi, who was in the army of
Virginia, now of Coffee county; Sampson, who was in the Tennessee army, and died
in the hospital. William B. Wise is the oldest in a family of three sons and one
daughter, viz.: William B., Isaac Franklin, died when four years old; Joseph W.,
of Coffee county; Mary, wife of William Rushing. In 1866, when but eighteen
years old, W. B. Wise married Sarah Melissa. daughter of Edmund and Elizabeth
Cody, who came at a very early day from one of the Carolinas to Coffee county,
where Mr. Cody died before the war. His widow is still living, aged about eighty
year s. Mrs. Wise was born in Coffee county, and is the youngest of six
children. At the death of his father, in 1882, W. B. Wise, purchased the
interests of the other heirs, and has since conducted the business in which he
and his father were partners, alone, and with remarkable success, conducting the
largest business of any man in the county. The capacity of this mill is about
5,000 feet of lumber per day. In the mill and on the farm about ten men are
usually employed. The farm contains about 1,800 acres of land. For the past
three years he has also had a general store, in which he does about $10,000
worth of business per annum. He is one of the most thorough-going business men
in the county, in fact in southeastern Alabama, and all the property he now has
he has obtained through his own efforts. In 1890 he established Penn postoffice,
and has since been postmaster. While he always does his part toward the support
of his party, he refrains from active participation in politics, and devotes his
undivided attention to his business; and it is to this that he attributes his
success.



Additional Comments:
from "Memorial Record of Alabama", Vol. I, p. 684-686

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