Coosa County AlArchives Biographies.....Vardaman, John F. May 19 1835 - living in 1893
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Ann Anderson alabammygrammy@aol.com May 17, 2004, 4:29 pm

Author: Brant & Fuller (1893)
    JOHN F. VARDAMAN, planter, of Good Water, Ala., is a son of E. L. and
Lucinda K. (Mauk) Vardaman. The Vardaman family is of German descent, three
brothers, Peter, James and William, coming to America in the early part of the
eighteenth century, Peter settling in Virginia, William in Kentucky and James in
South Carolina. The descendants of James settled in the fork of the Broad and
Ennoree rivers-called Dutch Fork-in what was then Newberry district, in South
Carolina, a colony of Germans having settled there. The grandfather of John F.
Vardaman, Thomas Vardaman, was a son of James Vardaman, and was born in Dutch
Fork about 1777, and married Annie Vining in Jefferson county, Ga., in 1801, and
moved into Jasper county, Ga., where C. L. was born in 1804. He then moved to
Jefferson county, Ga., in 1805, to Putnam county, Ga. in 1807, and to Meriwether
county, Ga., in 1827, back to Dutch Fork, and finally to Alabama in 1836,
settling in Coosa county, where he died in 1857. E. L. Vardaman was born in
Newberry district, South Carolina, and was married in Putnam county, Ga., to
Lucinda K. Mauk, on the 6th day of January, 1824, settling three years
thereafter in Meriwether county, Ga., where he lived until the winter of 1848-9.
He then came to Alabama. Mr. Vardaman remembers that year, 1849, as the year of
the great April frost, which destroyed a great deal of vegetation and growing
crops. He, E. L. Vardaman, represented Meriwether county in the Georgia
legislature in 1847, and when he moved to Alabama located first in the
north-western part of Tallapoosa county, and afterward moved to Coosa county,
and still later to Clay county, where he died in July, 1878. He had thirteen
children, seven of whom are now living, viz.: Cynthia M., of Clay county, widow
of Kenney M. Hannan, of Tallapoosa county, Ala.; Frances C., wife of George V.
House of Clay county, Ala.; Mary B., wife of Edward M. Adair of Clay county;
John F., Zilpha T., wife of J. M. L. McPhail, of Clay county; Adeline E.,
single; Annie L., wife of B. F. Luker, of Clay county; Meinda, Minerva and Nancy
died while young; William F. was killed at the battle of Williamsburg. Va., May
3, 1862. He was a private soldier in company A, Fourteenth Alabama infantry;
James M., was killed below Petersburg, March 30, 1865. He was a private soldier
in company C, Sixtieth Alabama infantry; Mielda V., wife of I. T. Kilpatrick,
died in January, 1884, leaving a large family of children, all married, except a
boy and a girl. Mrs. Lucinda K. Vardaman died in March, 1862, and in 1864, E. L.
Vardaman was again married, this time to Miss Martha A. Conway, who has no
children, and is yet living in Chilton county, Ala. John F. Vardaman was born
May 19, 1835, in Meriwether county, Ga. He had poor opportunities for securing
an education in his minority, but at twenty, and afterward, he attended school a
portion of each year, for four years. He began to teach school in 1859, and in
1861 he left the school room to enter the army, enlisting first as a twelve
months' man, and afterward joined company C, in the cavalry battalion of
Hilliard's Alabama legion. At first he saw service in Tennessee. He was at
Chickamauga, Knoxville, Bean Station and Strawberry Plains. He was a courier at
the time of Bragg's invasion into Kentucky. Before the Georgia campaign he was
ordered to Virginia, where he served during the rest of the war, being at
Appomattox at the time of Lee's surrender. Returning home from war he became
engaged in farming and teaching, and has been thus engaged ever since. He was
married December 21, 1865, to Miss Julia Flynn, of Coosa county, Ala., by whom
he has four children, viz.: Marshall E., married and living near his parents;
John W. A., at home; Maggie M., wife of T. J. Webb, of Kellyton, Ala.; and Ada
B., single and at home. Mr. Vardaman was elected county superintendent of
education for Coosa county in 1890. He had previously served nine years as
magistrate of his beat. Politically he is a member of the people's party, and
sympathizes in religious belief with the Primitive Baptist church, though he is
not a member. Mr. Vardaman is a man of influence in Coosa county, being one of
the most intelligent of the citizens of the county and one of the most
substantial and reliable. He is a prosperous farmer living two and a half miles
east of Good Water. He is in thorough harmony with the reform movement in
politics and is using his influence to cause it to spread and become permanent.



Additional Comments:
from "Memorial Record of Alabama", Vol. I, p. 743-744



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