Lowndes County AlArchives Biographies.....Bowie, Andrew 1830 - November 1885
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/al/alfiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Carolyn Golowka http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00012.html#0002972 May 18, 2021, 11:28 am

Author: “Memorial Record of Alabama,” Volume 2, published by Brant & Fuller in Madison, WI (1883), pages 417-419

Dr. Andrew Bowie, a prominent physician and surgeon of Benton, Ala., was born 
in Edgefield C. H., S. C., in 1830.  He is a son of Dr. Samuel W. and Julia R. 
(Bonham) Bowie, the former of whom was born at Abbeville C. H. in 1808, and 
the latter in Edgefield district, in 1823.  They were both liberally educated, 
he graduating at Nashville, Tenn., and she at Columbia, S. C.  Dr. Bowie 
afterward graduated from the university of Pennsylvania, and practiced 
medicine in South Carolina until 1835, when he came to Lowndes county, and 
here spent the rest of his life, dying in 1885, having practiced medicine 
forty years.  He was also extensively interested in planting.  He was a Scotch 
ancestry.  At first three brothers came to America, and settled in Virginia, 
Maryland and South Carolina.  Dr. Bowie was one of a family of five children, 
four sons and a daughter.  His mother belonged to a distinguished family of 
South Carolina, one of her brothers, Gen. M. L. Bonham, being a brigadier-
general in the Virginia army for some time; but resigned to become governor of 
South Carolina.  After the war, he was a member of congress for some years.  
James Bowie was a Virginian by birth, and a relative of Dr. Samuel Bowie.  He 
was the inventor of the bowie knife, went west at an early day, and was killed 
in a duel in Louisiana, with a knife of the kind he had invented.  A son of 
his, Col. James Bowie, a very talented man, was killed at the Alamo, with Col. 
Crockett, in the Texas revolution.  Dr. Andrew Bowie is the eldest of a family 
of seven, four sons and three daughters, viz.:  Andrew, James S., who joined a 
squad of Alabamians for the settlement of Kansas, and died in Brunswick, Mo., 
en route; Capt. Malachi Bonham was a captain of a cavalry company all through 
the late war in the Tennessee army with Gen. Wirt Adams.  During a raid on 
Vicksburg he was detailed with three companies to cut off Gen. Grierson’s 
forces.  He held the enemy in check all day, and had four horses killed under 
him.  He, another time, took two companies down the Mississippi river, and 
captured a trading boat heavily loaded with freight, a very hazardous 
undertaking; Capt. Milledge L. was captain of company M, Sixth Alabama 
infantry in the army of northern Virginia, all through the war.  He was 
wounded several times, at Antietam, in the Wilderness, and at other places; 
and at Spotsylvania, on May 12, 1864, while at the head of the Sixth Alabama, 
he was severely wounded, rendering necessary the amputation of the leg above 
the knee joint; Sara E., wife of Dr. J. S. Peake, now of Selma.  Dr. Peake was 
assistant surgeon in the army, was captured once, and was for a time held as a 
prisoner of war; Sophia Smith, wife of Thomas Riggs, of Pleasant Hill, Dallas 
county; Rosy E., wife of Joseph R. Dudley, one of the leading planters of 
Lowndes county.  Dr. Andrew Bowie was well educated in his youth, and 
afterward spent six years at the university of Georgia, and graduated from 
Charleston, S. C., Medical college, in 1854.  He began the practice of 
medicine at Braggs, Store, and remained there until the war, when he joined 
the army, and spent two years in the hospitals around Richmond.  He was then 
made surgeon of the Third Alabama infantry, and served in the field till the 
close of the war.  In the meantime he had been promoted to the rank of brigade 
surgeon and was, ex-officio, surgeon of the Third Alabama.  After the war, he 
located in Benton, where he has ever since been engaged in the practice of his 
profession.  He is one of the oldest physicians in the county, and stands at 
the head of the profession in the county.  He has a powerful constitution, 
and, notwithstanding the arduous duties of his calling, he is still well 
preserved.  During the sickly season he has gone two weeks without going to 
bed, getting what sleep he did get, in the saddle.  He has, however, always 
enjoyed excellent health.  He inherited his strength from his father, who had 
a very robust constitution, who was thoroughly devoted to his profession, and 
won the esteem of the entire community.  Since 1855 Dr. Bowie has belonged to 
the State Medical association, and has filled all the offices of the Lowndes 
county Medical society.  He was married first in 1856, to Mary Ann, daughter 
rof Dr. Adam Arthur, of Dallas county, a South Carolinian, but an early 
settler in Dallas county, where he died, having lived, however, a short time 
in Monroe county.  Mrs. Bowie was born in Monroe county, and died in 1863, 
leaving three children, viz.:  James S., of Tuscaloosa county; Samuel E., of 
Wilcox county, and Mary Julia.  Dr. Bowie was married the second time, in 
1865, to Miss Sarah Turnley, daughter of Edward Turnley, who was a wealthy 
farmer.  Mrs. Bowie was the youngest of twenty-one children, and died in 
Virginia in 1873, of consumption.  She left two sons, viz.:  Ira M. and Edmond 
Peake, the latter an orange grower of Florida.  Dr. Bowie was married, a third 
time, in 1878, to Mrs. Anna Bowling Keener, daughter of Col. John Walker, who 
came from Georgia to Alabama in an early day and died at Benton.  Mrs. Bowie 
was born at Benton.  Dr. Bowie has devoted his attention almost exclusively to 
his profession, but takes great interest in politics, and bears his share of 
party support.  So far as he knows, his forefathers have always been 
democrats.  His first two wives were Baptists, and his third wife was a member 
of the Presbyterian church.


Additional Comments:
In the above account, James Bowie was killed in a knife fight in Louisiana and 
his son, James, was killed in the Texas revolution (at the Alamo).  In 
actuality, James was NOT killed in the knife fight (known as The Vadalia Sandbar 
Fight) and was the very same James Bowie killed at the Alamo.

File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/al/lowndes/bios/bowie179nbs.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.net/alfiles/

File size: 6.5 Kb