Biography of John F. Norwood - Conway Co, AR

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Submitted by: Cathy Barnes <bbarnes@cswnet.com>
        Date: 21 Jun 1998
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
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SOURCE: Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Western Arkansas.
Goodspeed Publishers, 1891.

page 94

John F. Norwood, also a progressive plante of Union Township, was born
in Franklin County, Georgia, in 1844, and is the seventh of a family
of seven sons and four daughters born to William and Elvira (Thompson)
Norwood, who were born in South Carolina and Georgia, respectively.
They were married in Georgia, and while John F. was yet an infant
they removed to North Carolina, where Mrs., Norwood died in 1871. She
was a devout Methodist. Mr. Norwood went to Texas in 1873, and died
there the same year. Mrs. Norwood's father, David Thompson, was a
farmer, and died in Georgia. John F. Norwood was educated at the
country schools of his neighborhood, and at the early age of sixteen
enlisted in the Confederate army, in Company A, Thirty-ninth North
Carolina Infantry, and operated in North Carolina, Tennessee and
Kentucky, participating in the battles of Perryville, Ky.,
Murfreesboro and Chickamauga. He was then taken sick, and after his
recovery, joined an independent company of cavalry, and did service in
Georgia, North Carolina and Tennessee, taking part in the battle of
Athens, Ga. He was discharged at Kingston, Ga., after about four years
of hardship and suffering. After the war he spent five years in East
Tennessee as a laborer, and in 1870 came to Conway County, where he
was married the following year to Miss Anna Scrofford, who was born in
Conway, and died in 1873, leaving one son (deceased). In 1875 Mr.
Norwood married his present wife, Mrs. Nancy Williams, a daughter of
William and Caroline Mallett. Mr. Mallet was a native of Georgia, but
came to Conway in a very early day. He died a soldier in the Tenth
Arkansas Infantry, of the Confederate army. Mrs. Mallett died in 1872.
Mrs. Norwood was born in Conway County, and is the mother of six
children, of whom two sons and two daughters survive. Mr. Norwood
resides about three miles east of Springfield, and is the owner of 306
acres of land, in different tracts, making him one of the leading
farmers of his township. He is a Democrat in politics, and he and wife
are members of the Missionary Baptist Church. Mr. Norwood had four
brothers who served in the late war: William, who died in 1862, while
at home on a furlough from the Southern army; Jefferson, who was
killed in the Helena fight, while fighting for the Confederacy; George
W., was first in the Confederate army, but served the last two years
in the Federal army; Frank was also in the Southern army a short time,
but afterward served about three years in the Union army. He died in
1887.