Gadsden County FlArchives Biographies.....Curtis, Charles S. March 9, 1867 - ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/fl/flfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Nancy Rayburn http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00025.html#0006128 April 9, 2010, 8:50 am Source: The Lewis Publishing Co., Vol. III pg.214-5 1923 Author: The History of Florida: Past & Present CURTIS, CHARLES SIBLEY. The incumbent of the office of tax collector of Gadsden County since 1913, CHARLES SIBLEY CURTIS has discharged his duties in a manner that has won the entire approval of his fellow-citizens and has left no doubt as to his genuine worth and ability. Mr. CURTIS is a native of this locality, having been born at his present town of residence, Quincy, March 9, 1867, a son of HENRY CURTIS. HENRY CURTIS was born in Hanover County, Virginia, and was given good educational advantages, attending the schools of Richmond, Piedmont Institute and Roanoke College. When he was but eighteen years of age, in August, 1861, he enlisted in the Confederate service, becoming a private in the Richmond Grays, Twelfth Virginia Infantry. At the battle of Drury’s Bluff he was acting first lieutenant of Wickliffe’s Company, supporting Garnett’s Battery. At Seven Pines he was seriously injured and again in the Seven Days battles, and because of disability was assigned to bureau duty under Gen, GUSTAVUS W. SMITH, commanding, at Richmond, until July, 1864, when he came to Florida with the intention of raising a company. However, when he reported to Gen. WILLIAM MILLER at Tallahassee, he was attached to General Miller’s staff and remained thereon two months. Subsequently, under Col. J.J. DANIELS, of Madison, he had charge of the enrolling service of Gadsden, Liberty and Franklin counties until the close of the war. He was present at the battle of Natural Bridge, March 6, 1865, which kept Tallahassee the only state capital not invaded by Federal troops. Following the war Mr. CURTIS engaged in a general merchandise business at Quincy for sixteen years, and also followed planting in Gadsden County. He also engaged in railroad work, being for several years immigration agent of the Seaboard Air Line Railroad. He was one of the Florida Commission at the Omaha Fair in 1898, contributed much to the success of the Florida exhibit at the Nashville Fair, and in many ways was an enthusiastic worker for the advancement of Florida. He was auditor of the Seaboard Air Line for a number of years, and at the time of his death, which occurred at Quincy in 1914, he was state auditor. While securing his education in the public schools, CHARLES SIBLEY CURTIS clerked in a drug store at the age of fifteen years, and for a number of years thereafter filled clerical positions, being with one concern at Quincy for eight years. He then entered the auditor’s office of the Florida Central & Peninsula Railroad, now the Seaboard Air Line at Jacksonville, Florida, but one year later resigned to become a traveling salesman for Church’s “Arm and Hammer” brand of baking soda, covering the territory of Mississippi, Arkansas and Tennessee with headquarters at Memphis, Tennessee. Mr. CURTIS left the road in 1897, when he married Mrs. SARAH DAVIDSON CRAWFORD, the widow of THOMAS T. CRAWFORD, and a daughter of the late Col. ROBERT HAMILTON McWHORTA and LEILA A. (CALLIS) DAVIDSON, a review of whose lives will be found in the sketch of JAMES L. DAVIDSON elsewhere in this work. Following his marriage, Mr. CURTIS spent two years at Quincy as a clerk in mercantile establishments, and then went to Savannah, Georgia, where he spent one year selling shoes for a concern. Later he spent two years in a like capacity for a St. Louis, Missouri, concern. Returning to Quincy in 1902, he entered the employ of Love & Hearin, and remained with them until 1912, when he was appointed tax collector of Gadsden County to fill the unexpired term of R. M. MORGAN. He was elected to the office in the November, 1912, election, and has been the recipient of reelection ever since. His official record is an excellent one, warranting the high regard and esteem in which he is held. Mr. CURTIS is a Mason and an Elk, and his religious connection is with the Presbyterian Church, in which he is an elder. His diversion is poultry raising. Mrs. CURTIS is prominent in social, club and church work at Quincy. By a former marriage she had one daughter, MARY BUENA, now the wife of VINCENT C. BREWER, of Hockanum, Connecticut, who has five children, VINCENT C., Jr., SARAH B., CHARLES C., SELDON and ANNETTE. Mr. and Mrs. CURTIS also have a daughter, SARAH ELISE, honor graduate of Gadsden High School, who is now specializing in home economics and chemistry at Simmons College, Boston, Massachusetts. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/fl/gadsden/bios/curtis22bs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.poppet.org/flfiles/ File size: 5.1 Kb