Dooley County Georgia Bios William Simmons File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by tasimmo@mindspring.com Tom Simmons Table of Contents page: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/dooley.htm Georgia Table of Contents: http://www.usgwarchives.net/ga/gafiles.htm WILLIAM D. SIMMONS My g-grandfather was William D. Simmons (1879-1942) who married Mary Eveline ("Evie") Barker (1886-1942). William D. was the son of Moses Simmons (b. 1848 in Dooly County, 7th child of Lewis and Mary Simmons). Two of Mose' Simmons older brothers, William and Stephen enlisted on 4 March 1862 in the Dooly Volunteers. The Dooly Volunteers became Company C, 45th Georgia Infantry which served from the Peninsula to Appomattox in Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. In December 1862 Georgia Governor Brown had declared that 50,000 additional men were needed for the war - it was "jine up or be conscripted"; if you volunteered you received a $50 bonus. Probably, too, the neighbors would think more highly of a volunteer than a "draftee" (who might be considered a shirker). William, aged app. 26 (who had married Jane SYKES in 1860 in Dooly) and Stephen, age 19, were both shot on 9 August 1862 at the Battle of Cedar Run in Virginia. Stephen was killed outright, and is buried in a mass grave on private property on the battlefield; William was wounded and taken to Charlottesville, Va. where a military hospital had been established. William lingered until 16 February 1863, when he finally succumbed from his wounds. He is buried in an unmarked grave in the Confederate Cemetery on the University of Virginia campus. The grave's location, however, is known. Ironically, the Federal government (Veteran's Administration) will provide a gratis (no charge) marble Civil War gravestone for Confederate soldiers. The government calls all CW soldiers "old boys" because they lack a Social Security Number and thus cannot be indexed the way the rest of the veterans are. I have managed to have markers made for both my relatives, and on August 9 2002 - the 140th anniversary of the battle that cost them their lives - I will travel to Va. and see that the markers are formally placed. Maybe then William and Stephen will stop pestering me (I am quite serious about this). From the internet, I have the following list of Dooly County Civil War units: 12th Regiment, Georgia Infantry, Company F, Davis Guards 18th Regiment, Georgia Infantry, Company I, Dooly Light Infantry 45th Regiment, Georgia Infantry, Company C, Dooly Volunteers 55th Regiment, Georgia Infantry, Company C Who were the "Dooly Guards" to whom you refer? I haven't heard of them. I would imagine when you note that William H. Hill joined this unit in 1861, it may be the "Davis Guards" who became Company F, 12th Georgia. The 12th and 18th Ga. regiments were formed in 1861, while the 45th and 55th formed in 1862. If you have a newspaper showing him as joining in 1861, then he was probably in the 12th Ga. The 12th Georgia was famous in Lee's Army of Northern Virginia from Manassas to Appomattox; your relative could not have been associated with a finer unit. Of course, most of the Ga. units were known for their crack marksmen and "staying power" on the field of battle. Regarding your questions about HILL: I note a Robert W. Hill in Company C (Dooly Volunteers), 45th Ga. I have Mrs. Henderson's list in printed form for this unit because my Simmons relatives served with the 45th. It states "Hill, Robert W. - Private - March 4, 1862. Wounded at Fredericksburg, Virginia, December 13, 1862; Wilderness, Virginia, May 6, 1864. Surrendered at Appomattox, Virginia, April 9, 1865." A survivor - rare in this war. Does this help? My final reference to HILL comes from the book "Letters to Amanda". Do you know of it? The letter-writing CW soldier was Marion Hill Fitzpatrick - known as "Hill" - of Crawford County, Ga. His mother was Nancy Fitzpatrick (nee Hill, 1795-1875) who married Alexander Fitzpatrick (1791-1849). Regarding this branch of the Hills, the book's editors (Jeff Lowe and Sam Hodges, both descendants of Marion Hill Fitzpatrick) state, "Drawing from family histories and the few available records, we can say with some confidence that Nancy Hill Fitzpatrick's parents, James and Elizabeth Hill, came to Greene County, Georgia, from Mecklenburg County, Virginia, in the late 18th century. They died in Greene County when Nancy and her younger sister Elizabeth were young. Greene County records suggest a William Hubbard stepped in as guardian. But further information about him, or about Nancy's life until she married, has proved elusive." I'm currently "stuck" on from where Lewis Simmons came and who his parents were. He's been recorded as having been born in either NC or Ga., and appears to have been selected as a juror in Crawford County in 1830, having been married there in 1829. My Dad is looking into possible early connections for Lewis in Pulaski county. Of course, one of the biggest problems with researching this period in Georgia was the almost complete "state of flux" society found itself in; most of Ga. was really a frontier at that time, and the land lotteries plus the discovery of gold caused quite an influx of people from the 1820's through 1860. ======================== USGENWEB NOTICE: In keeping with our policy of providing free information on the Internet, data may be freely used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material. These electronic pages cannot be reproduced in any format for profit or other presentation. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for FREE access. ==============