Robeson County NcArchives Biographies.....Conner, D. R. 1923
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Sam West sam.west.1@gmail.com April 3, 2014, 11:27 pm

Source: Robesonian Mon 6/18/1923
Author: Robesonian

AN ACTIVE NONAGERNARIAN.
          _____
Mr. D. R. Conner, of Fair Bluff Stands 3 Feet 8 Inches Tall, Has Passed His 92nd 
Year and is Still Active – Was a Confederate Soldier in Spite of His Size – Born 
in Robeson and Remembers When There was Only One Store in Lumberton.
          _____
   Mr. D. R. Conner of Fair Bluff, who was 92 years old on the 9th of last 
November and is still wonderfully active, was a guest at the home of his son-in-
law and daughter Mr. and Mrs. Neill Stone, in East Lumberton, for a few days 
last week.  He went from here to Hope Mills to visit another daughter, Mrs. 
Henry Roberts.
   Mr. Conner was born in Robeson county, what is now White House township.  He 
started to school when he was 6 years old and in 16 days was graduated, having 
learned his abc’s.  He was then hired to the teacher, Nathan L. Williamson, for 
whom he worked on the farm 3 years at 5 cts., a day.  At the end of that time he 
was hired to James Williamson at 10 cents a day, working for that wage for 7 
years.  During all those years he never wore a pair of shoes.  He never had a 
coat until he was 20 years old.  He had but one hat, a hand-made wire-grass 
affair.  In 1848 he got a store straw hat.  He next hired himself to Calvin 
Edmund at $8 a month, at the end of two years getting a raise to $9 a month and 
working with him until 1861.  He was then 31 years old, weighed 67 pounds and 
was 3 feet 8 inches high.
   On account of his size, Mr. Conner was turned down at first when he tried to 
join the Confederate ranks, but later, in June 1861, he was accepted by Major 
Hedric.  He was captured at Fort Fisher in 1864 and carried to Elmira prison, 
New York.  He was exchanged, got back in the army and surrendered with Johnson’s 
army at Greesnboro.
   In 1867 Mr. Conner married Nancy Elinore Cribb, who on her wedding day 
weighed 96 pounds and 7 ounces himself tipping the scales on that happy day at 
96 pounds even.  He began married life with $8 but rented a farm and raised 5 
children.  He really had $657 in the hands of certain persons, but he never got 
any of it. After the death of his first wife he married again, his wife dying 
when their girl baby was only one year old.
   Such, in brief, is the story of this diminutive man.  He says he remembers 
when there was only one store in Lumberton, that being conducted by an Indian, 
Hardy Bell, who hauled all his goods from Fayetteville.  He says it seems almost 
like he had been here since the world was made.  There was nothing to do but 
work back in his early days, he says, and Webster’s Blue-Back speller and a 
dicionary [sic] were all the books he knew about.  The mail carrier passed 
through here once every two weeks, going on down to Georgetown, S. C., and 
coming back; but he didn’t carry much mail just made the trips.

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