CONFEDERATE BIOGRAPHY: ALFRED H. BELO  - Dallas Co, TX

*********************************************************** 
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm

Submitted by Doris Peirce - ginlu@charter.net
1 February 2002 
*********************************************************** 
TEXANS WHO WORE THE GRAY by Sid S. Johnson 
ALFRED H. BELO	

Alfred H. Belo, of Dallas, was born in Salem, N.C., May 27, 1839.  He 
attended Bingham School, and later was graduated from the University 
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  When his state seceded in 1861, 
he raised and was made captain of the first company of Confederate 
soldiers organized in Forsythe county, reaching the front in time 
to take part in the engagement at Bull Run, the first great battle 
of the war.  When not unfit for service by reason of severe wounds 
which he received, he was engaged in every battle fought by the Army 
of Northern Virginia from first Manassas to the surrender at 
Appomattox.  His gallant conduct and coolness attracted attention 
in his first engagement and resulted in his promotion at that time 
as major of his regiment.  In 1862, on account of what he considered 
an unjust reflection upon the conduct of his regiment, and failing 
to secure a suitable retraction from the officer who made it, he 
fought the famous duel with Mississippi  rifles, from which he 
escaped uninjured.  The result of this encounter greatly endeared 
him to his regiment, and when a vacancy occurred he was made 
lieutenant colonel and then colonel of the Fifty sixth North 
Carolina Infantry.  At the battle of Gettysburg he commanded his 
regiment, but was shot down at the close of the first day's action.  
As soon  as he recovered from this wound he returned to duty and 
took part in the memorable campaign between Lee and Grant in 1864, 
until his left arm was shattered at the bloody battle of Cold 
Harbor.  From this severe wound he never fully recovered.  After 
the surrender at Appomattox, with no money, and no property, except 
the horse which as an officer he was entitled to, he journeyed on 
horseback to Texas, and in August, 1865, he became connected with 
the Galveston News, a paper founded by William Richardson in 1842, 
when Texas was the Lone Star Republic.  He soon secured an interest 
in the paper, and after the death of his partner purchased the stock 
of the Richardson heirs and became the ruling spirit and owner of 
the paper.  In 1885 he removed his residence to Dallas 350 miles 
distant from Galveston, and established the Dallas News.  In both 
of these great enterprises he achieved a phenomenal success.  These 
two papers have a high rank among the journals of America, and they 
have in many ways been of inestimable value to Texas.  Col. Belo was 
married June 30, 1868, to the eldest daughter of Mr. and Mrs. 
Cornelius Ennis, of Galveston, and they had born to them two 
children:  a daughter, who married Mr. Peabody, of Boston; and 
Alfred H. Belo, Jr.  On the 19th of April, 1901, Col. Belo died 
at Asheville, N.C., and his remains were interred in his father's 
lot, near his boyhood home, at Winston Salem.  Upon hearing of his 
death, former President Grover Cleveland said: "I feel it to be a 
personal loss, as he was a friend to whom I was warmly attached, 
as a chivalrous, high minded man, and an exceptionally able, 
fearless and concientious journalist.  His death is a loss to the 
entire country."