Greenbrier County, West Virginia    Biography: George W. WILLIAMS

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Transcribed and submitted by Ed Johnson, <EDEAJ @aol.com>, 1998.
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GEORGE W. WILLIAMS - born in Greenbrier County, August 10, 1833, in
this county, April 25, 1866, was united in marriage with Elizabeth
Jane McCLUNG, who was born in Greenbrier County in 1841.  Minnie
Virginia, their oldest child, was born February 15, 1867;  Lena E.,
was born May 8, 1868;  Callie E., September 20, 1871;  Ida S.,
December 21, 1873;  Cassius M., December 6, 1875, and Harry Stuart,
May 20, 18879.  John WILLIAMS, father of George W., and son of David
WILLIAMS, was born in Williamsburg District, April 17, 1794, and he
married Jane, daughter of James KNIGHT, Sr., her birth in
Williamsburg District in 1808.  She died in this district, April 2,
1858, and John WILLIAMS died in Lewisburg, May 12, 1863.  He was
seven years deputy sheriff of Greenbrier County, and was one of the
prominent citizens who were instrumental in bringing the Chesapeake
and Ohio railroad through this county.  He always gave his best
endeavors to internal improvements of his native county, and,
although a Methodist in religious faith, gave liberally  to the
cause of education regardless of creed.  He was proprietor of the
Blue Sulphur Springs, in this county, and gave several thousand
dollars to the founding and building of the Allegheny College at
that place.  He was two years a soldier of the 1812 war-in politics
a Whig and then a Democrat.  He was a Welsh descent, a descendant
of Thomas WILLIAMS, who came here from Augusta county and was murdered
and had his children carried off by the Indians.  At one time John
WILLIAMS was the largest land-owner in the county, having 153,900
acres in one survey, and 200,000 in all.  Russell and Sarah (McCLINTOCK)
McCLUNG, born in Williamsburg District, were the parents of Elizabeth J.
(McCLUNG) WILLIAMS.  Her father died about 1849, and her mother in
October, 1865.  At the outbreak of the civil war, George W. Williams
was a student in the Virginia University, educating for the bar.
He abandoned study, entered the Confederate army, and on many a
hard-fought field did a soldier's duty.  He served first in the
69th Virginia, known as "Wise's Legion," and when that disbanded
at Richmond, in 1862, he entered the 13th Battalion of Artillery,
where he served until 1864, when he was promoted major of signal
corps, on General Breckenridge's staff, till the war ended.  Since
the war he has been engaged in farming, and is a local minister of
the Methodist Protestant Church, Greenbrier circuit.  He represented
this county in the legislature, in 1872, and was re-elected in 1874.
During his second term the capital controversy raged and he was one
of the supporters of Charleston for the capital.  His post office
address is Williamsburg, Greenbrier County, West Virginia.

Source:  Hardesty, Henry H.  Hardesty's Historical and Geographical
Encyclopedia.  New York: H.H. Hardesty and Company, 1884.
Rpt. in West Virginia Heritage Encyclopedia.  Ed. Jim Comstock.
Richwood: Comstock, 1974.