I96043: ELIZABETH BLOUNT of WindsorBaroness (ABT 1469

Notes

Alberta Martin, the last widow of a Civil War veteran, has passed away
Associated Press May 31, 2004

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) - Alberta Martin, the last widow of a Civil War veteran, died Monday, ending an unlikely ascent from poor sharecropper's daughter to the belle of 21st century Confederate history buffs who paraded her across the South. She was 97.

Martin died at an Enterprise nursing home of complications from a heart attack she suffered May 7, said her caretaker, Dr. Kenneth Chancey. She died just as the nation was celebrating Memorial Day and nearly 140 years after the Civil War ended.
Her May-December marriage to a Civil War veteran in the 1920s and her longevity made her a celebrated final link to the old Confederacy.

After living in obscurity and poverty for most of her life, she spent her final years with the Sons of Confederate Veterans carrying her to conventions and rallies, often with a small Confederate battle flag waving in her hand and her clothes the colors of the rebel banner.

"I don't see nothing wrong with the flag flying," she said frequently.

Gertrude Janeway, the last widow of a Union veteran from the Civil War, died in January 2003 at her home in Tennessee. She was 93 and had married veteran John Janeway when she was 18.

Wayne Flynt, a Southern history expert at Auburn University, said the historical distinctiveness of the South, which is so tied to the Civil War, has been disappearing, but Martin provided people with one last chance to see that history in real life.

"She became a symbol like the Confederate battle flag," he said.

In 1997, Mrs. Martin and Daisy Anderson, whose husband was a slave who ran away and joined the Union Army, were recognized at a special ceremony at Gettysburg, Pa. Mrs. Anderson, who lived in Denver, died in 1998 at age 97. Mrs. Janeway wasn't invited to the Gettysburg event since at the time, no one outside her family knew her whereabouts.

Alberta Stewart Martin was not from the "Gone With the Wind" South of white-columned mansions and hoop skirts. She was born Alberta Stewart to sharecroppers on Dec. 4, 1906, in Danley's Crossroads, a tiny settlement built around a sawmill 70 miles south of Montgomery.

Her mother died when she was 11, and her widowed father eventually moved to Tallassee in central Alabama. At 18, she met a cab driver named Howard Farrow, and they had a son before Farrow died in a car accident in 1926.

Stewart, her father and her son soon moved to Opp to stay with relatives. Just up the road lived William Jasper Martin, a widower born in Macon County, Ga., in 1845. He enjoyed a $50-a-month Confederate veteran's pension and was looking to get remarried.

The cantankerous 81-year-old man struck up a few conversations with the 21-year-old neighbor and a marriage of convenience was born.

"I had this little boy and I needed some help to raise him," Alberta Martin recalled in a 1998 interview.

They were married in a civil ceremony at the courthouse in Andalusia on Dec. 10, 1927, and 10 months later had a son, William.

When asked if she loved her husband, Martin said, "That's a hard question to answer. I cared enough about him to live with him. You know the difference between a young man and an old man."

William Jasper Martin died on July 8, 1931. Two months later, Alberta Martin married her late husband's grandson, Charlie Martin. He died in 1983 and is buried at New Ebenezer Baptist Church six miles west of Elba, where the family had its home.

Under arrangements made years in advance and paid for by Civil War groups, Alberta Martin also is to be interred at the church in an 1860s-style ceremony.

In her final decade, Chancey, a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, carried her to Confederate events across the South and said she loved the attention. "It's like being matriarch of a large family," he said.

In her final years, she became the focus of a dustup over the depiction of her and her late Confederate husband in the 1998 book "Confederates in the Attic." Among other things, the book by Tony Horwitz described William Jasper Martin as a deserter.

A group that defends Southern heritage and the Confederate battle flag disagreed, contending there were at least two William Martins who served in Company K of the 4th Alabama Infantry Regiment and that Horwitz got the wrong one. Horwitz said his research was carefully checked and the book was accurate.

The state government considered Martin's record clean enough to award him a Confederate pension in 1921 and to give Alberta Martin Confederate widow's benefits in 1996. Chancey had helped her apply and put together the necessary documentation.

She said her husband never talked much about the war, except the harsh times at Petersburg, Va.

"He'd say it was rough, how the trenches were full of water. They were so hungry in Virginia that during the time they were fighting, they had to grab food as they went along. They came across a potato patch and made up some mashed potatoes," she said.

Martin's older son, Harold Farrow of North Little Rock, Ark., died last June. Her younger son, Willie Martin, lives in Elba.

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America's Last Confederate Widow Dies
By: Calvin E. Johnson, Jr.
Kennesaw, Georgia
[email protected]

The nation has lost an historic lady. Mrs. Alberta Martin, the last known widow of a Confederate soldier, died on Memorial Day. She was 97 and a living link to history of which most Americans know little or nothing.

Mrs. Martin was born on December 4, 1906, at Dannely's Crossroads, Coffee County, Alabama. The small country intersection has changed little since her birth.

"Miss Alberta" was born into a sharecropper family. They went wherever there was work for planters and pickers. She learned the hard work of picking cotton at a young age.

Alberta married W.J. Martin in 1927. Martin was 82 and Alberta was 21.
He had been a Confederate soldier over 60 years before they married.

In July of 1997 Mrs. Martin made a pleasant trip to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania to a gathering of the descendants of Confederate and Union soldiers. There, Mrs. Martin met Mrs. Daisy Anderson who was the last widow of a black Union soldier. The two ladies had a good conversation at the historic Dobbs House. Mrs. Anderson passed away in 1998. She was the widow of Private Robert Ball Anderson who served in the 125th United States Colored Troops.

The Last Union Widow, Mrs. Gertrude Janeway, died on January 2003.

Mrs. Martin spent much time with members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans and she believed in flying the Confederate Cross of St. Andrew. In 2000 she participated in a rally in Columbia, South Carolina to support the flag which then flew on the state capitol. Though in a wheel chair, Alberta held her Southern flag and proudly waved it.

In 1996, Mrs. Alberta Martin was escorted to the National Convention of the Sons of Confederate Veterans in Richmond, Virginia. As she entered the meeting hall, everyone there stood and sang "Dixie."

Our nation, if it is truly diverse, should fly the stars and stripes at half mass for this great lady. It would be the American thing to do.

***********************
Last Widow of a Civil War Veteran Dies
http://www.timesdaily.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20040531/APA /405310709
Widow of U.S. Civil War vet dies at 97
http://www.cbc.ca/stories/2004/05/31/world/widow040531
Funeral Information
http://lastconfederatewidow.com/funeral.htm
The Old Man’s Darling
http://lastconfederatewidow.com/
At 94th Birthday
http://www.johnwill.net/udc/martin/martin3.htm

Last Civil War widow's funeral to draw national attention
Jun 9 2004 12:00AM By By Carole Brand Sun Staff Writer

The South may have lost its link to the Civil War but the nation also mourns the loss of a living legacy to its past.
When Mrs. Alberta Martin, 97, died Memorial Day, May 31, at an Enterprise Nursing Home, the county, the state of Alabama and the nation lost forever a touch of history that linked Americans visibly to a war fought between brothers, neighbors and friends.

Mrs. Martin, world renown as "the last link to Dixie" and "the last surviving Civil War widow," was featured in almost every major newspaper and magazine in America, including the front page of The New York Times, People Magazine and the Los Angeles Times.

Gov. Bob Riley signed a resolution of memoriam in honor of the Civil War widow May 31 and requested that all Alabamians honor the life and memory of Mrs. Martin. All major networks including CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC, numerous journalists from across the nation and foreign journalists are expected to arrive for the widow's funeral Saturday, June 12, and see a regal reenactment of a Confederate funeral and procession.

Mrs. Martin wed Pvt. William Jasper Martin, who at 18 years old joined the Confederate Army in May 1864. In 1927,at age 81, the former soldier asked a young Alberta, 21, to marry him.

According to "Miz Alberta," as she was affectionately known, the courtship was just a few brief conversations over a fence rail in Opp. The two were married at the courthouse in Andalusia Dec. 10, 1927. The marriage worked well for four and a half years until Martin died July 8, 1932. He is buried at the Cool Springs Primitive Baptist Church cemetery near Opp.

Miz Alberta was born Alberta Stewart near Danley Crossroads in Coffee County to parents who were sharecroppers. She once said she remembered that when the children were old enough to wear a 24-pound flour sack around their necks, they would start picking cotton. The family moved around as sharecroppers and ended up in Opp where she met Martin.

After 10 months of marriage, a son Willie was born. The former Confederate soldier would periodically take his son into town, showing him off by carrying the lad on his shoulders, reports state.

One of the few things Miz Alberta remembered her husband telling her about the war was complaining about how hungry he and the rest of the men were in his Company K of the 4th Alabama Infantry Regiment. Martin fought throughout the South and under Gen. Robert E. Lee's command in northern Virginia.

Martin told his young wife that on passing a field, he would dig frantically to find a potato or something left from the harvest. Martin also told his wife about how he and his unit would constantly throw firewood, blankets and anything else they could find on the floor of the trenches in order to stay out of the mud. After Martin's death, Miz Alberta married Charlie Martin in Elba, who was the grandson of her late husband W. J. Martin from his first marriage. After his death and being married for 50 years, Miz Alberta lived a quiet life attending church services and the local senior citizens center. Later in life, she lived at the Elba Nursing Home and then the last few years of her life resided at the Enterprise Nursing Home.

Miz Alberta, with the help and assistance of Enterprise dentist Dr. Ken Chancey, began receiving a pension in 1996 from the Alabama State Pension for the Widows of Confederate Soldiers, Sailors and Marines.

During her lifetime, she attended numerous Civil War reenactments, Confederate grave dedications, the dedication of the Jefferson Davis Presidential Library, Confederate flag rallies and Confederate Day celebrations.

Mrs. Martin will be remembered Saturday, June 12, as Elba brings her home once again to her final resting place.

Mrs. Martin will lie in state in the parlor of the First White House of the Confederacy in Montgomery Friday, June 11. She will be placed in the sanctuary of the First Baptist Church in Elba Saturday, June 12, prior to the funeral, from 8 a.m. until noon.

The funeral will take place in two locations. The funeral will be at the First Assembly of God Church, Highland Drive in Elba at 1 p.m. The church will open its doors at 10 a.m. for early arrivals. Nineteenth century period heritage music will be played from 11 a.m. until 1 p.m. by the 52nd Regimental String Band from Memphis, Tenn., and the Olde Town Brass Band from Huntsville.

Following the church funeral service, a Confederate reenactor heritage funeral march and graveside service will be at the New Ebenezer Baptist Church Cemetery in the Curtis community, located six miles west of Elba.

The Confederate reenactor funeral procession with a mule-drawn wagon will be for the half mile funeral march from the Coffee County Co-Op to the church cemetery.

She will be buried along side her husband of 50 years, Charlie Martin. Also buried in this family plot are her mother and younger brother who died in infancy.

Photo: Alberta Martin's caretaker Dr. Ken Chancey, dressed in Sons of Confederate Veteran's attire, poses with Mrs. Martin in January 2003.
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Date: Jun 14, 2004
ELBA, Ala. (AP) - Alberta Martin, the last widow of a Civil War veteran, has been buried in an 1860s-style ceremony complete with war re-enactors.

Martin, 97, died May 31, nearly 140 years after the Civil War ended. She was a 21-year-old widow with a young child when she met and married 81-year-old Confederate veteran William Jasper Martin in 1927.

After two days of lying in repose at the First White House of the Confederacy in Montgomery, a funeral service was held Saturday at the First Assembly of God Church in Elba.

Members of Company E, 15th Alabama re-enactor group carried Martin's flag-draped casket to a cemetery, followed by women dressed in black Southern belle dresses with black veils covering their faces.

Martin's caretaker, Dr. Ken Chancey, gave her eulogy, saying she was a very witty person who loved a good joke. He said Martin, who grew up poor and often went without shoes on her feet, was content with whatever she had.

William Martin died in 1932 after having one child with his wife. Two months later, Alberta Martin married her late husband's grandson, Charlie Martin, who died in 1983.

She lived in obscurity and poverty most of her life until members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans learned about her past in 1996. They started taking her to conventions and turned her into the belle of Civil War history buffs.

"It's one of our last living links to a grand old lady," said Confederate Veterans member Gerald Moore. "She was moving, she was a great person with an outgoing personality and she is a piece of Southern pride."

The last widow of a Union veteran, Gertrude Janeway, died last year in Tennessee at age 93.

My Southern Family

Baroness ELIZABETH BLOUNT of Windsor

ABT 1469 - ____

ID Number: I96043

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Edward CARTER

4 Aug 1704 - ____

ID Number: I48064

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Mary CHARLTON

ABT 1755 - ____

ID Number: I73268

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Martha Caroline "Carrie" FEAGIN

22 Mar 1872 - 19 May 1926

ID Number: I25289

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Richard GRAVES

BET 1700 AND 0000 - ____

ID Number: I21968

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THOMAS (John?) GREGORY

ABT 1610 - ____

ID Number: I57347

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Paul HARRALSON Sr. "the Immigrant"

ABT 1650 - 1734

ID Number: I60664

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PHILIPPE LANCASTER

1394 - ____

ID Number: I35460

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SANDERS OR SAUNDERS

ABT 1800 - ____

ID Number: I44743

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Alberta STEWART Last Confederate Widow

4 Dec 1906 - 31 May 2004

ID Number: I92722

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Robert VAULX "the Immigrant"

ABT 1616 - ____

ID Number: I88806

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