“Impetuous Gallantry” - William Jones in the Civil War

Orientation: Starting with Raymond Blackford, son of Minnie Lee Jones Blackford, daughter of Jeptha Lorenzo Dow Jones, son of William Joseph Jones (January 17, 1820-November 23, 1894)

William Jones, Jonathan Jones’ son, fought in the Civil War. On Ancestry.com there is a William J. Jones listed in Company I of the 57th Unit of the Georgia Infantry. It shows his rank at both induction and discharge as private and his allegiance as Confederate. At another spot on the internet I found Jones, William enlisted as a private on March 4, 1862 on the “Muster Roll of: Company I, 41st Regiment Georgia Volunteer Infantry Army of Tennessee, Confederate States of America, Heard County, Georgia, Heard County Rangers.”

As a side note: I wondered why William, from Georgia, would have been fighting in the “Army of Tennessee”. A genealogy librarian explained to me that different sections of both the Union and the Confederacy called their troops by different names. Here is quote from an interesting link that describes it further.

“To the non-military buff, the organization and terminology used for Civil War armies can be very confusing. The "Army of the Potomac" was the main Union army in the eastern theater of the war and the "Army of Northern Virginia" was the main Confederate force. Remarkably, both of the armies that fought the Battle of Gettysburg were organized in a similar fashion including a structure of corps, divisions, and brigades.”

The link goes on to describe the differences between terms such as regiments, brigades, divisions, etc. in an Army organization chart. Understanding these terms will help you better understand the entries about the 41st Regiment further in this section. http://www.nps.gov/gett/getttour/armorg.htm

I visited the San Antonio Public Library and spent the better part of one day researching the 41st Regiment of Georgia. The most helpful source to which the librarian directed me was the War of the Rebellion – Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies – Series I . The index of this set of reference books led me to a number of different volumes that spanned April 1862 to March 1864. Here are several entries found that specifically regard the activities of that 41st Regiment.

From What I’ve Read and Heard

Having established an email correspondence with the Heard County Historical Center coordinator, I decided to call upon her knowledge of the area and history of the county to possibly provide a fuller picture of Jonathan Jones life and times. I sent the email below to her to which she responded.

Dear Ms. B.,
Many thanks for the pictures you sent of the Jones' graves! It was most kind of you to go to that effort. Seeing them means very much to my family and me.

I am trying to piece together a picture of Jonathan and Elizabeth's lives. Here are some facts I can pull together from your help and other various sources: They lived in the St. Cloud District. In the 1860 US Federal Census Jonathan's occupation is listed as farmer. The value of his real estate is shown as $2,700 and the value of his personal estate, $14,650. The Slave Schedules in 1860 indicate he had 19 slaves. Using that information and what you know of the history of Heard County, what would you say was his economic status? That is, was he a man of wealth, a well situated man, or a middle class man? What would your educated guess be that he grew on his land? Do you know of any old homes in the old St. Cloud district still standing that might have been his? Do you know of any old churches that were in that area in the 1840's, 50's or 60's?

I know that you have given a great deal of help to me already for which I am highly appreciative. If the above questions are asking too much, I will certainly understand.
Thank you for the wonderful help you have provided.

Sincerely,
Nancy H.
3rd Great Granddaughter of
Jonathan Jones (1804 - 1873)

Dear Nancy,
Sorry to be late in writing, too busy this spring!
In my opinion, your Jones family were very "well off" as we say in the South. He could have gotten a land grant, have you checked? I would guess his main crop was cotton and then corn. With the number of slaves he had I am sure he had lots of acreage and that would mean a large plantation. To know where he lived we would need to know from deed records a land lot and district number. As our records burned in 1894 that might be hard to locate unless someone re-recorded after the fire. Many did record their property in the early 1900's that had been burned. I will keep my eyes open for their property when I am researching in the early 1900's.
I was so thrilled when we found the cemetery. It had been "lost" for many, many years.
Good hunting---
Always,
Selmah B.

As was true for so many in the South, the height of Jonathan Jones’ wealth was prior to the Civil War. In the 1870 census the value of Jonathan’s real estate had dropped to $1,600 as compared to $2,700 in 1860 and his personal estate had dropped from $14, 650 to $600 in those same ten years. I have no idea what monetary value was placed on the nineteen slaves he had owned in 1860, but for sure, they were gone by 1870. Additionally, he was 66 years old in 1870 and may have begun to live off his estate and or given parts of it to his family.

There’s a good chance that many of you reading this blog have also read a good deal about the American Civil War. You have probably heard or read about Sherman’s March to the Sea. In the late summer of 1864 Union General Sherman brought his forces into Atlanta and burned it to the ground. Then he proceeded to march from Atlanta to “the Sea”, namely to Savannah, Ga.

Below is a link to an article written about Sherman’s March to the Sea by Dr. Frank Oliver Clark. The following is a quote from that article:
“No other campaign in the entire war has contributed more to keeping alive sectional feeling than Sherman's march through Georgia and South Carolina. The march began in November, after the crops had been gathered. The "bummers" found the barns bursting with grain, fodder, and peas, the outhouses full of cotton, the yards crowded with hogs, chickens, and turkeys. The soldiers in the Southern armies were starving, not because there was no food, but because the rail roads had been destroyed and it was impossible to send supplies to the front. Sherman was not content simply to use what food and supplies he needed, but boasted that he would "smash things to the sea" and make Georgia howl. His men entered dwellings, taking everything of value that could be moved, such as silver plate and jewelry; and killed and left dead in the pens thousands of hogs, sheep and poultry. Many dwellings were burned without any justification. Sherman in his own Memoirs testifies to the conduct of his men, estimating that he had destroyed $80,000,000 worth of property of which he could make no use. This he describes as "simple waste and destruction." One of the most serious aspects of his work was the destruction of the railroads; the Central from Macon to Savannah, for instance, was almost totally ruined.”
The following link has an excellent map and discussion of that march. It looks as though that march missed the land of Jonathan Jones by about fifty miles to the East, although one group of Union soldiers passed as close as twenty miles to the South of the Franklin, Ga. area. I highly recommend you check the following link to get a “feel for” what took place in that march. It has an excellent map and narrative. http://sciway3.net/clark/civilwar/marchingthruGA.html