The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1890-11-19
SEVENTEEN BROTHERS IN THE WAR.
They Came of Remarkable Family of
ThIrtv-five Children. All Sons.

Thlrty-five Children, All Sons.
If it came within the line OF his lnqui.
ries." said W. c. Meyer, OF st. Glars
vile. W. V. 1.-The census enumcrator
for Mouudsville, near where | live, must
have found about as wonderful a dom
este history as any enumerator ran
against elsewhere in this country. re-
fer to family by the name OF Brandon.
The father of that family. Charles Bran
don, died when he was 96 years old but
his Youngest child was then less than a
year old. lie died just as the civil war
broke out, from q broken heart. his wife
having refused to live with him any lon
GER. He had at that time thirty-tive
living children, and had been married
three times.
His first wife bore him two children.
His second wife died after bearing him
eighteen. At the age of Is he married
Sarah Barker. she being l6, and the
Youngest of sixteen children. She lived
with him twenty-one years, bearing him
fifteen children, and then left him, taking
her year old baby with her. Brandon
was still hale and hearty, but the deser-
ton OF his wife broke him down, and he
died within month after she left him.
when his third wife married him the
Oldest of his twenty children by his two
previous wives was 80, and the entire
twenty lived under the paternal roof.
The young wife reared all of the twenty
that were young enough to need rear
inc, besides caring for the fifteen of her
own, the Oldest Of whom was but 20
when she left their father. The family
of thirty-fve kept together for many
wears after their fathers death, and the
patria,c chal Brandon had lived a few
months longer he would have seen
seventeen of his sons enlist in the Union
army. Its question : ~ tnls or any
other country an instance can be found
where one family ever before contributed
seventeen sons to their country's SER
vice.
These boys all came ofgood fighting
stock, for their father was famous. In
dian fighter himself, veteran of the
war of 1912 and the Mexican war.
When western Pennsylvania was the
frontier, and the Indian fighter was the
most important and indispensable per-
son in the settlements. Charles Brandon,
occordinc to all traditions, was one OF
the best and most daring Of all the ac-
tive foes Of the red men. His father
was killed by Indians when Charles was
only wears old. He himselfwas made
prisoner. and lived with the Indians
twelve years, hating them more the
longer he was with them. At the age
Of Is he escaped, and after learning his
mother tongue, spent all his time, until
they were driven away to more remote
settlements, in hunting and killing In
dians.
He was 81 years of age when the
war of 1912 broke out, and he was one
of the first to join the American army,
and was in it when peace was declared.
He was II when he enlisted in the
Mexican war.
The third wife Of this yerile old
fighter is living in Moundsville hale and
hearty at the age of e.. She is over SIX
feet high and as straight as an arrow.
Of her thirty-fve children and stepchIl-
dren, she knows positively Of the WHARF,
abouts Of but fifteen. The rest are
scattered about the country and dead.
The thirty-fve children were all sous"
st. Louis Globe-Democrat.