Watauga Democrat. [volume] (Boone, Watauga County, N.C.) 1888-current, 1927-04-21
ALBERT WILSON CELEBRATES
l02ND BIRTHDAY ANNIVERSARY
BY RUPERT GILLETT


as Shady Valley, Tenn, and old
buddies of the sixties, gathered last
Thursday at the home of Albert P
Wilson, east of town, to help him
celebrate his one hundred and second
birthday.
And as they ga hered around the
old man, blind, deaf and afflicted
with palsy, they marveled at the ac-
tivity Of bis mind after his more than
a century of life. The first wheeling
locomotive made is way over the old
Baltimore and Ohio railway shortly
after his fifth birthday, and shortly
before his latest birthday an aerial
passenger train-a power-driven air
plane pulling a train of gliders-was
put into operation in Germany. Such
are the extremes covered by his life
As the hundred or more guests
gathered around the dinner table,
piled high with only such food as can
be prepared in country homes, Albert
Wilson and his old buddies of the
Civil war told of the heroic exploits
of Company E, 37th North Carolina
infantry, of which Mr.. Wilson was
first sergeant.
The men in this company We're, as
Lieut.. Octavius A. Virgins describes
them, Hardy mountaineers, as fine
looking body of men as ever marched
to the tap of a drum"
Mr.. Wilson and E. j. Norris, one of
the visitors, told of how the regiment
got its baptism of fire at New Bern,
of how it joined jackson in the
Shenandoah and there participated
in its first major engagement at
Hanover Courthouse, where it drove
the enemy from the front and forced
him to take refuge in the woods un-
der the pro ,ection of his batteries.
Then followed Mechanicsville, Gaines
Mil and Frazier's Farm, where their
beloved commander, Col. Charles C.
Lee, was killed in action. With Lieut..
Col. Barber as their new commander,
trey went on to Malvern Hill, where
they forced Mcclellan back to Har-
rison's Landing and checked Pope at
Cedar Run.
It was in this last engagement that
they had one Ct their most thrilling
experiences Of the War. Early and
Taliaferro were giving ground, but
the 37th brushed in quickly formed in
line. and with well-directed volleys
sent the enemy back across the field
to the protection Of their earth
works.
The Federal cavalry, in an attempt
to save the day, charged over the
ground that thci infantry had relin-
quished. The 9th waited. On came
the laundering hoofs of a thousand
chargers galloping straight a the
Confederate line. They were near
now the horsemen were drawing
their flashing sabres in preparation
to cut down the Confederates whom
they expected to annihila e.
/ Still the 37th waited and waited
and waited. The cavalry was so near
that the roar of hoofs sounded ike
thunder in heir ears, and they eX-
pected at the next moment to be
tramped to earth or to be run
through with sabpes. Al last when
the enemy cavalry was within point
blank range. came the order to fire.
There was a binding flash along the
whole Confederate front, the COM
posite report of a thousand rifles,
which, with its sharp crash, makes
voIley firing in some respects more
terrifying than artillery. The cloud
of dust stirred up by the racing cav
airy gradually lifted and disclosed
horses and men, bleeding, groaning,
diving, all in one CHASTITY heap. Those
who had survived the blighting volley
from the 37th were retreating in the
direction whence they came.
How Mr.. Wilson'S regiment feasted
on captured Federal rations after
having lived a week on nothing but
green corn was another interesting
story told at the celebration. The
37th was one unit of Jackson's "foot
cavalry" in the flank movement to
Pope's rear. Throughout the strenu-
Gus march the only food they had was
corn they plucked from the fields
they passed.
At Manassas junction they charged
Taylor's New Jersey Brigade, forced
it across Bull Run and annihilated it.
In the Federal camp they found great
stores of excellent rations and be-
fore returning to the business of war
fare they attended to the business OF
filling their empty stomachs.
jackson led them in SO many VIC