Posted on 01/27/2015 7:40:15 PM PST by iowamark
RALEIGH, N.C. – Luke Martin Jr., whose father was an ex-slave and Civil War Union soldier, has died — 179 years after his father was born.
Martin was 97 when he died Sunday at his home in New Bern, North Carolina..
..lived in the house where he was born — a house his father built in the 1890s.
Martin had little memory of his father, Luke Martin Sr., who died at age 84 in 1920 when the son was just a few years old, according to Martin-Williams. The elder Martin, who was born in 1836, was married twice, the second time to a much younger woman.
According to multiple historical references, Luke Martin Sr. was enslaved at a plantation near Plymouth, North Carolina, but escaped and became a member of the 1st North Carolina Colored Volunteers, later called the 35th U.S. Colored Troops. The U.S. Colored Troops were established in 1863 and by the end of the Civil War, black soldiers comprised 10 percent of the Union Army.
Martin, a member of Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, also attended the 2013 unveiling of a historical marker at New Bern Academy that honors his father's regiment. The group's website said in announcing his membership last year that he was one of an estimated nine first-generation sons of Civil War veterans. One other man on that list died earlier in January.
All the recognition pleased her father, Martin-Williams said. "He was glad that he lived long enough to be recognized," she said.
In June, the Martin family loaned the elder Martin's Springfield rifle and a German-made Confederate sword to the state for one year. The items were part of a tour that also included North Carolina's original copy of the 13th Amendment.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Many of the soldiers were very young and I guess a few could be long-lived and if their kid was also long-lived, I suppose it is possible
I would guess that he is one of the last.
The last of the widows just died off a few years go.
I absolutely loves me some history.
I watched the patriots earlier tonight and saw some names from the revolution that I’d like to research.
Salem Poor (black)
Prince Eastabrook (black)
James Armistead Lafayette (black)
John Honeyman (white)
Sybil Ludington (white)
Peter Fransisco (white)
Betty Zane (white)
Around 1996 I was camping at a state campground near Vidalia, GA. I had a little 5 inch TV but it would only pick up a single UHF station.
I was watching it and they were interviewing a 100 year old Black lady. One of the more interesting things about her was that her Father, a Black man had served in the Confederate Army.
She recalled how when she was a child, he took a trip by railroad to Chattanooga. He was gone for a week and she learned he had attended a reunion of Confederate veterans.
I am sure she is gone by now.
I’m a direct descendant of Betty Zane.
I’m five generations out. The last of the sons of the Civil War veterans in my family died in the Sixties. I remember one of them from when I was three or four. He popped us some popcorn on the wood stove in his basement, where his wood shop was. I still have a couple of items he turned on his lathe.
I read that and said “no way”, and then I did a little math. If a vet serving in his teens had sired a child in his 70’s and that child had a long life, then I’ll be dipped in spit, it absolutely could happen. Wow.
16 years old and she ran through enemy fire to bring more gunpowder back to Fort Henry where the patriots were under siege.
The war was really over at that point but news didn’t travel very fast in those days so fighting continued.
RIP.
My Grandpa, we called him Grandpa Mac, was the Son of a Confederate soldier. His Father was Martin Able McDuffie of the 18th Alabama. He and three Brothers enlisted at Elba, Alabama tho they technically lived just inside the Florida line.
My Grandfather, Abel Emmanuel McDuffie, died around 1955.
Escaped from Demorat Party slavery only to see most of his people slip into Demorat Party slavery by other means. Socialism then and now.
My grandmother who lived with our family in the 1950s and died in 1961 at age 70 was the daughter of a Union Solider. She showed me his diary which he kept during the war and I now have. And my Dad, a WWII vet, who passed away in 1988 often talked about his memories of his grandfather who was a Confederate vet. But I really didn’t realize that any of these sons of Civil War vets were still alive.
The last surviving Confederate Veteran lived in Crestview, Florida. He was actually the last Civil War Veteran period.
They used to have a party every year for Uncle Bill Lundy. I got to meet him. He lived to well over 100.
There were supposedly two who lived longer than Lundy but more recent research has shown they both were imposters.
I used to call on a business in the late 80’s that was owned by a white haired southern gentleman in his 80’s.
Business always took 5 min. followed by 30 min. of shooting the bull. One day the subject turned to the Civil war and he told me he recalled his grandfather used to take him to visit the “old soldiers” home (Confederate) when he was a boy. I’m guessing it would have been around 1905-1910.
Is he the Confederate vet who died in 1959 after appearing on a TV show?
I just looked it up. He died in 1957 while there were still two others alive but they both turned out to be imposters.
Some guy claimed that Lundy was also wrong but he was genuine and records later proved it. He was a member of a home guard unit and never saw combat, at least I think that is right.
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