William Marshall Richardson Family Bible Records

William Marshall Richardson M. D. William Marshall Richardson was born in Brunswick County, North Carolina, 15 February 1831. He was tire son of Purdie Richardson (b. Bladen County) and Catherine Marshall (b. Anson County), the grandson of the Rev. Samuel Neal Richardson and Mary Ann Smith of "Harmony Hall" on the Cape Fear River near White Oak, Bladen County, and the great grandson of Colonel James Richardson and Elizabeth Neal (Bugnion) (Purdie) who built "Harmony Hall" near White Oak, Bladen County. William M. Richardson's maternal grandparents were William Marshall and Sallic Lanier, and his great- grandparents were James Marshall and Ann Harrison and Burwell Lanier and Elizabeth Hill all of Anson County NC. When William M. was nine years of age his parents moved from Brunswick County to the vicinity of Wadesboro in Anson County, where he grew up. He attended the University of North Carolina, graduating with an A.B. degree in 1851. In John Hill Wheeler's "Historical Sketches of North Carolina" ( p. 129) William is shown to have been a commencement speaker, June 1851. The University of North Carolina presented him with a Bible, and the entries made in this Bible are included with this paper. He then attended Medical School in Charleston in 1852, and 1854 he was graduated in Medicine from Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. A brother, Clement Lanier Richardson also graduated from University of North Carolina, and he too became a medical doctor. William was married three times. By his first wife Martha Elizabeth McRae of Richmond County NC, lie had a son and a daughter, both of whom died as children. By his second wife, Olivia Caroline Jolmson of Mississippi he had three daughters, two living to adulthood, and by his third wife, Anna Louise Gibson of St. Louis Missouri he had two daughters and one son. He served in the CSA, as 1st Lt in the 43rd Regt., Alabama Volunteers, but evidentally had to resign his commission because of contracting a disease which prevented his performing effectively. He practiced medicine in Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Florida. He practiced in Jeancrctte Louisiana for 19 years and here his last three children were born. In 1886, William and Anna Louise with Louise, Ella, and Purdie, moved to Marion County Florida near McIntosh and Boardman where he became a citrus grower and a semi-retired physician, and built a home "Hillcrest". Devastating Florida freezes forced him to give up his fanning, and lie and Anna moved to Ocala in Marion County, and then still later to West Palm Beach, Florida to be near their oldest daughter, Louise Price. He joined the Methodist church early in life, and was very active in that church in the various places in which he lived . In Jcanerette he conducted the Sunday School for the many years he lived there, and was one of the founders of the Center Point Methodist Church near "Hillcrest". This church is now the McIntosh Methodist Church.. He was totally blind for the last seven years of his life. His last days, aficr the death of his wife, Anna, were spent in the home of his daughter Ella Bouvier in Union County, FL. He died at the age of 98, 20 April 1929. It had pleased him that he had become the senior alumnus of the University of North Carolina. He was buried by his wife Anna in the Woodlawn Cemetery, West Palm Beach, Florida. /?9S'