Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 7.djvu/462

Rh resumed his residence at Florence and the practice of law, and was actively engaged in a number of enterprises looking to the development of his region of the State, until his death, November 7, 1891.

Brigadier-General William F. Perry was born in Jackson county, Ga., in 1823, and was educated in his native State and in Alabama, where his parents settled in 1833. After leaving the schools he perfected his education by careful and constant study. From 1848 to 1853 he was principal of a high school at Talladega; then studied law at Tuskegee, under Judge Chilton. In 1854 he was admitted to practice in the courts of Alabama, and in the same year he was elected by the legislature as the first superintendent of education for the State. He held this position until the fall of 1860, when he resigned to take charge of the East Alabama college at Tuskegee. He was in this position when the Confederate disaster at Forts Henry and Donelson, in February, 1862, caused him to give up every other duty for what he considered the just cause of his imperiled country. He enlisted as a private and was elected major at the organization of the Forty-fourth Alabama, in May, 1862, and on the 1st of September became lieutenant-colonel by the resignation of Colonel Kent. The regiment was ordered to Virginia and first assigned to Wright's brigade, with which it served in the Seven Days' battle with the steadiness and valor of veterans, at Second Manassas, and then went into the Maryland campaign. At Sharpsburg Colonel Derby was killed, and from the date of that battle, September 17, 1862, Lieutenant-Colonel Perry became the colonel of the Forty-fourth Alabama. In November the regiment was transferred to Law's brigade, and at Gettysburg, under Colonel Perry, shared in the assault on Round Top, winning undying fame. At Chickamauga Colonel Perry led the brigade, and for gallantry General Longstreet recommended his promotion. At the Wilderness, coming to the front at