Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 5.djvu/759

 VIRGINIA BIOGRAPHY

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member of the Methodist Episcopal church, and holds position on the official board. He was a delegate from the X'irginia Metho- dist Episcopal conference to the general con- ference of the church held in Oklahoma in May, 1914, and has played an important part in many forms of church service, ac- cepting and faithfully administering his charges.

Captain Nathaniel Burruss. The first an- cestor of Captain Nathaniel Burruss was Jacob Burruss, of England, who came to America in 1717 with his two sons, William and John, and located in Caroline county, A'irginia.

\\'illiam Burruss married Susanna Ter- rell, in 1770, daughter of David Terell, Sr., and Agatha Chiles, his wife. William Bur- russ and Susanna Terrell had issue: Pleas- ant, of Caroline county, Virginia ; William, Harris, Jacob, Patsy, and Susan. Pleasant Burruss married (first) Nancy Cheadle, (second) Elizabeth Wright, daughter of William Wright and Frances Riddle, his wife, and they had issue : Cicero, father of Nathaniel Burruss ; Pleasant, Edroin Nancy, and Susan. William Burruss mar- ried. Nancy Redd ; Jacob, married Mary Redd; Patsy, married Jacob Reynolds; Susan, married William Campbell.

^^'illiam Burruss. father of Pleasant and great-grandfather of Nathaniel Burruss, was a banker of Caroline county, Virginia.

Cicero Burruss. eldest son of Pleasant Burruss and Elizabeth Wright, was born in Caroline county, Virginia, in 1819 ; married, June 6, 1843, Adelaide Octavia Charter, of Richmond. Virginia. Adelaide Octavia Char- ter was a daughter of Lieutenant Nathaniel Charter, of Richmond, Virginia, and Wini- fred Lacy Johnston, of Fredericks))urg, A'ir- ginia. Cicero and Adelaide Burruss had issue : Nathaniel Burruss, born in Richmond, Virginia. December, 1844; married Margaret Walters Dey. daughter of William Dey, of Norfolk, and Margaret Catherine Walters, of Maryland. They had issue : Adelita Chartel Burruss, who married Captain Harry B. Jordan, United States army, com- manding officer of San Antonio (Texas) arsenal : William Cicero Burruss, married Nell Orr, of Greenville, South Carolina, he died June 6, 1902 ; Edwin Elovin Burruss, died aged six months ; Nathaniel Charter Burruss, of Norfolk, Virginia, married

Eleanor Rellis, of Saginaw, Michigan ; Al- bert Edward Burruss. of Norfolk, married Harriet Gaughn, of St. Louis, Missouri; Margaret Walters Burruss, married (first) Lieutenant John Henry Read, United States army, aide-de-camp for General James Par- ker, Fort San Houston, Texas ; Eugene Lan- sing Burruss, of Norfolk, married Nell Old- field, of Edgewater, Norfolk, Virginia.

Nathaniel Burruss was only three years old when he came with his parents from Richmond to live in Norfolk, Virginia. He was educated at the Norfolk Military Acad- emy and Virginia Military Institute, Lex- ington, Virginia. At the commencement of the Civil war, in 1861, he was a cadet at the Virginia Military Institute, and after the oc- cupation of Harper's Ferry by the Confed- erate troops under Colonel Jackson, after- wards the celebrated "Stonewall" Jackson, he was ordered to General Jackson from the institute, for duty on his stafif, as instructor of tactics. He continued to perform this service up to the battle of Manassas, in which he took part with the "Stonewall Brigade." He was shortly afterwards or- dered back to the Virginia Military Institute to resume his studies, but that institution soon closed. In 1862 he entered the service again at Brownsville, Texas, being stationed at Fort Brown, as lieutenant in Captain Cumming's company of infantry, in which position and capacity he remained until transferred to Ringgold Barracks on the Rio Grande river. He continued in active service as captain, serving respectively as ordnance officer, quarter-master and com- missary to the close of the war, being at- tached to the cavalry corps of Colonel Ben- avide's, who guarded that line of the frontier bordering on the Rio Grande river. At the close of the war, having returned to Nor- folk, Virginia, he was elected captain of a volunteer company, the Norfolk City Guard, which he commanded (and uniformed the entire company) several years. He was next commissioned as quarter-master with the rank of captain, on the stafif of Colonel C. H. Nash, Fourth Virginia Volunteers. He occupied this position until 1897, when he voluntarily resigned, having served his state in a military capacity during a period of ten years of active service. Pie died at Nor- folk, October 9, 1905.

Cicero Burruss, father of Nathaniel was a successful banker of Norfolk, Virginia,