Page:The part taken by women in American history.djvu/538

Rh body sick she reported to the kind and patriotic Dr. Hugh Shaw. If any of the families lacked meal or other provisions, it was reported to her father, who would send meal from his mill or bacon from his smoke-house.

In appreciation of her heroic work, her father and her gallant brother-in-law, Major Robert Meriwether, who was in the Virginia army, now living in Brazil, bought a beautiful Tennessee riding horse and gave it to her. She named it "Clara Fisher," and many poor hearts in old Edgefield were made sad and many tears shed in the fall of 1864, when Sadie Curry and "Clara Fisher" moved to southwest Georgia.

Bless God, there were many Sadie Currys all over the South, wherever there was a call and opportunity. Miss Sadie married Dr. H. D. Hudson and later in life Rev. Dr. Rogers, of Augusta, where she died a few years ago.

The subject of this sketch is a woman of strong and attractive personality. She is a member, on both sides, of distinguished families that gave lustre to the society of the Old Dominion, in its palmiest days. Her father was the late Hon. Charles James Faulkner, Sr., who filled many positions of honor and trust, not only in his own state, but under the government of the United States. He represented his country as minister to the court of St. Cloud, with distinguished ability, just prior to the Civil War, coming home at the commencement of the troublous times of 1861, and casting his fortunes with the South. Mrs. McSherry was born in Martinsburg, Virginia, now West Virginia, and spent the greater part of her young life, with the exception of the years she lived with her father's family, in Paris, at her ancestral home "Bodyville," until her marriage to Dr. J. Whann McSherry. Mrs. McSherry's heart was bound up in the Southern Confederacy, in the service of which, her father, her husband, her brothers, and many friends, displayed unswerving fidelity, and immediately after the cessation of hostilities, she devoted her energies to the care of the gallant soldiers, who fought so nobly for the cause they believed to be right and just. Mrs. McSherry organized a chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy in her county of Berkeley, which by her energy and exceptional executive ability became a model of efficiency, in caring for the living and keeping bright the memories of the dead. When the West Virginia Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy was organized, Mrs. McSherry was elected its president, which office she filled with marked ability, until called higher, and at Houston, Texas, in 1009, she was elevated to the highest office in the gift of the organization, that of president-general of the noble band of women, who compose the National Association of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, and was re-elected, at Little Rock, Arkansas, at the succeeding election. Her administration of that exalted office has been eminently acceptable, impartial and just. Her conscientious discharge of her duties has won for her the enviable reputation of having been one of the very best presiding officers that this organization has ever had. She will go down in the history of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, with the plaudit, "Well done, good and faithful servant,"