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My grandfather's sister Elizabeth Lanier was born in Giles County. Lived there during the Civil War. Her husband James Nelson Russell, who she married after the War, was in Nathan Bedford Forrest's Calvary. They married in Giles County and had 5 children born there and 2 more in Florence AL. Then they moved to Texas around 1894 where they died. Russell was so proud of his service that they put "Rode in Forrest's Escort" on his tombstone.
Bobby Lanier
See a photo of James Nelson Russell
Name: Elizabeth LANIER
Sex: F
Birth: 1 Jun 1850 in Selma County, Alabama
Note: Information from Elizabeth's death certificate.
Death: 14 Jun 1933 in Red Oak, Ellis County, Texas
Note:
Dated June 21, 1933 from Plano Texas. This letter was written to
John Chamberlin by his brother W. H. (Henry) Lanier.
Dear Brother,
I have sad news to send you. Your sister, Liza, passed away last
Wednesday morning,
June 14, at 12:20 noon. I got there just as she drew her last breath.
She was 83 years old, born June 1, 1850. She died in Red Oak,
Texas. She was buried in Red Oak Cemetery. She had 11 children, one
was dead.
(Information shared by Bobby Lanier at blainer@fayelectric.com)
Burial: Red Oak Cemetery, Red Oak, Ellis County, Texas
Father: James Thomas LANIER b: 10 Mar 1815 in Brunswick County, Virginia
Mother: Mary Katherine FARRAR b: abt 1826 in Selma County, Alabama
Marriage 1 James Nelson RUSSELL b: 11 Mar 1848 in Kentucky
• Married: 24 Jan 1871
Name: James Nelson RUSSELL
Sex: M
Birth: 11 Mar 1848 in Kentucky
Death: 4 May 1920
Burial: Red Oak, Ellis County, Texas
Event: Military
Note:
Inscription on tombstone reads "Rode in Forrest's Escort", so he was
in the calvary division under Nathan Bedford Forrest of the
Confederacy during the Civil War.
He was only about 14 1/2 to 15 years old at the time, but history
bares him out. The calvary was from Lincoln and Giles County,
Tennessee where Russell had moved from Kentucky with his parents. He
had to be in one of these quotes:
By early summer Forrest commanded a new brigade of green cavalry
regiments. In July, he led them into Middle Tennessee under orders to
launch a cavalry raid. On July 13, 1862, his men joined the First
Battle of Murfreesboro, and Forrest is said to have won this battle.
In December 1862, Forrest had to recruit a new brigade, composed of
about 2,000 inexperienced recruits, most of whom lacked weapons.
Again, Bragg ordered a raid, this one into west Tennessee to disrupt
the communications of the Union forces under Grant, threatening the
city of Vicksburg, Mississippi. Forrest protested that to send these
untrained men behind enemy lines was suicidal, but Bragg insisted, and
Forrest obeyed his orders. On the ensuing raid, he again showed his
brilliance, leading thousands of Union soldiers in west Tennessee on a
"wild goose chase" trying to locate his fast-moving forces. Forrest
never stayed in one place long enough to be located, raided as far
north as the banks of the Ohio River in southwest Kentucky, and came
back to his base in Mississippi with more men than he had started
with. All of them were then fully armed with captured Union weapons.
As a result, Grant was forced to revise and delay the strategy of his
Vicksburg Campaign significantly.
Forrest continued to lead his men in small-scale operations until
April 1863.
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