DOB:  August 2, 1839 DOD:  November 14, 1929 Age at Enlistment: 21 Date of Enlistment:  May 9,1861 Place of Enlistment:  Franklin, TN Rank at Enlistment:  Private Rank at Discharge:  Private Casualty:  He was wounded in the side slightly at Murfreesboro on December 31, 1862.  He was captured near Smyrna, GA on July 5, 1864 when his picket line was cutoff.  Comments:  William is probably the second best resource on the company with only George Nichols surpassing him.  He was born near Triune, TN and was educated at Hardeman Academy in Triune as a child.  After enlisting in the Williamson Grays, his health appears to have been pretty good and shows as present on all rosters until his capture.  In June 1861, the regiment voted on whether to secede or stay in the Union.  William was the only member in the entire regiment to vote to stay.  William’s grandson told me that when someone found out there was a vote to stay in the union, everyone wanted to know who the idiot was that voted that way.  It was discovered and on a post war roster, George Nichols wrote next to William’s name “Only Republican in the 1st Tennessee.”  He filled out the Tennessee Confederate Veterans Questionnaire in the 1900’s.  One of the questions asks the soldier to list every battle they participated in.  He lists everything for the 1st Tennessee with the exception of Perryville, but he does not state why he missed that battle.  Captain Atkeison reported that he was wounded at the Battle of Murfreesboro on December 31, 1862 but the nature of the wound is hard to read.  It looks like it says he was wounded in the side and a concussion.  On his pension record he refers to it as “shocked and bruised.”  The 1st Tennessee was exposed to Artillery fire while attacking the Wilkinson Pike and a shell probably exploded nearby where he caught some shrapnel and the concussion gave him a headache.  The wound was slight none the less.  In a letter to George Nichols after the war he wrote at the Battle of Chickamauga he was hiding behind the same tree that Lee Shute and Garrett Bradford were hiding behind and both of them were killed in the fighting.  When Maney’s Brigade was driven back on September 19 at the same battle he stated he and John Watson were the last two to retreat.  He states John out ran him but William was still able to escape danger with the loss of only one shoe.  After the Confederates abandoned the Kennesaw Line on July 3, 1864, they retreated south to Smyrna, GA near the Chattahoochee River.  William was detailed to go on picket the night of July 3.  The next morning there were Federals to their front and the picket line opened fire on them before retreating.  When they got back to camp everyone was gone.  The picket line headed for the river and found pickets from other parts that were in the same situation.  Some of the Confederates gave up at that moment, but William and another decided they would see if they could make it back to the Confederate lines.  They were able to avoid the Federals most of the day and night of the 4th but they eventually got stuck on a high bluff near the river and group of Federals spotted them and cut off their escape so they agreed to surrender to them.  William and his friend buried their rifles in sand before coming down from the bluff.  According to William he was captured by the 76th Illinois, but they were operating on the Mississippi River at that time.  He does state the Captain was very kind to him and that he gave William and his companion soap to wash themselves and their clothes before taking them to the rear.  William was taken before General Geary and told if he took the Oath of Allegiance he could go home.  He told the General he would not take it and the General told him he could go rot in prison.  The next day he was loaded onto a train and taken to Nashville.  Once he reached Nashville he was taken to the Penitentiary and kept in a cage outside.  He was told if he took the Oath he would be let go and he still would not take it.  After about a month they finally sent him to Camp Chase Prison in Columbus, OH.  He states several times after arriving he wished he had taken the Oath especially when he was finally released because he had to take the Oath anyway.  In his own words, “But I was just too damn stubborn.”   According to his service record he was released from Camp Chase on May 9, 1865 upon taking the Oath of Allegiance.  His release papers describe him as Complexion: Dark; Hair: Dark; Eyes: Gray; Height: 5’4”.  He states he was released with another soldier named Tim Ward, a soldier from the 41st Tennessee who had been captured at Atlanta on July 22, 1864.  William’s health was not good but they made their way to Columbus, OH and stopped at a saloon run by a Copperhead, a Northerner who sympathized with the south.  The Saloon keeper fed them and gave them whiskey and advised them to stay there for the night.  William and Ward did not listen and no sooner had they gone outside a group of soldiers assaulted them.  Some Citizens intervened and the two went back to the saloon.  The keeper gave them one more drink and they waited a little before heading for the railroad tracks and continuing their trek out of Ohio.  They arrived in West Jefferson, OH and got jobs working for a sawmill for 15 days.  This work paid their train tickets back to Nashville.  On the way home they stopped in Louisville, KY where William was arrested for wearing Confederate buttons which was against the law in town.  The Provost Marshall forced a clerk to cut the buttons off and William blocked the attempt with his hand which caused the clerk to cut him badly.  He was finally released and took a train out of town, arriving back at home the next day, July 11. After the war William ran a store in Nashville then Denmark, TN.  He then started traveling for various Wholesale Grocery and Liquors Companies.  He was Postmaster General for Jackson, TN from 1890-1893 and again from 1897-1901.  He states in his memoirs that the General Geary that interrogated him after his capture was the Postmaster General for the entire U.S. when William held the position in Jackson, however the only General Geary in Sherman’s army died in 1873 and the U.S. Postmaster General was John Gary (never a General in the Civil War).  In 1905, he purchased the Capital Hotel in Jackson, TN located near the Railroad Tracks and ran it for several years.  In 1917, he applied for a soldier’s pension because according to his application the hotel was barely breaking even financially.  William married Louisa Britton about 1867 and the couple had four children before her death in 1878.  William remarried on November 30, 1881to Mary Randolph and this union produced eight children.  William was the second to last Williamson Gray to die when he passed away on November 14, 1929 from Arteriosclerosis.  He is buried in Riverside Cemetery in Jackson, TN.  Only James R. Hughes outlived William and he passed away roughly six months later. His son from his second marriage, William Preston Moss, is responsible for all the information on him.  He wrote down some of his father’s stories and made him fill out the Tennessee Veterans Questionnaire.  William Preston Moss had a son named John R. Moss who was an attorney in Jackson, TN.  On trip to try to find William’s grave at the archives in Jackson, one archivist looked in the phone book and found John R.’s name and suggested I call him.  John met me at Riverside Cemetery and showed me where William Mortimer was buried.  I helped get John the paperwork to get a VA marker for William to mark his grave since he did not have a tombstone at the time.

Left:  William’s grave in Riverside Cemetery Right: William’s Grandson John R. Moss who met me at Riverside Cemetery to show me where William was buried.  This photo was taken in 2005, John passed away in 2011.