Tallahatchie County Mississippi Biographies and Biographical Sketches

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CARDER, David Biography

David Carder, a planter of Tallahatchie county, was born ih Tennessee in 1841. He was a son of David and Nancy Elizabeth (Sutherland) Carder. His father is thought to have beon a native of Alabama. He removed to Tennessee, where his wife died when David was two years old. Sho was a Christian woman, a member of the Baptist church. Mr. Carder’s second marriage was to Susan Calbert, who died in Tennessee, also, having borne her husband five children, all of whom are deceased. Mr. Carder spent one year, soon after the war, with his son David, in Tallahatchie county, returning to Tennessee, where he died in 1809. Our subject was the youngest of two sons and six daughters. He is the only one of the family living in Mississippi, and, so far as he knows, his brothers and sisters are all dead. Moses joined the Confederate army in Arkansas during the war, and has never been heard from since. The others were named Mary, Susan, Lottie, Sallie, Fannie and David. David Carder never had an opportunity to acquire an education. He attended school but very little, being obliged to begin life for himself at about the age of thirteen years as a farm hand, in which capacity he worked until after the war. In 1855 he came to Tallahatchie county and found employment upon the farm on which he now lives. In 1801 he joined the Tallahatchie rifles, of the Second Mississippi infantry, and served' through the war in the army of Virginia, participating in engagements at Fredericksburg, Antietam, Malvern hill, in the Wilderness, Manassas junction aud other battles and skirmishes. He was transferred to the ordnance department, and the last year of the war was wagonmaster; he surrendered with General Lee, and returned to Mississippi. He was married in i860 to Lucy Elizabeth, daughter of Willis and Jane Shaw, then and until the end of their lives residents of Tallahatchie county. Mr. Shaw was a planter of moderate means. Mrs. Carder was born in Tallahatchie county. She has borne her husband “eleven children, seven of whom are living: Dr. Thomas A., a practicing physician of Coahoma county and a graduate of the Memphis medical college; Napoleon, a telegraph operator, also living in Coahoma county; Nancy Jane, wife of Alexander Williams; Louanna; Frances Rebecca; Lydia Elizabeth and Virginia are those who survived. With the exception of about one year, 1873, passed in Arkansas and in Boone aud Jackson counties, Mr. Carder has lived in Tallahatchie county since 1855, and on his present farm since his return from Arkansas. He is the owner of four hundred and eighty acres of land, two hundred and forty of which lie in the river bottom. This he has acquired from his own unaided efforts, and on his home farm has put the improvements which mark it as one of the finest in this county. He has cleared about, one hundred and fifty acres of the bottom land, which was originally covered with timber. Mr. Carder is a hard working, industrious farmer, honest and upright in his dealings and a good citizen in every sense of the term. Though deprived of such educational advantages as he could have desired, he has still always been a steadfast supporter of the schools, and his elder children have, at considerable pains and expense, fitted themselves educationally to be good and useful citizens. [Source: Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Mississippi, Chicago, The Goodspeed Publishing Company, 1891.]

CARSON, A. T. Biography

A. T. Carson, father of Robert B. Carson, M. D., Durant, Miss., was born in Georgia, and came to Mississippi in 1834. when a single man. He first settled in Tallahatchie county, but subsequently went to Yazoo county, where he met and married Miss Laura Edgar, a native of that county and the daughter of M. Edgar. He became one of the foremost planters of Yazoo county, reared his family there, and there received his final summons in 1890. His widow still survives him. Dr. Robert B. Carson was born in Y'azoo county. Miss., on September 12, 1840, to the above mentioned union, and there spent his youth and received his primary education. He subsequently continued his studies at the State university at Oxford, Miss., and then began the study of medicine, taking his first course of lectures in 1868-9, and graduating in the class of 1870. He began practicing medicine at Benton and continued there for five years. In 1875 the Doctor located at Durant, has continued there ever since, and has established an excellent practice. In January, 1804, he enlisted in the Confederate army, Colonel Wood’s cavalry, and served until the close of the war, participating in a number of small engagements and skirmishes. Dr. Carson is a republican in politics, but has never made himself obnoxious by intruding his views. He is esteemed and respected by his political opponents, and has many friends among them. He has held several local offices, and has discharged the duties of the same in a very creditable manner. He was appointed postmaster, first, under President Hayes and served four years. During the present administration (Harrison’s) he was again appointed to that position, and is now serving his second term in that capacity. The Doctor w'as first married in Yazoo county to Miss Bettie Luce, who is now deceased. There were six children born to this marriage, and two daughters, young ladies, attend to the postoffice business. Dr. Carson married his present wife in Durant, Miss Mary Ramsey, a native of Mississippi, who was reared and educated in this town. She is a member of the Methodist and the Doctor a member of the Presbyterian church. He is a Roval Arch Mason, a member of the Knights of Honor and the Knights and Ladies of Honor, and is medical examiner of both the last-named organizations. He is a member of the state medical society, and was a delegate to the national medical convention at Chicago. He is health officer of Holmes county, and devotes his entire time to his large practice. [Source: Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Mississippi, Chicago, The Goodspeed Publishing Company, 1891.]