My Genealogy Hound

Z. H. LOWDERMILK, proprietor of grocery, provision and feed store, was born in North Carolina, January 8, 1841. He was reared on a farm and received a common school education, and enlisted in the Third North Carolina Infantry, in June, 1861, as a private, and was promoted to Fifth Sergeant, of Company H. He participated in the six days’ fight around Richmond, in 1862. Was in the battle of South Mound, Md., September 14, 1862, and in the battle of Sharpsburg, September 17, 1862, where he was wounded in the head by a shell, and left the command for a few days. On his return he was elected Lieutenant, took command, and went through the battle of Fredericksburg, Va., December 14, 1862. In the spring of 1863, he was with Jackson when he flanked Hooper on the right; May 3d, at the battle of Chancellorsville, where he was shot through both lungs, and considered mortally wounded. He was taken off the battle-field to Maj. Lacey’s house and kept twenty days before he could be moved. Stonewall Jackson was wounded the same night. Mr. Lowdermilk returned and took command of his company August 1, 1863, and participated in the battle of Mine Run, in November. In the spring of 1864, he participated in the battle of the Wilderness, May 5, and was captured during the day’s battle, but escaped the same night, and captured six of the enemy, whom he delivered to the Sixty-first Alabama. He participated in all the battles of the Wilderness, including the 10th and 12th of May, and was, on the latter day, captured by Hancock’s corps, and taken to Fort Delaware a prisoner, where he was kept until August 20, when he was taken out with 599 other officers, and shipped in the steamer Crescent, by way of Cape Hatteras to Morris Island, La., where they were placed under the fire of their own guns and kept forty-seven days on three and one-half crackers’, two ounces of meat, and half a pint (very thin) of bean soup a day, being guarded by the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts Negro Regiment, who frequently shot among the men as though they were shooting at prairie chickens for amusement. On October 24, he was transferred to Fort Pulaski, Ga., where he was guarded by Col. Brown’s regiment, the One Hundred and Fifty-seventh New York. During that winter rations were cut down, by order of Gen. Foster commanding that department, to ten ounces of corn meal per day, without even salt, for forty-three days, and the prisoners were not allowed to buy or receive the provisions that were shipped to them by friends at home. On the 4th of March, 1865, he was sent back to Fort Delaware, where he was kept until June 1, when he was discharged on special release. Mr. Lowdermilk then went to Philadelphia, where he met friends who lent him money to go home to Ashburn, N. C. In 1866, he was elected Colonel of the Sixty-third North Carolina Militia, which was afterward disbanded by act of Congress. He remained in North Carolina until 1868, and then went West to Iowa, then to Illinois, and then to Kansas, where he located at Lowell, Cherokee County, and remained nine years on a farm and in merchandise, and in 1879 came to Galena, and opened his present business. He has been burned out twice, but is now running a flourishing business. He is also in the drug business, in Galena, and owns business houses and residences, in Galena, and a farm in Garden Township, near Lowell. He was elected Township Clerk and Township Treasurer, of Galena, November, 1882. He is a Freemason charter member, and is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. He was married to Miss Mary L. Bookshere, of Randolph County, N.C., February 3, 1864, and has two children- Mary Luetta and Anzeletta.