My Genealogy Hound

Samuel W. Godwin, M. D., dealer in drugs and medicines, was born in Maury County, Tenn., February 19, 1831, son of Seth and Nancy (Vestal) Godwin, both born in North Carolina, in 1797 and 1800 respectively. Our subject’s paternal grandfather was George Winn Godwin, a North Carolinian, who, with his family immigrated to Middle Tennessee in 1815, and died in that section at the age of seventy-five years. The father of Dr. Godwin died in 1876, and his mother in 1870. Our subject is one of ten children, and is of German-Irish extraction. He was raised on a farm, and obtained a fair English education. He began the study of medicine in 1855, in the office of Dr. John M. Vestal, and afterward attended lectures at the University of Nashville, graduating in 1859. He located in Maury County, and continued the practice of his profession until the breaking out of the late war, when he became assistant surgeon of the Forty-eighth Tennessee, serving throughout the entire war. He then resumed his practice in Maury County, continuing until 1870, when he came to Union City. He practiced here during the cholera epidemic of 1873, but gave up practicing in 1885. He began keeping drugs in 1882. September 20, 1859, he married Nancy Littleton, of North Alabama, born in 1837, daughter of David H. and Elizabeth Littleton. Dr. Godwin is a Democrat, and his first presidential vote was cast for Pierce. He has been a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church since 1846, and was a delegate to the General Conference of 1886, which sat at Richmond, Va. He has been a director of the Bank of Union City since its organization in 1879, and is considered one of the first citizens of the city.