My Genealogy Hound

WILLIAM BEESLEY, farmer, was born December 23, 1838, and is the eldest child born to Christopher and Susan (Ridoubt) Beesley, natives of Rutherford County, Tenn. Our subject was reared on the farm and secured a good common school education. At the age of twenty-one he began trying to make a livelihood by farming for Arthur Miller and others, and so continued up to the time of the war. In 1866 he rented a farm in the Seventh District, where he lived for twelve years, at the end of which time he was able to buy land. In 1878 he purchased the property where he now resides. Mr. Beesley has met with evident success in his occupation of farming and at present owns 112 acres of land. In 1866 he married Miss Alice G. Elliott, a native of Rutherford County, Tenn., and to this union were born eight children: Adelaide S., Christopher E., Mattie T., Carrie K., Susan W., Ethel L., William A. and John R. Mr. Beesley is a Democrat, and enlisted in 1861 in Company I of the First Tennessee Regiment as a private. He was engaged in some of the noted battles, such as the battles of Shiloh, Chickamauga, Perryville, Franklin, Murfreesboro and Bentonville. He was wounded in the leg during the battle of Chickamauga, which disabled him from active service for about six weeks. In 1863 he was wounded for the second time in the leg, and at the battle of Franklin he received a flesh wound which disabled him for three months. After the war he returned home and resumed his business of farming. He is an influential citizen and a good neighbor.