Willie Thaddeus Roughton, Sr.

--Information from the "History of Tift County" by Ida Belle Williams, C. 1948 by the Tift County Historical Society and reprinted by W H Wolfe Associates of Atlanta in 1979, pages 498.

"When a small boy, Willie and his mother were left at home near Sandersville, Ga, when his father was in the Confederate Army. During Sherman's march to the sea, their house was raided, their livestock taken. While searching the house for valuables, one of Sherman's officers found Willie's father's Mason trunk. The officer was a Mason, so he order the stock returned and the occupants be left unmolested. He even posted a guard around the house.
Willie became a railroad engineer, and he and Lula Williams had two children: Eloise and Willie Thaddeus Roughton Jr.
Willie Thaddeus Roughton Sr was killed when struck by a train in a Savannah, Ga railroad yard."