s/o Rev James Madison Brown, Elizabeth Byers

h/o Sarah Malinda Frady, m. 25 Aug 1866, Rutherford, North Carolina

Civil War Veteran

Service in both the Confederate and Union armies
(see 1941 interview "Glenwood Man to Celebrate 98th Birthday")

D. C. Brown Is Taken By Death Friday Evening

Well Known Citizen of County Passes After Lingering Illness; Funeral Sunday.

Doctor Clayton Brown, well known citizen of McDowell county, died at his home near Glenwood last Friday evening at the ripe old age of 99 years. He had been in declining health for several years.

Mr. Brown was born in Polk county on August 28, 1843, and spent his boyhood days in helping his father farm and operate a store.

He was 18 when the Civil War broke out and was drafted into the Confederate army in the 13th (___) in 1862. Returning to the South after the war he took up life again on his father's farm, and on Sept. 4, 1886, he married Sarah Malinda Frady, of Rutherford county. To them were born 14 children, 11 of whom survive.

In 1870 he and his family moved to Kansas where they resided eight years. Upon his return, Mr. Brown purchased a farm in Rutherford county where he resided until 1892 when he moved to McDowell county. For your (sic) years he lived near Montfords Cove, moving to his home near Glenwood in 1896 where he spent the rest of his life. His wife died in 1928.

Mr. Brown was a deacon in the Baptist church for many years and was held in high esteem by a large circle of friends.

Funeral services were conducted at Glenwood Baptist church Sunday (___) at 2 o'clock by Rev. B. F. Bray, assisted by Rev. Millard Hall, Rev. A. P. Sorrels, Rev. H. W. Bell (continued on last page (not avlb)).

--Transcribed from news copy by Debbie Metcalf

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M'DOWELL MAN NOW 94, FOUGHT IN UNION ARMY
***
D. C. Brown, Glenwood, Is Retired And Lives With Daughter
***
By Rosamond Braly
1938

MARION, Sept. 18. -- One of North Carolina's few surviving veterans of the Union army in the War Between the States is living in McDowell county.

He is D. C. Brown, 94 years of age, believed to be the only Union veteran in this section of the state.

Having retired from active work as a farmer several years ago, Mr. Brown lives in a comfortable home with a daughter, Miss Louise Brown, one of the 14 children he reared, in the small town of Glenwood.

His house is built close to a street which runs along by the railroad, and the aged veteran may be found seated in his old rocker on the porch, watching the trains passing.

Until the past two or three years he was often seen on the streets of Marion. But now, because of failing eyesight and hearing, he remains seated in his daughters' car when the two "come to town."

Having witnessed almost a century of progress, he can tell many a story of the "Gone With The Wind" days. His mind dwells chiefly on the war period when he, a lad in his early twenties, chose to "stick by the Union" even though most of his boyhood acquaintances and his relatives were fighting under the Confederate flag.

Mr. Brown is not only McDowell's only surviving Union veteran, but he is one of the county's oldest men. Born in Rutherford county on August 18, 1843, he passed his 94th birthday last month with a large gathering of relatives and friends at his home.

Was School Teacher

Mr. Brown grew up on a farm in Rutherford County near Cooper's Gap Baptist church (now Polk county). He attended public schools and was a school teacher before he passed his teens. He taught school in Rutherford and Polk counties.

At the age of 20 he volunteered as a soldier in the Union army. This was in October, 1863. A member of Company H. Second North Carolina Regiment, Mounted Infantry, most of his service was at Cumberland gap. On August 16, 1865, he was mustered out near Knoxville, Tenn.

After being home from the war for one year, this Union soldier was married to Miss Sarah Frady, daughter of Col. I. M. Frady, a Confederate.

The years of reconstruction were hard on the Browns, who "went west" to Kansas in 1870 and lived there for eight years. Returning to North Carolina in 1878, the Brown family made the long trip by wagon. Two years they spent in Polk county, after which they purchased a farm in Rutherford, near Uree.

It took 11 years of hard labor to pay for the farm -- years in which the Browns made many trips to Asheville in a one-horse wagon to sell sweet potatoes and other farm products. These trips, Mr. Brown said, required three days each because of the rough mountain roads.

*** Move to Montford Cove

The Browns moved to Montford Cove in McDowell, where they lived for four years and then bought part interest in a farm on Muddy Creek. There Mr. Brown and his family lived until 18 years ago, when he moved to Glenwood.

Mr. and Mrs. Brown reared 14 children and there were no deaths in the family until the mother died in 1928 at the age of 82. Since then three of the children have died.

Those living are Mrs. Alice Searcy, of Hendersonville; Mrs. Hester Williams, of Montford Cove; Mrs. Amanda Williams, of Rutherford; James M. Brown, of Glenwood; Miss Louise Brown, at home; John Brown, of Chattanooga, Tenn; Mrs. Laura Wood, of Hampton Roads, Va; Sankey Brown, of Seattle, Wash; Yates Brown, of Asheville; Mrs. Ada Wilson, of Sugar Hill, and Briscoe Brown, of Napa, Calif.