Lifelong Echoes of the Civil War: Insights into Greenville with John Nolan

Washington Boazeman was born in 1841 in Newberry County, South Carolina, to Cooper and Cathrine Boazeman.

For the next 20 years, he led a relatively normal life until the event that shook everyone in the United States – the war between the North and the South. Boazeman answered the call to join the Confederate cause and served in General Wade Hampton III’s famous Hampton’s Legion in Company G of the 2nd South Carolina Cavalry Regiment.

In interviews with The Greenville News, he said of his service: “I was in many battles, fights and skirmishes during the war, but Gettysburg was the greatest circus of all. There and there we went from bad to worse for three days and nights, fighting hand to hand. I remember well that on the (first) day of the fight, July 3, it seemed to me as if earth, sky and this other place had collapsed in one fight. I was sometimes very afraid for the men and horses on both sides, who were falling in great numbers. I stayed on the battlefield all night, giving water to the dying and wounded soldiers. It was after the Battle of Gettysburg, after we had fought as hard as we could all day. I will never forget that time.”

The Greenville News frequently featured stories about Greenville’s eccentric Little Reb, such as this story about his injury in 1903. Photo courtesy of author John Nolan.

Shortly after surviving Gettysburg, Boazeman was captured near Culpeper Court House in September 1863 and spent more than a year as a prisoner of war before being exchanged in late 1864. When the war ended, he returned to South Carolina with other survivors. However, while most returned to their previous occupations and family lives, for Boazeman the war never seemed to end. In addition to the psychological trauma of the war, he also suffered from his deafness and a crippled leg. He wore his Confederate uniform every day for the next 49 years until his death in 1914 at the Confederate Soldiers Home in Columbia.

Boazeman spent most of his postwar years in Greenville under the generous patronage of Arthur Gower on McBee Avenue. Gower let Boazeman live on his property and do odd jobs while he lived in a wooden shack. He was apparently mentally disabled, perhaps as a result of the trauma of battle or a head injury. His spirit of inquiry and invention, however, never wavered. Boazeman was constantly tinkering with materials, trying to find creative ways to make everyday tasks and products more useful or efficient. Among the curiosities he amassed were burglar-proof door locks, a hand plow for clearing mud from street crossings, a novel foot-pedal-operated fly fan, and a multi-use, convertible piece of furniture.

A 1903 article in the Greenville News reports on a patent that The Little Reb received for one of his inventions. From the collection of author John Nolan

Aside from crafting, Boazeman was always there when a war-related event took place. He was a proud standard bearer at the annual Robert E. Lee birthday celebrations hosted by the Daughters of the Confederacy. He played his bugle at funerals of men buried with military honors. At Memorial Day processions, he could be seen walking down the street, limping, pushing a small cannon. Sometimes he would fire it at night, waking the town with a salute to honor the birthday of a great man of the Confederacy. Whether it was a formal memorial ceremony or

John Nolan. Photo by Bonfire Visuals

He was always seen in his tattered gray war uniform, with pistol in holster, canteen and Confederate flag. On his daily walks down Main Street, locals could see him changing direction, performing the formal military marching maneuvers. Even in his company, one could often hear mutterings of condemnation against the Yankees.

Greenville is home to many people with remarkable personalities and characteristics, and Boazeman is no exception. Local writer CA David said of him in 1927: “In the old days, no one was better known here, and of all the well-known characters on the street, he was the one who appeared most frequently.”

John M. Nolan is owner of Greenville History Tours (greenvillehistorytours.com) and author of A Guide to Historic Greenville, SC and Lost Restaurants of Greenville, SC.