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| General Zebulon York |
Portrayed Sam Jones
General Zebulon York was born in the state of Maine. His Granddaddy on his mother’s side was an aide to General George Washington during the Revolutionary War and was present when Lord Cornwallis surrendered his British forces.
York graduated with honors from Transylvania University in Kentucky and earned a law degree from the University of Louisiana, now called Tulane.
He, along with a business partner, Mr. Hoover, owned 6 plantations in Louisiana, and produced 4,500 bales of cotton each year, with the help of 1700 slaves.
When the Civil War started York formed the Concordia Rifles, Company F of the 14th Louisiana Infantry, which the men made him Captain because he paid for the entire outfit’s equipment with his own money. This Company was the original Louisiana Fighting Tigers, which had a reputation of fierce fighting and troublemaking.
Zebulon York was wounded 3 times during the Civil War. His first wound was in 1862 at the Battle of Williamsburg where one bullet gave him injuries in three different places. His second wound came at the second Battle of Bull Run (Manassas Creek) when he was wounded in the neck. While he was in the hospital recuperating he was almost captured by the Yankees, but managed to escape. His third wound happened in 1864 in the Shenandoah Valley where grapeshot shattered his left arm. A surgeon amputated his arm on the battlefield and told York they expected a counter attack, and since he had lost so much blood it would be best if the Yankees captured him. York told the doctor to get his horse because the only part of him the Yankees were going to capture was his arm. Thus York avoided capture for the second time while wounded.
After the fall of Richmond York was ordered to hold the Yadkin River Bridge, which connected North and South Carolina, to allow people and troops to evacuate. He had a couple of hundred men and 3 small cannon against 4500 Yankee troops with full artillery. The Yankee commander sent several demands for York to surrender, but he refused and held the bridge for 3 days. One of the evacuees was President Jefferson Davis, who crossed the bridge on Easter Sunday, 1865. Upon crossing the bridge Jefferson stopped his carriage and shook York’s hand telling him, “Your gallant defense shall not be forgotten.”
After the War York returned to Vidalia, Louisiana to find all of his plantations destroyed, but he began his life again by running a boarding house in Natchez that was called the York House. It was located where present day finds Biscuits & Blues Restaurant. York eventually acquired 5 tiny steamboats that worked on Black River, in nearby Louisiana, delivering goods, people and livestock to and from rural areas.
During the floods of 1882 York led relief efforts for people in Louisiana. Sam Clemens rode one of his little steamboats during one of their many trips into the Black River region and mentions it in his book Life on the Mississippi.
York became ill in January of 1900 and died on August 1900. He funeral took place at St. Mary’s Basilica and he was buried in the Natchez City Cemetery. His grave plot contains his old business partner, Mr. Hoover and York’s wife whom he married in 1895, but her grave is unmarked to this day.
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