THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, July 21, 1996 TAG: 9607190214
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 11 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ERIC FEBER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 86 lines
Thanks to a rare find in a Norfolk surplus store, a Daughter of the Confederacy will receive a posthumous honor next week.
The Norfolk County Grays' United Daughters of the Confederacy will place a special plaque by the grave of Sarah Dozier Wallace at the Old Hollywood Cemetery in Elizabeth City, N.C., during a special dedication ceremony Saturday .
The Chesapeake-based group will be joined by others, including the Grays' Sons of Confederate Veterans, the Magruder Ewell SCV, the Stonewall SCV, the 61st re-enactors, the Stonewall UDC, the Hampton UDC along with other regional and North Carolina UDC and SCV chapters and interested spectators for a ceremony to honor the late Wallace as a Real Daughter of the Confederacy.
``A Real Daughter of the Confederacy is a direct descendent of a Confederate soldier who fought in the Civil War,'' said Billie B. Earnest, treasurer with the Norfolk County Grays' UDC. ``We are placing this special graveside marker so that she may forever be remembered as a Real Daughter.''
Earnest, who is behind the drive to honor Wallace, found out about her through sheer serendipity.
``Last August, I was at the surplus store in Norfolk (M&G Sales on Granby Street) looking for a birthday present for my husband,'' Earnest said. ``While looking around, I spotted Mrs. Wallace's certificate of membership in the Gen. D.H. Hill chapter of North Carolina. It was dated 1912. At first, I just walked past it but later I recognized the certificate. It was in a frame and hanging on the wall.
``The man in the store originally bought the certificate for his own daughter who collected Civil War memorabilia. But this particular certificate was one she didn't really want. Lucky for us.''
Earnest was able to purchase the certificate for $25.
``Members of the United Daughter of the Confederacy have the task of always finding out about, researching and honoring members,'' she said. ``I knew I had the duty to buy that certificate as part of our history and heritage.''
What excited Earnest and other Grays' UDC members was the fact that Wallace was a Real Daughter whose father was Willis Dozier, a private who served in Capt. W.A. Duke's Independent Co. of 1st Company I, 32nd Regiment, known as the Jonesborough Guards of Camden County, N.C.
Private Willis Dozier, along with other members of his troop, were captured at Fort Hatteras on Aug. 29, 1861. He and his mates were paroled in December of the same year as part of a prisoner swap with Federal troops. He later served out the war and was present at Lee's surrender at Appomattox. After the war, he settled in Elizabeth City and later purchased a furniture store.
``At first, I had disbelief that I was able to find the certificate of a Real Daughter,'' Earnest said. ``You just don't find things like that every day. After we found out that she was a Real Daughter, I contacted our main office in Richmond and they sent me a copy of her original application to join the United Daughters.''
After finding the certificate, Earnest began to do research on Wallace.
``We wanted to find out who this lady was,'' she said. ``So we found out about her life, kin and history.''
She said Wallace first married an Elizabeth City man, Mathias Wallace, and later remarried a Mr. Stewart from Norfolk. She moved to live with her second husband in South Hampton Roads and, after she became a widow, moved back to her family home in North Carolina. She died in 1949 at the age of 81.
Explaining why Wallace's framed UDC certificate ended up in a Norfolk retail establish, Earnest mused that since Wallace lived in Norfolk for many years and eventually moved back to North Carolina, she may simply have left many of her records and papers in the city after she finally abandoned South Hampton Roads.
Earnest said her research led her to contact Wallace's great-great nephew, Dr. Gregory Worth, a retired dentist from Elizabeth City.
``Dr. Worth was thrilled to hear from us, we provided him with some family history details he didn't know,'' Earnest said. ``For example, he didn't know his great-grandfather fought in the war.''
``Thank-you again for letting me know that Aunt Sade (family name for Sarah Wallace) was a real daughter of the Confederacy,'' Worth wrote in a letter to Earnest. ``This information was not in any of the family records that I have.''
After finding out about Wallace's direct lineage to a Southern Civil War veteran, Earnest and the Grays' UDC decided to stage a fund-raiser to help purchase the commemorative plaque for Saturday's ceremony.
``We sold bricks from the birthplace of Gen. William ``Billy'' Mahone in Southampton County, the same way we raised money to buy the sign for the Chesapeake Civil War Monument,'' she said. ``It's not often you get to honor a Real Daughter. We did this to show our love and honor and to teach the truth and to educate about history.'' ILLUSTRATION: Graphic
Plaque Dedication
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