My Genealogy Hound

Benjamin F. Quertermous began life for himself at the age of sixteen as a farm hand. In 1857 he came to Arkansas and located in Arkansas County, and two years later was appointed deputy county clerk, which position he held until the opening of the war, when he enlisted in the Seventh Arkansas Battalion, being made third lieutenant of Company I. After the battle of Shiloh he was transferred to the Trans Mississippi Department, and was promoted to first lieutenant of the Twenty-sixth Arkansas Infantry, participating in the battles of Prairie Grove, Pleasant Hill and a number of others. When peace had been declared he returned home and again served as deputy clerk until the reconstruction. In 1874 he was elected to the office of clerk of the court and was re-elected in 1876. In 1880, after a successful official career, he engaged in the mercantile business at Crockett’s Bluff, where he has since lived. Mr. Quertermous was born in Meade County, Ky., in 1841, to the union of John W. and Elizabeth (Roson) Quertermous, of Kentucky and Virginia birth, respectively. John W. Quertermous was born near Louisville, Ky., in 1796. They removed to Arkansas in 1859, and located in this county, where he died in 1867, and his wife four years later. The principal of this sketch was married in 1884 to Lillie Cannon, daughter of D. S. and Josephine Cannon. She died in 1885, and in October, 1888, Mr. Quertermous married a sister of his first wife, and who is the mother of one daughter. Mrs. Quertermous is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Her husband has always voted the Democratic ticket, and cast his first presidential vote for Greeley in 1872. He has been very successful in business; starting on a small capital, he now carries a stock of over $5,000, and has a trade which will aggregate $16,000 per annum.