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Below is a family biography included in Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Chicot County, Arkansas published by Goodspeed Publishing Company in 1890.  These biographies are valuable for genealogy research in discovering missing ancestors or filling in the details of a family tree. Family biographies often include far more information than can be found in a census record or obituary.  Details will vary with each biography but will often include the date and place of birth, parent names including mothers' maiden name, name of wife including maiden name, her parents' names, name of children (including spouses if married), former places of residence, occupation details, military service, church and social organization affiliations, and more.  There are often ancestry details included that cannot be found in any other type of genealogical record.

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Henry F. Clark is of Scotch-Irish extraction, and is a man who has lived an energetic and useful life, acquiring thereby a prominent place among the progressive farmers of Chicot County, Ark. He was born in Hinds County, Miss., October 23, 1835, and is a son of Archibald Clark, a native of North Carolina, whose birth occurred in the year 1807. He was also a farmer by occupation, and, at the-time of his death, in 1863, he was a prominent member of the Baptist Church, and a Master Mason. He was an Old Line Whig in politics, and died in Meridian, Miss. His wife, Nancy A. (McGraw) Clark, was born in Wilkinson County, Miss., in 1812, of Scotch parents, and died, in Hinds County, Miss., in 1876. Their marriage took place in Wilkinson County, Miss, in 1829, and the result of their union was a family of ten children: Angus Marion (a banker of Fresno, Cal.), Melissa E. (the widow of Judge J. F. Lowry, of Corsicana, Tex.), Henry F., and Nancy A. (wife of J. B. Robertson, a farmer of Hinds County, Miss.), are the only ones living. Those deceased are: Susan E. (wife of John McDonald), Flora P., John H., James W., Baldwin H. and Robert H., the last four dying in Hinds County, Miss. Henry F. Clark’s youth was spent in this county and State, and here he received the advantages of the common schools, and commenced life for himself at the age of twenty years, as a farmer and overseer, but as early as 1859, he removed to Arkansas, but after remaining one year returned to Mississippi. In 1869 he returned to Arkansas, and settled in Chicot County, near his present place of abode, and here he has followed the occupation of farming ever since, being the owner of 120 acres of good land, seventy-five of which are under cultivation, all well adapted to raising corn and cotton. In 1861 Mr. Clark enlisted in the Confederate army, in Company G, Eighteenth Mississippi Volunteer Infantry, Col. Burt Barksdale’s brigade, Longstreet’s corps, and was in the battles of Manassas, all the preliminary battles around Richmond, both battles of Fredericksburg, Sharpsburg, Ball’s Bluff, Gettysburg, where he was wounded in the right shoulder by a minieball, which disabled him from further service. He had the ball extracted from his shoulder in 1878, having carried it for fifteen years. He is an uncompromising Democrat, sincerely interested in the success of tariff reform, and he and Mrs. Clark are active workers in the Presbyterian Church. They are charitable, to the extent of their ability, and are highly honored residents of the county. They were married, in Chicot County, Ark., October 22, 1874, his wife being Mrs. Isalba (Heard) McDermott, a native of Mississippi, and the daughter of Dr. Heard, an eminent physician and surgeon. Their union has been blessed in the birth of the following children: Frank L. and Allie M. (who died in 1880, at the age of three years). Mrs. Clark has three children by her first husband, Benjamin S. McDermott, who died in 1871, their names being Mabel R. (wife of W. D. Trotter, a merchant at Dermott), Matt A., also a merchant there), and Lizzie L. (wife of Burns Mason, a farmer of Chicot County).

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This family biography is one of 34 biographies included in Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Chicot County, Arkansas published in 1890.  For the complete description, click here: Chicot County, Arkansas History, Genealogy, and Maps

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