My Genealogy Hound

Wm. Farley, a well known farmer of Smith County, was born in 1818, in Goochland County, Va. He is one of a family of five children born to Roley and Mary (Radford) Farley. The father was born in Amhurst County, Va. about 1790, and came to Tennessee in 1835. He worked at his carpenter trade at Dixon Springs and Carthage. He died at Botten Bend of Caney Fork. The mother was also a native of Virginia. She died in 1837 near Dixon Springs, Smith County, Tenn. The subject of this sketch had but meager educational advantages. He attended school a short time at Chapel Hill. At the age of fourteen he was thrown upon his own resources. The following six years he was employed at various places in the neighborhood, going wherever he could get work of any kind. At twenty years of age he was elected constable of Carthage, District No. 1. He served in this capacity for six years, after which he purchased a farm on Bluff Creek, where he lived for several years. Later he bought the farm situated three miles northeast of Carthage, where he now resides. He married in 1844, Mary, daughter of Logan D. and Polly Key, who lived on Peyton Creek. This union resulted in the birth of four children: John E.; Mary, wife of William Bryant; Virginia, wife of John Ford, and William, deceased. Mrs. Farley died in 1850. Mr. Farley married the second time to Jane, daughter of Allen and Patsy (Stanford) Robinson, who was born in 1835. The fruits of this union were nine children, of whom but four are living: Andrew Johnson, Morris Brown, Alice (wife of Thomas J. Carter), and Leroy Cage. Our subject enlisted in the Confederate service, Company A, Forty-fourth Tennessee Regiment, at Carthage. At the battle of Shiloh he was wounded by a minie-ball, in the thigh. He received his discharge in 1862, in Tennessee, since which time he has been prosperously engaged in tilling the soil where he is at present living. He was cast off from home a penniless, mere boy, but by hard and diligent work, he has been able to accumulate considerable good property, although the war was the means of him losing about half of his possessions. His farm contains 400 acres, the bottom land of which is well cultivated. Mr. Farley is a Democrat, casting his first presidential vote for James K. Polk in 1844. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity, Car lodge, No. 14. Mrs. Farley and Morris B. are connected with the Methodist Episcopal Church, and A. J. is a Missionary Baptist.