Howe, Chiliab Smith, 1809-1875.

Prominent members of the Howe family of Marengo County, Ala.; Okolona, Miss.; and Memphis, Tenn., included Chiliab Smith Howe (1809-1875), soldier, planter, and merchant; his wife, Julia Pickens Howe (1815-1898), daughter of U.S. congressman and Alabama governor Israel Pickens (1780- 1827); their daughters, Ellen (1839-1921), who married John Richardson (d. 1862), editor of the "Prairie News" and Confederate soldier; Laura (1841- 1927), who married J. Byrd Williams (d. 1864), merchant and Confederate soldier; and Joanna (fl. 1851-1899).

The chief figures in this collection are Chiliab Smith Howe (1809-1875), his wife Julia Pickens Howe (1815-1898), and their three daughters: Ellen (1839-1921), Laura (1841-1927), and Joanna (fl. 1851-1899).

Chiliab Smith Howe was born in Massachusetts in 1809. He attended grammar schools in Massachusetts and the U.S. Military Academy, graduating as a 2nd Lt. in 1829. He was assigned to duty in North Carolina and Tennessee in connection with the relocation of the Cherokee Indians. After leaving the army in 1838, he became a planter and settled first in Marengo County, Alabama, from 1838 to 1844, and then moved to Okolona, Mississippi, from 1844 to 1866. After the Civil War, he became a merchant in Memphis, Tennessee, from 1866 to 1875.

Julia Pickens Howe was the daughter of Israel Pickens (1780-1827) and Martha Patsy Lenoir (d. 1823). She married Chiliab Smith Howe at Fort Defiance, North Carolina, in 1836. Her father, Israel Pickens, was born in what is now Cabarrus County, North Carolina, and moved to Burke County, North Carolina. He graduated from Jefferson College at Canonsburg, Penn., in 1802, and practiced law in North Carolina. He was a member of the state senate in 1809; a Democratic member of the U.S. House of Representatives from North Carolina, March 1811 to March 1817; register of the Land Office of Mississippi Territory (Alabama), 1817 to 1821; and governor of Alabama, 1821 to 1825; and he filled the unfinished term of Henry Chambers in the U.S. Senate, February through November 1826. He died in 1827 and is buried near Greensboro in Hale County, Ala. Julia's mother, Martha Lenoir, was the daughter of General William Lenoir. After Martha's death in 1823, Julia was put in the care of her aunt, Eliza Mira Lenoir (1789-1835), who lived in Fort Defiance, N.C.

Ellen and Laura Howe, daughters of Julia and Chiliab, attended school in Aberdeen, Miss., and at the Columbia Female Institute in Columbia, Tenn. Laura married J. Byrd Williams (d. 1864), a merchant in Okolona, Miss. Williams enlisted in the Confederate army on 25 April 1861 in Okolona. He served as Captain of Company C, The Prairie Rifles, 11th Mississippi Infantry Regiment. He was promoted to Colonel of the 41st Mississippi Infantry Regiment and was killed at Jonesboro, Ga. Ellen married John Richardson (d. 1862), editor of The Prairie News of Okolona. He also enlisted in the Confederate army on 25 April 1861 in Okolona, served as 2nd Lieutenant in Company C, 11th Mississippi Infantry Regiment, was promoted to captain, Company L, 41st Mississippi Infantry Regiment, and was killed at Corinth, Miss.

After the Civil War, both Ellen and Laura taught school to support themselves. Both of them taught at different times at the Lamar Female Seminary in Paris, Texas. Laura eventually remarried, to a Mr. Stobaugh of Honey Grove in Paris. Jo Howe, the youngest of the three daughters, apparently remained single.