Kyle family.

Robert Benjamin (R.B.) Kyle was born 1826, May 24 at Leaksville, N.C. His father, James Kyle, died at Leaksville in 1836. In 1845, R. B. Kyle was hired as a clerk in the dry goods store of J. and J. Kyle and one year later was made a partner. In 1850 R. B. Kyle sold his interest and entered the wholesale grocery business under the firm of Grimes, Kyle and Thornton.

In 1853 Kyle moved to Cherokee County, Ala. and became a planter. Four years later he moved to Gadsden, Ala. where he became a merchant and banker.

In 1861, Kyle opened the first recruiting office in Ala. for enlistment into the regular army of the C.S.A. The following year, Kyle helped organize a company of volunteer infantry and was chosen 1st lieutenant. When the regiment was organized in Talladega, Kyle's company became Company A, 31st Ala. Infantry. Kyle was elected quartermaster and served in that post until his health failed, at which time he was sent to Columbus, Ga.

At the end of the war he returned to Gadsden where he helped with the construction of a railroad. In 1870 he started a sawmill that operated until 1912. In 1887, Kyle and his son-in-law James M. Elliot, started the Elliot Car Company. Kyle was president of the Gadsden Land and Improvement Company, he was the first mayor of Gadsden and was a member of the 1901 Constitutional Convention. He died in Gadsden in 1922, January.

Thomas Stonewall (T. S.) Kyle was R. B. Kyle's son. T. S. Kyle was vice president of the First National Bank of Gadsden and Secretary-Treasurer of the Kyle Lumber Company.

Robert Bartlett (R. B.) Kyle, Jr. was R. B. Kyle's grandson. R. B. Kyle, Jr., served as an officer with the American Expeditionary Force during WWI and was a Lt. Col. of Field Artillery with the Ala. State Militia under Gov. Bibb Graves.