My great great grandfather was a man named CC Phillips, or Christopher Columbus Phillips. I am pretty sure we are not related to the famous explorer Columbus, however. [History now indicates Columbus was not really the discoverer of America but was a racist jerk - read more here...]
No, Grandaddy Phillips was, according to Find A Grave:
"...a pioneer builder of this town and throughout his life held a position of one of the leaders in all community activities. He was a deacon in the Acworth Baptist church and a Christian gentleman. He is survived by his wife, Mrs. Nannie A. Phillips; and four daughters, Mrs. R.E. Butler of Marietta; Miss Alma Phillips, Mrs. M.A. Goodwin and Miss Mildred Phillips, of Acworth."
He was in the Civil War. He was a Private in COMPANY A (ACWORTH INFANTRY), 18TH REGIMENT,GEORGIA VOLUNTEER INFANTRY, ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA, C.S.A. Mom remembers seeing his uniform and sword, passed down through the family.
I grew up being told the Civil War was "the War Between the States." Southerners have long memories. I was born in 1962, more than 100 years after the War started.
My grandmother [C.C. Phillips' granddaughter Wilma] was joking around with her brother-in-law once when he was examining Grandaddy Phillips' Civil War sword. Harvey was from Boston Massachusetts. He said "Your sword here has a bunch of nicks in it."
Mamaw replied "Every one of them came from cutting a Yankee head off."
Now whether that was true, who knows. Doubtful. I think she just said it to rile him.
Anyway, back to C.C. Phillips. After the war he became a successful businessman and raised four daughters. His daughter Mildred never married. She wanted to marry, but her father disapproved of the match, so she just never married anyone. Instead, she became a career woman, at a time when that was unusual. Mother described Mildred as "a wild Indian." Mother said "He had every man his four daughters dated or got serious about investigated by a detective. He told Mildred the man ran around and slept with whores and had VD. I think he just said that to keep her from marrying. That was probably not true. Grandaddy was a snob. So Mildred said if she couldn't marry the man she loved she'd never marry at all, and she didn't. She was very smart. She was well-educated, for that time. She worked. One of her jobs was as a detective - don't know for whom. She was undercover. Mother and the sisters would talk about it and purse their mouths and roll their eyes. They didn't know where Mildred worked. She was a tall, broad woman with bright red hair.
Daddy donated blood to her after an accident. Mildred was about to die. They had the same type blood. It was very rare. They joked about it for years - he said she we're related now. You've got my blood." [Of course, they were related by marriage because he was married to Mildred's niece. "Daddy" refers to Bob Hasty, Mom's daddy and my grandfather.]
My grandfather's blood type was so rare that Atlanta hospitals used to call him to come donate when there was an accident. "They got him out of bed at 3 a.m. from time to time, to come to the hospital. He felt he had no choice to go and donate." Mamaw wasn't too crazy about him being pulled out of bed at all hours but he felt it was his duty.
I wrote a short story recently about C.C.'s daughter Beulah Phillips Butler, a fictional story but based loosely on her life. After I finished it I thought to myself, I will never run out of things to write about, because just the family stories are a wealth of material...
