Lifelong echoes of the Civil War: Glimpses of Greenville with John Nolan (2024)

Washington Boazeman was born in 1841 in Newberry County, South Carolina, to Cooper and Cathrine Boazeman.

For the next 20 years, he lived a relatively normal life until the event that disrupted everyone in the United States – war between the North and South. Boazeman heeded the call to join the Confederate cause and served in Gen. Wade Hampton III’s famous Hampton’s Legion in Company G of the 2nd South Carolina Cavalry Regiment.

Reflecting on his service in The Greenville News interviews, he said: “I was in many battles, fights, and skirmishes during the war, but Gettysburg was the greatest circus of all. It was there and then we kept it up from bad to worse for three days and nights, fighting man to man. I well remember that on the (first) day of the fight, July 3rd, it seemed to me that earth, heaven and that other place had all come to a general smash-up. I was mighty scared at times for men and horses on both sides that were falling thick and fast. I stayed on the battlefield all night and gave water to the dying and wounded soldiers. It was after the battle of Gettysburg, after we had been fighting all day as hard as we could fight. I shall never forget the time.”

Shortly after surviving Gettysburg, Boazeman was captured near Culpeper Court House in September 1863 and was a prisoner of war for more than a year before being exchanged in late 1864. When the war ended, he returned to South Carolina with other survivors. However, while most transitioned back to their former livelihoods and family life, for Boazeman the war never seemed to end. Beyond the mental trauma of war, he also dealt with near deafness and a crippled leg. For the next 49 years, he would wear his Confederate uniform every day until he died at the Confederate Soldiers Home in Columbia in 1914.

Boazeman spent most of the years after the war in Greenville under the generous patronage of Arthur Gower on McBee Avenue. Gower let Boazeman live on his property and do odd jobs while living in a wooden shanty. He was apparently mentally disabled, perhaps the result of the trauma of battle or from a head wound. His spirit of inquiry and invention, however, were never deterred. Boazeman was constantly tinkering with materials and trying to find creative ways to make everyday tasks and products more useful or efficient. Among the curiosities he assembled were burglar-proof door locks, a hand-plow for removing mud from street crossings, a novelty foot-pedal-driven fly fan, and a multiuse convertible piece of furniture.

Beyond tinkering, whenever a war-related event was held, Boazeman was sure to participate. He proudly served as the flag bearer in annual birthday celebrations of Robert E. Lee hosted by the Daughters of the Confederacy. At funerals of men buried with military honors, he would play his bugle. In Memorial Day processions, he was seen limping along the street pushing a small cannon before him. Sometimes he’d fire it at night and wake up the town in salute to honor some great Confederate man’s birthday. Whether the occasion was a formal remembrance ceremony or

not, he could always be seen wearing his tattered, gray war uniform, holstered pistol, canteen and Confederate flag. On his daily walks of Main Street, locals could observe him changing directions by enacting the formal military marching maneuvers. Murmurs of damnation against Yankees could also frequently be heard in his company.

Greenville has had its share of people walking its streets with memorable personalities and characteristics, and Boazeman was no exception. Local author C.A. David said of him in 1927, “At one time no one here was better known, and of all the familiar figures on the streets, he was the one oftenest in evidence.”

John M. Nolan is owner of Greenville History Tours (greenvillehistorytours.com) and author of “A Guide to Historic Greenville, SC” and “Lost Restaurants of Greenville, SC.”