Following is one of the Biographies and Stories which where gathered by Charles Sumner McKamy in the 1950s for publication in a Crawford County History Book. Unfortunately he passed away before the book was published.
Charles Sumner McKamy, son of William and Mary Ann (Maxwell) McKamy, born near Flat Rock, Ill., August 2, 1877. My Father came form Maryville, Tenn. To Crawford County, Ill. in 1860, where he engaged in farming and Saw Milling near Flat Rock and at the outbreak of the civil war he enlisted in Co. "E", 98th Ill. Vol. Inf. Participating in the Battle of Chickamauga where he was wounded. He served three years and was mustered out at Springfield.
After attending common schools I had the further advantage of attending Robinson High School, then a year at Danville (Ind.) at the State Normal and one year at the State Normal at Valparaiso, Ind. where I graduated in the Bookkeeping and shorthand and typewriting courses, after which I became the private stenographer of the Hon. William C. Jones until 1898, when Judge Jones was appointed Judge of the Court of Claims under Gov. Tanner who appointed me as the Official Court of Claims Stenographer. After serving for three years I returned to Robinson and embarked on my own account in the Abstracting, Loan and Insurance business in 1902 and at the same time was elected a Justice of the Peace and in April 1905 I was re-elected and in 1907 I was appointed Assistant Postmaster at Robinson where I served three years.
March 1st, 1901 I was married to Maude Estella Berry, who was a graduate of the Robinson High School and had taught in the grade schools in the county for some three years, to which union was born one daughter, Frances Estella, on Aug. 10, 1905, and departed this life on Aug. 10, 1915.
Soon after the death of our daughter we adopted two children, one a girl, Betty Lois and the other, a boy, William James, both married and Betty has three boys living in Robinson and William with his wife Adele with a boy, Georgie, and a girl, Vickey, live in St. Louis, Mo.
My Father and Mother moved to Duncanville when I was about three months of age, where they had erected a nice home (which is now owned by Dr. H.R. Dennis). Father having purchased ten town lots in Duncanville, on which he had moved the Saw Mill from the Hervey Rickey farm, where I was born, to two of the vacant lots just across the street from the new home in Duncanville, where we lived until I was eight years of age, after which my parents traded the Duncanville property to Mrs. Lucy Duncan for her home and 60 acres of land and purchased forty acres adjoining the sixty acres where we brothers, myself and John, got our first experience in farming, attending grade school in Brown District, walking more than a mile each way over yellow clay roads morning and evening each day.
We worked hard on the farm during the summer months and went to school in the winter doing farm chores mornings and evenings, but all in all we really enjoyed farm life and our parents planned so we could have good wholesome recreation. When we were fifteen and seventeen years of age they took us on a trip by train to visit the Chickamauga Battle Field adjoining Chattanooga, Tenn., round trip railroad fare from Robinson $10.50 and we had accompanying is William Hope and J. William Jones, who were on the battle field with father at the time he was wounded near where Widow Glenn’s house stood at the time, now marked in the battlefield with a monument. Mr. Hope and Mr. Jones could point out the location near the Glenn House where father was shot with a Minnie ball in he battle, the bullet going through the head and shoulder, after which he lay unconscious for more than two weeks and the rebels thinking he would die they exchanged him for a confederate soldier and he was later brought back to Illinois. This was a wonderful trip, we went up on top of Lookout Mountain and Missionary Ridge and to the Home Place of my father’s family before the war. In the Battle where father was wounded William A. Hope was taken prisoner and placed in the Andersonville Prison. Mr. Jones, Mr. Hope and my Father were in Wilders Brigade in this War and all came home and lived for several years.
To those who visit the Chickamauga Battlefield near Chattanooga, Tenn. They will see the largest monument on the battlefield Park labeled the Wilders Brigade for which my Father served as Secretary in its erection. My father made several trips to Chattanooga, taking the family along twice during its erection and needless to say that I and my family visit that Park very time we go south, as well as stopping at Missionary Ridge Battlefield. And we visit Dalton, Ga. which is close to the home place of my Father and his family before the war.
Our family left the farm, building a home in Robinson (now occupied by Roscoe Keenan and wife), in order that we might be close to High School but Father only lived about six months after which Mother, John and myself moved back to the farm.