Newman J. Albright served the Confederate States as a private in Company I of the 48th Alabama Infantry during the American Civil War. He was severely wounded at the Battle of Chickamauga, Georgia on 19 September 1863 and had an arm amputated. Newman was furloughed and returned to rural Cleburne County, Alabama to trade his life as a militiaman for that of a farmer.

Newman began courting Miss S. Elizabeth Scott, a young woman in her mid-twenties who was the daughter of Jesse and Senia Scott. Newman served in the same unit as three of Elizabeth’s brothers: William Thomas Scott, Willis Lee Scott, and John Henry Scott. (See the Broken Unions series for their history.) On 21 December 1869, Newman was granted a license to marry Elizabeth by Probate Judge William Randolph Hunnicutt:

To any Minister of the Gospel, Judge or Justice lawfully authorized to celebrate the rites of Matrimony, you are hereby licensed to celebrate the rites of Matrimony between N. J. Albright + S. E. Scott and for So doing this Shall be your warrant. Given under my hand + seal this 21st day of Dec. in the year of our lord one thousand eight hundred and Sixty nine.

W R. Hunnicutt
Judge of Probate

By virtue of a license from the Judge of the Court of Probate of Said County, I have this day celebrated the Rites of Matrimony between N. J. Albright and S. E. Scott. Given under my hand this 28th day of December 1869.

J. W. Wiggonton, J. P.

The following week, after the Christmas holiday had passed, Newman and Elizabeth were married on 28* December 1869 by Justice of the Peace John W. Wiggonton, who had been Newman’s commanding officer during the war.

* The image above reads “28th” to me, but Ancestry.com has transcribed it as the 29th. Notice that the nine in 1869 looks nothing like the number alleged to be a nine. FamilySearch has transcribed the date as the 28th.

Bibliography

Ancestry.com. Alabama, U.S., Civil War Muster Rolls, 1861-1865 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Original data: Muster rolls of Alabama Civil War Units. SG025006-25100. Montgomery, Alabama: Alabama Department of Archives & History. Unit: Company I; Regiment: 48th Alabama Infantry

Ancestry.com, Alabama, County Marriage Records, 1805-1967 (Lehi, UT, USA, Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016), Ancestry.com, http://www.Ancestry.com, Record for S E Scott. https://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=61365&h=900152182&indiv=try.

“Alabama Marriages, 1816-1957”, database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FQVZ-FJL : 13 February 2020), N. J. Albright, 1869.