"OLD CITIZEN DEAD"

Mr. Ben Garrett died at his home at South Bend on Flint River in the first district last Friday morning at 11 o'clock and was buried at Antioch Church, Woodbury, Saturday morning. Uncle Ben, as he was generally known, was 82 years of age and was one of the old settlers of the county. He was well known, was an honest man, harmless and kindhearted. For several years he has been quite feeble and had become nearly blind.

When the Confederate war broke out, Uncle Ben, then 57 years old, was among the first to volunteer and left Greenville on the 18th of May, 1861, with the Echols Guards, the first company that left Meriwether. The Guards formed Company D of the famous 8th Georgia Regiment. The company participated in the first great fight at Manassas Junction, Uncle Ben going all through that bloody day's engagement. He used to describe the balls as flying round his head thick as gnats. The hardship and exposures of camp life and his extreme age induced Dr. H. V. M. Miller, surgeon of the brigade, to send Uncle Ben home after a term of honorable service. The old man was always at his post and never shirked any duty. He was a general favorite and his quaint expressions were quoted all through the army of Virginia. Indeed his saying that the campaign would only be a "rat killing" found its way into the Northern army.

A few weeks ago the old man started to Newman to the old soldier reunion but was compelled to turn back on account of extreme feebleness. He took his bed on reaching home from which he never arose. In his later years he became a member of the Methodist church at Concord and died of a blessed immortality.