Uncle Billy Lundy and his Super Sabre birthday
The War Between the States, aka the U.S. Civil War, aka the War of Southern Independence, et. al. saw nearly 3~ million men and boys (as well as a few women) called to the colors on both sides between 1861-65. These soldiers still endured as late as the 1950’s with their widows and surviving children still around and receiving pensions as late as 2011, nearly 150 years after the guns fell silent.
One of the more controversial last Confederate vets was “Uncle” Billy Lundy.
Supposedly born January 18, 1848 in Troy, Alabama, Lundy was 16 years old when he signed up with Brown’s Partisans, which was officially mustered in as Co. D, 4th Alabama Cavalry late in the war. The unit never left Coffee County and spent the last months of the war on Home Guard duty, which translated into guarding the court-house and patrolling for random Yankee horsemen and deserters. When the war ended, Lundy mustered out without ever “seeing the elephant.”
Later he moved to Crestview, Florida, just north of what is now Eglin AFB, and lived quietly, picking up a $600 per year military pension starting in 1941. At the time that was about $9800 adjusted for inflation. For the next fifteen years or so Lundy was the subject of magazine, newspaper and television stories, being one of the last Civil War vets on either side. He even outlived the last Union Army vet, who marched to far off drums in 1956.
On the occasion of his 107th birthday, Lundy visited Eglin to take in some of the new-fangled weapons of the day, which were much improved from the muskets, muzzle-loading shotguns and cap and ball pistols of the old grey-coat cavalry.
Photo taken in January,1955. Note with photos reads, “Celebrating his 107th birthday, Florida’s oldest living Civil War Veteran, Uncle Billy Lundy of Crestview, Florida prepares to board an Air Force plane at Eglin Air Force Base.” The jet is a F-100A Super Sabre, at the time the most shit-hot plane in the US arsenal, just having been adopted the year before and having set the the first supersonic world speed record of 822.135 mph.
Uncle Billy Lundy, Florida’s oldest living Confederate of the Civil War inspects some “new fangled artillery” while celebrating his 107th birthday at Eglin Air Force Base.” You have to love the old musket compared to an M3 and M1 (Courtesy Florida State Archives, Florida Memory Project, c023161, http://www.floridamemory.com)
Bill passed on September 1, 1957 at age 109 and is remembered in a monument in downtown Crestview, erected the next year. The year before he died, Congress presented him and the last three other surviving vets from the Civil War a special gold medal.
Uncle Billy’s marker today
As a sad postscript, Lundy’s service was discredited in the 1990s by historians who believed he actually was born in 1860 and only claimed veteran’s status after those old enough to know better were dead.
Did he serve? Did he make it up? Who really knows for absolute certainty. Either way, it’s an interesting story and photo shoot.
Film from that day (silent)