William R. Peck - Submitted for the USGenWeb by Richard P. Sevier 2/22/2011

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William R. Peck - Madison Parish, Louisiana

From The Monroe Daily Telegraph, January 27, 1871

Our entire community will learn with unaffected regret, of the sudden and unexpected death of that gallant soldier and true hearted gentleman, General William R. Peck. This sad event occurred at 8 o'clock yesterday morning, at the late residence of the General in Madison parish, La., and was, we learn, produced by a congestive chill.

General Peck was about forty- seven years of age (actually 53), and was possessed of as many noble and generous qualities as usually fall to the lot of man. He was widely known, and where he was known the best, he was most highly esteemed and warmly beloved. He has hosts of friends to whom his high qualities had endeared him, and his death will produce a pang in many hearts now widely scattered.

General Peck was born in East Tennessee, but his boyhood was spent in this city, with his elder brother, Dr. Peck. When he arrived at manhood, he removed to the parish of Madison, La., where, with the energy peculiar to him, he engaged in planting. His success as a planter was signal and brilliant, and a few years saw him the master of a fortune, which his own judgment and industry had accumulated.

A Democrat in politics, he took an active part in the political struggles of the day, and on several occasions was chosen by the people to represent Madison parish in the Legislature of Louisiana, where his excellent sense, sound judgment, genial manners and generous impulses, gave him a commanding influence. He had been warmly recommended for the office of Chief Magistrate of Louisiana, and but for the occurrence of the war, we doubt not that he would long since have been chosen the Governor of that great State.

When hostilities between the North and the South commenced, he saw plainly what duty required, and like the brave gentleman he was, he prepared to tread in its thorny path. He raised a company of volunteers, of which he was unanimously chosen Captain, and his company was assigned to Colonel (subsequently Lieutenant-General) Richard Taylor, as a portion of the 9th Regiment. How he discharged the duties of a soldier, we all know. He rose to the Colonelcy (sic) of his regiment, became a Brig.-General, and if the war had lasted three months longer, would have worn the rank and title of a Major General.

Distinguished for personal gallantry in the army, that of Northern Virginia, where personal gallantry was the rule, his tall form and Herculean proportions made him concpicuous (sic) on every battle-field, and his plume, like that of Henry of Navarre, was always in the lead, and in the thickest of the fight.

To his old comrades in arms, the intelligence of his death will come with the force of a personal bereavement, and there is not one who shared with him the dangers and the glories of the campaigns of Gen. Lee, who will not drop a tear to the memory of General William R. Peck, as brave a soldier, and as generous a gentleman, as ever wore a sword, or bestrode a horse. Peace to the memory of the gallant dead.