Charles S. DECK, a
prominent citizen of New Burnside, Johnson County, was born at Dayton,
Ohio, in 1846, to John Deck, a Pennsylvanian, and a
carriage and wagon maker by trade, who came to Illinois, locating at
Olney, Richland County, when Charles S. was eleven years old. He died
away from home, having gone away with a drove of horses, and his widow
married again and is now the wife of A. E. Banks, living near Olney. At
the age of sixteen Charles S. Deck enlisted in the Twenty-ninth
Illinois Infantry, and was in Gen. Logan's command for a time, serving
through the war and being wounded
twice, though not seriously.
Our subject was married
to Mrs. B. R. Byrne, formerly Miss Maggie Ellsworth, a cousin of Col.
Ellsworth, who was shot down at Alexandria, Va., early
in the war. Mrs. Deck was born in Indiana and was left an orphan at
five years of age, but was reared by Thomas DuPoyster in Illinois and
Tennessee and
was first married in Dyersburgh, Dyer County, Tenn., in 1852, when she
was fifteen years old, to B. R. Byrne, to whom she bore ten children,
nine sons
and one daughter. They lived in Tennessee, Missouri and Kentucky, and
he died in the latter State, in Blandville, Ballard County, at the age
of fifty-four
years, leaving her in comfortable circumstances. She was married to her
present husband, Mr. Deck, in 1875, at Ullin, Pulaski County, this
State, and as
a result of this union there was born one son, Charles H., who died at
two years of age. Six of Mrs. Deck's sons are still living: John P.,
assistant
superintendent of the Oxley Stave Company, of Poplar Grove, Mo., who
has a wife and five children; E. D., a young man living at Tupelo,
Miss., where
he is foreman in a large spoke factory; A. J., unmarried and living at
Meridian, Miss., Yardmaster of a railroad; L. N., living at Thornton,
Calhoun County,
Ark., who is married, and is a master mechanic in a large sawmill;
George B., a traveling agent for the Camden (Ark.) Stave Factory, a
single man; and
Joseph E., in a wholesale hardware store in Cairo, with J. B. Reed.
While these men in their youth received but a limited education, yet
they are bright,
active and successful business men. Mrs. Deck came to New Burnside from
Cairo in February, 1891.
Our subject has been
greatly prospered and has bought the fine large house in which he
lives, together with thirty-five acres of land under cultivation.
He
has been in business in the South not far from Natchez, engaged in the
manufacture of lumber and shingles, and in merchandising. He is a Mason
and an
Odd Fellow, and a Republican of the straightest sort.
Our subject's home has
been recently visited by the Grim Messenger Death, the faithful and
devoted wife departing this life January 6,1893. She was a
zealous worker with her husband in the Missionary Baptist Church, and
her death is mourned by a host of friends and relatives, who deeply syrmpathize
with Mr. Deck in his bereavement.