John W. Parker, Jr. M.D.
Since his honorable discharge from army duty as specialist in gastrointestinal diseases at the Base Hospital at Camp Wadsworth, Doctor Parker has located at Greenville and now gives all his time to his specialty, in which he is one of the foremost authorities in South Carolina. Doctor Parker has practiced medicine in this state since graduating from the University of Maryland.
He was born at Durham, North Carolina, April 16, 1880, a son of John W. and Jane (Lunsford) Parker of Durham. He grew up in the famous tobacco city, was educated in Rutherford College and the University of North Carolina, and did his work in preparation for the medical profession at the University of Maryland where he graduated in 1905. The first three years he practiced in Lee County, South Carolina, and from that time until 1914 at Williamston in Anderson County. He had become well established in his profession at Greenville when the World War came on, and he volunteered his services in the Medical Reserve Corps. Upon being taken into the National army he was assigned to duty as specialist in gastro-intestinal diseases at the Base Hospital at Camp Wadsworth, Spartanburg, and was on continuous duty there from January 3rd until September 8, 1918.
Doctor Parker has specialized for a number of years in gastro-intestinal diseases, and his skill and success have brought him well deserved recognition from the medical profession. He has every advantage bestowed by experience, personal skill and complete facilities. These facilities in his fine suite of offices in the Wallace Building at Greenville include the latest Bellevue Model X-Ray machine of the Woppler Electric Company.
Doctor Parker is a member of the County, State and American Medical Associations. He married Miss Andrina Anderson of Anderson County, a daughter of George W. and Narcissa (Nesbitt) Anderson. George W. Anderson was born in Greenville County, South Carolina, March 7, 1828. He was the son of John Anderson, a native of Ireland, who came to America with his parents, Thomas and Nancy (Ewing) Anderson, in his childhood and settled in Greenville, Greenville County, where he died in 1837. Of ten children living at the time of John Anderson's death, Major Anderson and his sister are the only ones surviving. Thomas and Nancy Anderson, the grandparents, spent the remainder of their lives in Greenville County, the latter living to be nearly 100 years old. The mother of Major Anderson was Mary Terry, who survived her husband a great many years, dying at the age of seventy. Four sons of John and Mary Anderson served in the Confederate army; James, John, David and George W. James died in 1863 from sickness contracted in the service; John was captured at the fall of Petersburg and died from the effects of his treatment on the boat while on his way to Charleston to be released; David survived the war and farmed in Alabama until his death in 1896. George W. was educated chiefly at the Cokesbury High School. He taught for one year in Alabama, but began a mercantile business in Laurens County, South Carolina, in 1851. For several years before the war he was a major in the state militia, commanding the upper squadron of the Tenth Regiment of cavalry. In the fall of 1863 he entered the army as a private in Company K, Seventh South Carolina Regiment of cavalry, commanded by Col. A. C. Haskell, and served with it to the close of the war. He was in the battles of Drewry's Bluff, and shortly afterward detailed as a courier for Gen. G. T. Beauregard, serving as such for some time, after which he returned to his command, and participated in the battle of the Crater. He was present at Lee's surrender at Appomattox. Major Anderson located in Williamston, South Carolina, in 1868. As a merchant after the war he was very successful. He was a very active and loyal churchman and at that time when prohibition was very unpopular, he took a strong stand in support of it and was instrumental in the publication of a prohibition paper. To the poor and needy he was unusually kind and generous. He was married February 21, 1860, to Miss Nancy Narcissa Nesbitt, who survived him nine years, and died November 27, 1901, leaving seven children, four sons and three daughters. Her maternal ancestry includes the notable Nesbitt family of Spartanburg County. She is a granddaughter of James Nesbitt and a great-granddaughter of Jonathan Nesbitt of Spartanburg County. Jonathan Nesbitt was a Revolutionary hero. At the battle of Cowpens the breech of his gun was shot off by enemy fire. He was participant in a number of other battles in North Carolina, and at his death was buried with military honors in old Nazareth Presbyterian Church in Spartanburg County. The Nesbitts were among the founders of this historic congregation. They had located in Upper South Carolina a number of years before the Revolutionary war and represented some of the finest of the Scotch-Irish stock in that vicinity. One of the prominent members of the family was Col. Wilson Nesbitt, who was a member of Congress in 1817-18, and had in this and otherwise a brilliant career. He married Miss Susan Tyler DuVal of Washington, District of Columbia, and he died at Montgomery, Alabama, to which place he had removed from Spartanburg County later in life.
The two children of Doctor and Mrs. Parker are: Andrina Anderson Parker and John W. Parker, III.
[History of South Carolina, Volume 3 Edited by Yates Snowden and Harry Gardner Cutler, 1920 – Transcribed by AFOFG] |
