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In the autumn of 1862 he enlisted as a private in the Twenty-seventh Massachusetts
Volunteer Infantry, and for the next year and a half he was in active service, part of the time
in North Carolina under General Foster, and part of the time in Virginia. In April, 1864,
he was commissioned second lieutenant in the First United States Volunteers, and in July
of the same year was promoted to first lieutenant in the same regiment. He served in the
Northwest and on the Kansas frontier, and was actively engaged in protecting the line of
frontier settlements from the Indians. In May, 1866, Williams was commissioned in the
regular army, and not long after was ordered, with his company, to the Southwest, where,
erelong, a vigorous campaign was in progress against the Apaches and other savage tribes.
In September, 1867, in the vicinity of the upper waters of the Arkansas River, a small force
of sixty-four men was assailed by a band of four hundred Cheyennes. The coolness and
discipline of the trained soldiers won the day, but in the course of the engagement Captain
Williams was severely wounded and lost a leg. For "coolness, bravery, and good conduct,"
he was brevetted captain, and not long after was put upon the retired list with the rank of
captain.
From 1869 to 1871 Captain Williams was professor of Greek and Latin in Norwich
University, Northfield, Vermont. In 1878 he received the degree of B.A. from our college,
also the degree of M.A. from Williams and Norwich University. After resigning his
professorship at the university he lived in retirement, spending his summers at his old home
in Deerfield, and his winters in St. Augustine, Florida. Though he suffered much from the
effects of his wound, he was always cheerful and hopeful. He never married, but lived for
the larger part of the year at the family homestead in Deerfield with a sister, Miss Eliza D.
Williams. During the last eight or nine years of his life he was one of the trustees of
Dickinson Academy, at Deerfield. One pays this tribute to him: "He was a most sincere
man, loving, gentle; was fond of books and of his home, and was as well known in St.
Augustine as in Deerfield, and as greatly respected." He kept in close touch with his army
comrades, especially those of his old regiment. He died at his Deerfield home November
4, 1902.
Source:
Class of Sixty-Three Williams College Fortieth Year Report, by
the Class Historian, Thomas Todd Printer, Boston, 1903
Williams
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