James Fowler Pressley, Age 19

Pressley Family Cemetery, Williamsburg County, South Carolina

James Fowler Pressley was the uncle and namesake of Col. James Fowler Pressley, M. D., of Civil War fame.

John Gotea Pressley, another nephew who wrote the family history, reports:

James Fowler Pressley...married Eliza Dick (daughter of John Dick and Janet Dick his wife). He died before he settled on a place of his own. He lived during his short married life with his and his wife’s parents. He was quite young when his life was ended.

James Fowler Pressley and Eliza Pressley, his wife, had a daughter, Mary James Fowler Pressley, born after the death of her father. Her story is as poignant as that of her father.

The age on the tombstone, has been misreported in the past as “49 years….” I have examined the original stone in the Pressley Family Cemetery, both visually and by touch, and there is no question that the correct number, still cleanly and clearly carved, is 19. (The photo here is a closeup I took once I realized the error.) Both James’s epitaph and John Gotea Pressley's description further confirm this age.