John Rawls

John Rawls

• John Rawls married Caroline (?)
• John Rawls died circa 1846.
• The following appeared on 17 March 1882 in Georgia Weekly Telegraph: . . . Similar to this was my feeling in Rose Hill Cemetery when I came to read the inscription to the memory of: Caroline Matilda, Wife of Philemon Tracy, and Daughter of John and Caroline Rawls, Born December 16th, 1833, Died March 3d, 1858. Her Infant Sleeps Beside Her. . . . /P/ As stated in the inscription, Mrs. Tracy was the daughter of John and Caroline Rawls. The father, John Rawls, was a wealthy planter, having large estates in the counties of Pulaski and Baker. He, together with James Everett and Hartwell Tarver, owned much of their property in common, and so acted in concert that the name of one suggested the other. Jointly or severally they had a financial status in commercial circles such as was seldom enjoyed by planters. Mr. Rawls died while the oldest of his children had not emerged from the condition of childhood. There were three of them and he left property enough to make his widow and each of his children wealthy. Mrs Tracy was the middle one in point of age. She soon grew to womanhood and was marked for her beauty, grace and amiability. She was known as Miss Carrie Rawls, and was one of the belles of Macon. . . /P/ She first married Willie Walker, a very bright, talented and fascinating young man, the "first born" of Mrs. Governor H. V. Johnson. Their married life did not reach beyond a long honeymoon, when Walker died. She then married Philemon Tracy, a companion of her childhood, but a little her senior, and the duration of her married life was only another long honeymoon, when death "stole her awya," and all, (as will be seen by the inscription) happened before she had attained her twenty-fifty year. In a little more than four years therefrom, her handsome, brilliant and brave young husband, as Major Tracy of the Sixth Georgia Regiment (Colquitt Brigade) received his death wound on the fatal field of Sharpsburg. And thus poor Phil after "laying his darling down to sleep," with her baby "beside her," gave his own life for his country. Of him and her and their posterity, not one is left to tell the sad story of their early marriage and early death. . . .

• Last Edited: 16 Jul 2008