Henry Dukes

Prior to the end of the Civil War the south, in it's efforts to replenish it's dwindling forces, the Confederate Army drafted men from it's jails and prisons. Henry Dukes was serving a sentence in the penitentiary in Wetumpka, Coosa County, Alabama, when he was drafted into the military.

Henry Dukes entered the Confederate Army in Coosa County, Alabama on August 7, 1863 by Captain J. D. Hastings. In the Confederate records he was in Company I, 61st Alabama Infantry. His military records also show that he was in the hospital in Richmond, Virginia for 45 days at Receiving and Wayside Hospital or General Hospital #9 on September 3, 1864.

The following was found in an old letter about Henry Dukes:
There was a man who was a peddler that came through and was killed. The peddler was buried somewhere near Haigwood Cemetery. People though Henry Dukes and his Daddy killed him. They were sent up to the pen for the murder. They were taken out of the pen to fight in the Civil War. Henry and his father were killed at the battle of Chattanooga.

I have also heard that Henry was actually listed as Missing in Action during the battle and that his body was never found. It is also said that he ran off from the war and returned to Jackson County and that he is buried in the woods behind his old home place.

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