Youngblood-Armstrong & Allied Families
most prominent men in Birmingham, being President of a bank, Founder of the Boys Club and a leader in civic affairs. All four sons died without heirs.
For several years William Youngblood's mother had planned to go to Texas to visit her oldest daughter, Jane, who after the death of her husband, Thomas Fielder, had married Rev. J. W. Williams, a Baptist Minister, and was living in Caldwell. She also wished to see her brother, Dr. John Johns, a physician, who lived in Caldwell as she had not seen him since before the Civil War. While she was visiting these members of her family in the Lone Star State, she passed away and was buried in the cemetery at Caldwell in 1878.
Now there was left at the old home place only William Youngblood and his father upon whom the years were beginning to tell. He survived his wife by only a few years and was buried in the cemetery at Union Springs, Oct. 20, 1884.
Relatives and neighbors in Bullock County have said that William Youngblood was a devoted son and brother, placing the well being and happiness of his parents and sisters before his own. Dr. Frank B. Webb, a Presbyterian Minister in Union Springs, told the Youngblood daughters of their father's sacrifices for the comforts of members of his family. He also told them that he was considered a confirmed old bachelor in the community whose only interest was caring for his loved ones. This was unquestionably correct for William Youngblood was about forty years old before he thought seriously of marriage for himself.
Years later when asked by one of his children if it was true that he was forty years old before he married he replied, "My child, no man is ever forty until AFTER he has married." This remark ended all discussion in the family circle from that day forward as to his marriage age.
For many years, William Youngblood and Col. James Francis Armstrong had been close friends and he was a frequent visitor to the Armstrong plantation located near Mathews, in Bullock County. Col. Armstrong had only one living daughter, Fannie, who was the adored member of the family. Her mother died at the time of her birth and all of her relatives, including her stepmother, had succeeded in spoiling her greatly. She had lived with her Grandmother Edna until her father's re-marriage and she was old enough to start to school. Certainly Grandmother Edna contributed her share to the indulging of the motherless little girl, as evidenced by a story whichhas been handed down in the family.
When Fannie was quite small she begged to go home with some visiting cousins to spend the night. Her grandmother re-
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