Can You Help? William Bonner, killed during the Civil War, is the Collaborative Profile of the Week

Question

The Civil War Project and Collaborative Profile of the Week present

William Bonner (1837-c.1862)

Today is Memorial Day in the United States. We remember and honor the men and women who died serving in the countries' armed forces. William Bonner fought and died during the Civil War.

 

1. William is a blank slate. Can we find enough information on his parents to create profiles?
2. Can he be connected to the rest of WikiTree?
3. Was he married? Did he leave children?
4. He was only alive about 25 years, so there is probably not a lot of information. Can our WikiTree Civil War experts elaborate on his military activities?

It’s helpful to the collaboration and to save duplication of work if you post an answer here before working on some aspect of the profile. But please feel free to simply add to the profile whatever you’ve found out with it’s source.

US Civil War Project

While the Revolutionary War formed our Nation, the Civil War tore it apart resulting in the death of more than 620,000, with millions more injured. The mission of the U.S. Civil War Project is to honor those who fought in that horrendous conflict. It is also dedicated to those individuals who participated in this conflict in what ever capacity, whether a soldier, spy, or civilian who supplied either side during the conflict.  It is not necessary that you have an ancestor who fits this description.  If you have an interest in this part of American history, you are more than welcome to join us!

Thank you

Comments

Posting reference for Ross' Texas Cavalry with Bonner's name listed. and data about the brigade.

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Thank you very much Mary.

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So far, it points Wm. L. Boner as the son of Benjamin Beckham Bonner (b. Georgia )  and Rebecca Wilson ( b. Virginia )  in some family trees , living in Canton, Texas in 1860 census.

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Again, in 1850 census as a 14 years old boy with same parents / siblings in Smith county, Texas. If this is who we want to go with for his family, I will go ahead and add them.

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Is there a D.H. L Bonner in the same family?

https://www.gengophers.com/book.html#/book/61152?page=271&given=Beckham&surname=Bonner&rels=Rebecca%20Wilson

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This sounds like the same family to me.  Dixon H. L.is his brother.

https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MXLG-PNN

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This is probably the same family then.

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I saw the DHL listed on the Texas units when I was searching for William Bonner.

 

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I was trying to see if I could find someone from his father's family already on here to connect ( Bonners from Georgia ) but alas. I think we will create new ?

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Canton is: Van Zandt County it neighbors Tyler, Smith County; was the site of Camp Ford https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_Ford , Smith County: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_County,_Texas Van Zandt County: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Zandt_County,_Texas . 

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Yes I think we will have to create a new family for him.

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The profile looks thoroughly well done for an early relatively obscure battle in the western theatre. Nice to see Texas represented though.

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I agree, Tim!!

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Very beautiful job done on this profile. :)

Answer 1

Calling all members interested in contributing to this fallen soldier on Memorial Day!  Once we find his family, I wouldn't be surprised to find brothers or cousins who fought with him. This profile needs everything!! Please pitch in!

Answer 2

Bumping him back up. I've added a paragraph about the data in the 1850 Census.

Answer 3

I expanded one bare URL citation and added the link to Archive.org where we can read the Sid Johnson book. I also attached muster roll JPGs from fold3.

Answer 4

Thank you for leading this, Anne, once again. It will be featured on the home page shortly.

I'm going to remove the "Roll of Honor" image and project notice. That should be done with a project template rather than HTML and CSS. (And someone did add the project already.)

Comments

Is it okay to add the Civil War template?

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It's already on there. Or is the Roll of Honor template different?

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Yes.  I didn't know if we would want two templates. This is Civil War CPOTW. We chose a profile that had also died in service to recognize Memorial Day. The Civil War template is on the project page here:

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Project:US_Civil_War:_War_Between_the_States

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Ah, then it makes sense to replace it. I'm sure you wouldn't want both.

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There are multiple templates that could apply to this profile. Perhaps, an animated flash template incorporating them is an interesting idea for the technology advanced crew?  Thinking about Military and War, Civil War, KIA, Southern Colonies, Roll of Honor, Flags, etc.  Adding sound has also been on a wishlist.

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Till a decision is made. I placed the Roll of Honor Template lower in the Profile to allow the featured Project to be at the top. Since the Roll of Honor takes up little space, I think ot looks fine there.

Answer 5

I have William connected. There was a profile for his mother and a badly spelled version of his father. I'm adding his siblings

Comments

Excellent job on the father's biography!! What an interesting story!!! Thanks so much, Anne!

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Take a look at his brother Dickson. He's an interesting character also.

Answer 6

The existing old template "US Civil War" was not displaying the regiment flag nor his regiment name. I updated it to the new "US C W" template so now the regiment flag (Texas flag) and his regiment name are displaying.

HOWEVER, I believe the "CSA Texas flag" had 7 stars in place of the "Union" Texas flag having the one large star?

Comments

Okay, I corrected this to use the "CSA Texas flag" with 7 stars!  :)

- this is the flag that was used by Texas during the Civil War (the 7-star CSA Flag because Texas was the 7th State to join the CSA) = Civil War Flags-26.png

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Thank you Russ for fixing that. Perhaps the template was old. Look on the project page in the template section to see if what's there looks right if you think it's wrong contact Paula J the Project manager.

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I see you've posted in the G2G.  Excellent idea.

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Yup, this was driving me crazy figuring it out. Paula J posted the explanation so I understand now too. ;)