People
Biographical Sketches: H Surnames
C. W. Heiskell
Colonel Heiskell was born ten miles west of Knoxville, Tenn., in Knox county, on July the 25th, 1836. After graduating, he read and practiced law at Rogersville, Tenn., until the war broke out. He entered the army as a private in Company K, May, 1861. At the organization of the Nineteenth Tennessee regiment, in June, he was elected Captain of Company K. At the reorganization of the regiment, in June, 1862, he was re-elected Captain of the company. After the battle of Murfreesboro he was promoted to Major of the regiment. He was severely wounded at the battle of Chickamauga. Some time after the death of Colonel Moore, and before the death of Colonel Walker, Major Heiskell was made Lieutenant-Colonel of the regiment, I think in January, 1864. After the battle of Jonesboro, Ga., Atlanta campaign, and the death of Colonel Walker, Heiskell was promoted to Colonel of the regiment. Source: W. J. Worsham, The Old Nineteenth Tennessee C. S. A. (Knoxville, Tennessee, Paragon Printing Company, 1902), 182.
Thomas William Humes
(April 22, 1815 - January 16, 1892) Thomas William Humes, clergyman, college president, author, librarian, was born in Knoxville. His father, Thomas Humes, was born in Armagh, Ireland, and came to this country when a boy. His mother, Margaret (Russell) Cowan Humes, was born in Jefferson county, Tennessee. Thomas W. Humes was graduated from East Tennessee College in 1831; received a master's degree in 1833. With intent to comply with his mother's wish that he become a Presbyterian minister, he studied theology at East Tennessee College under the instruction of Reverend Stephen Foster, then spend a term (1835) at Princeton Theological Seminary. Finding that he could not subscribe to the Westminster Confession of Faith he returned to Knoxxville and became a member of the mercantile firm of Cowan, Dickinson and Company. He had little taste for business, however, and turned to journalism. He edited in succession the Knoxville Times (1839), the Knoxville Register (1840), and the Watch Tower, a Whig campaign paper. In 1845 he was ordained a deacon in the Protestant Episcopal church and the following year became rector of St. John's Episcopal church in Knoxville and served as such until 1861, when he resigned because of his sympathy with the Union cause. General Burnside, when he occupied Knoxville in 1863, requested Humes to resume his ministry in the church. He did so and for the next six years was rector of St. John's church. In 1864, and also after the war, he was Chairman of the East Tennessee Relief Association, an organization which aided impoverished Unionists in East Tennessee. In 1865 he was elected president of East Tennessee University. This institution had been closed during the Civil War and the grounds and buildings, having been occupied in succession by both armies were in deplorable condition. The new president accomplished much in bringing order out of chaos. In 1883 he resigned the office of president. In 1869 the degree of S. T. D. was conferred upon him by Columbia College of New York City. Humes had married, in 1835, Cornelia Williams, of Grainger County, Tennessee. She died in 1847, leaving 3 children. In 849, he married Anne Betsy Williams, of New Hartford, Connecticut, who was teaching in the Knoxville Female Seminary at the time. She died in 1879, leaving two children. Humes was the author of "The Loyal Mountaineers," 1888. He was president of the Knoxville Bible Society; a member of the Sons of Temperance; a missionary of the Protestant Episcopal church in East Tennessee, 1884-1886. During the last six years of his life he served as librarian of the Lawson McGhee Library in Knoxville. He died in Knoxville. Source: Mary U. Rothrock, editor, The French Broad-Holston Country: A History of Knox County, Tennessee (Knoxville, Tennessee: East Tennessee Historical Society, 1946), 431-432.
