Biography - W. P. Belcher

W. P. BELCHER is accounted a successful planter of Bossier Parish, and deservedly so, for all his operations have resulted profitably. He was born in Abbeville District, S. C., in 1833, being the eldest of seven children-six sons and one daughter-born to Robert E. and Mary (Norwood) Belcher, the former being born in Abbeville District in 1811, and his wife in the same place a few years later, their deaths occurring there in 1851 and 1845, respectively. The father was a lawyer and planter and a son of Rev. Washington Belcher, a Virginian by birth, who afterward went to South Carolina, where he died, having followed the calling of a Baptist minister. His wife, formerly Miss Mary Bennett, was born in Maryland and died in South Carolina, also. The Belchers were of English descent, and were among the early settlers of New England, one of whom was one of the colonial governors of Massachusetts. The maternal grandfather, Williamson Norwood, who was also of English descent, was born and died in Abbeville District, S. C., and although he was reared in poverty he became one of the wealthiest planters of his district by his own efforts. The subject of this sketch, although reared on a farm, was given excellent educational advantages, and graduated from the South Carolina University at Columbia in 1855. He then spent a short time in Kansas, after which three years were devoted to the cotton business in Augusta, Ga., at the end of which time he returned to his home. When the first gun was fired in the late war he joined Capt. J. M. Perrin's company, First South Carolina Infantry, State Troops, and was at the fall of Fort Sumter, and after three months' service he came to Arkansas, but soon after returned and joined Company D, Seventh South Carolina Infantry, and served with the Army of Northern Virginia until Nov. 1861. In January, 1862, he came to Louisiana, and the same month of the following year he became a member of Company F, Fifteenth Arkansas Regiment of Infantry, and was captured at Port Hudson after a long siege of fighting. After being paroled and exchanged he joined what was known as William Harrison's Cavalry, with which he served until the close of the war as quartermaster-sergeant, surrendering in Mansfield in May, 1865. In February, 1862, he was married in Arkansas to Miss Ella S. DuBose, daughter of Dr. E. E. and Caroline DuBose, natives of South Carolina, from which State they moved to Alabama, thence to Arkansas, where they resided until their respective deaths. Mrs. Belcher was born in Glennville, Ala., and died in 1865, having borne one son, Robert E. After the war they resided in Arkansas for three years, but afterward made their home in different parts of Northwestern Louisiana. In 1874 he rented a part of his present farm, and is now the owner of 657 acres, it being one of the most fertile farms on Red River, and all of which he has earned since 1874, as he came here with only $120. He has over 500 acres cleared and raises from 350 to 400 bales of cotton annually. He is one of the substantial planters of the region, and is truly a self-made man.

Contributed 29 Aug 2020 by Norma Hass, extracted from Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Northwest Louisiana, published in 1890, pages 126-127.