Pages 682-683
William Alexander McGhee is without doubt among the leading farmers of Casa Township, as these facts amply testify. He was born in Washington County, Tenn. on January 8, 1835, his father's birth occurring in the same county in 1805. He was a farmer of Dutch and Irish descent, and moved from Tennessee to Alabama, thence to Georgia in 1854, and in 1858 to Perry County Ark. He died September 1, 1885. His wife was born in Greene County Tenn., and died in April 1879, also in Perry County. She was the mother of fourteen children, seven of whom are now living, four sons in Perry County: Malachi P., James K.P., Nicholas A., and our subject; and three daughters: Josie E., Rebecca J., and Mary C. William Alexander, the third of the family, was reared and received most of his education in Alabama. At the age of twenty three he began life for himself, and at the time married Miss Anna Green, who was born in Alabama in 1835. They have had ten children, all living: John R, Martha Jane (wife of Green McCabe), William M., George W.M., Francis A., Mary C., Missouri A., Serilda L., Ophelia F.E. and James N.A. In 1861 Mr McGhee enlisted in the Confederate army in Company H, Tenth Arkansas Infantry, and served as corporal till 1863, being in the battle of Port Hudson, where he was wounded in the head with a spent ball. He came to this county in 1858 and purchased 198 acres of unimproved land. This has increased until he now has 360 acres of which 115 are under cultivation, watered by Grace Creek, and forming an excellent stock farm. Mr McGhee is a Democrat in politics as was his father and grandfather before him. He cast his first presidential vote for Buchanan.