Biography: Wiley Gallaway born 1792

 WILEY GALLAWAY, Esq.

BIOGRAPHY and GENEALOGY

(1792- 1864)

Morgan and Lawrence County, Alabama.

Wiley Gallaway b. 1792 and his brothers, Levi, Anderson, Brittain, Nathan J. and sister Sallie, were all born in Oglethorpe county, Georgia. Their father was Matthew Gallaway, a native of Oglethorpe County, Georgia, who died in Morgan county, Alabama in 1822 and Mary East, who lived to the advanced age of ninety-six and died in Oglethorpe County. She returned to Ogelthorpe County, Georgia after the death of her husband.

In 1816, the family began moving to North Alabama and by 1819, nearly every member of the family was located in Lawrence County, Alabama.

Wiley Gallaway was a very competent and one of the first school teachers in the State of Alabama. He taught in Huntsville, from 1820 to 1823. Then he taught at Houston’s Store in Morgan County, Alabama. He moved to Oakville, Lawrence County, Alabama and taught two sessions there. Next, he moved to Kittakaska in the northern part of Lawrence County and conducted a school there until 1830. In 1831 he taught in Moulton until 1835, when he was elected the 5^th county court clerk, then Probate Judge of Lawrence County, a position he held for twenty-seven years. He received his commission Sept 11, 1847. While a clerk of the County of Lawrence, he purchased THE MOULTON NEWS and presented it to his oldest son Matthew C. Gallaway, who was then a practical printer in the office of that paper.

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He married Mary McDowell, in 1817 at Bowling Green, Kentucky. She was the daughter of John McDowell, who emigrated from Ireland to America in 1774, the only one of his family when a boy. He was in the Revolutionary War from the beginning to it’s close. John McDowell first settled in Oglethorpe County, Georgia, moved to Bowling Green, Kentucky and then to Lawrence County, Alabama. He died near Oakville in 1841, eighty-odd years of age. and was a pensioner at his death. He was a hatter by trade and for the first ten years of the settlement of Lawrence County, he made most of the hats worn in the county and Morgan County as well. John McDowell had twelve children; all left Lawrence County except his daughter Mary, wife of Wiley Gallaway and Clarissa, wife of Hon. Charles Gibson. Mary (McDowell) Gallaway died in 1855 at Moulton and Clarissa (McDowell) Gibson died sometime during the war between the States.

Mary (McDowell) Gallaway was a member of the Baptist Church and was celebrated for her piety, charity, and fine practical sense. She died in 1855 at Moulton, Alabama, at the age of fifty-seven, leaving six children.

1. Elizabeth Gallaway married James Forrest Wise and was living in Marion, Drew, Arkansas in 1860
2. Matthew Campbell Gallaway (March 2, 1820 – Feb. 28, 1898 TN)
3. William Madison Gallaway (b. 1823Lawrence Co., AL – 1873 Arkansas City, Ark. )
4. Harriet Galaway (b. 1827 AL)
5. Mary A. Galaway ( 1829 AL)
6. Levi Tristam Galaway (b. 1835 AL – 1867 Florida)

Wiley Gallaway moved to Texas in 1859 with his two daughters, Mrs James Townsend and Mrs. James Wise and there died and was buried at a place called Lone Pine, in his seventy-fifth year. Judge Gallaway was known as the finest scholar of his day and State. “He was also a most popular man, as evidenced by his having an elective office for so long a time, his integrity, honesty, and inflexibility of character winning for him the implicit confidence of the entire community. The family strength in the county is also seen in the remarkable fact, that at one time, while he was the probate Judge, his son, William M. Gallaway, was the circuit Judge, elected by the Legislature, and his nephew, Amos P. Gallaway, was at the same time sheriff of the same county.”

SOURCES

1. SAUNDERS, EARLY SETTLERS OF ALABAMA, P. 75
2. SPEER, WILLIAM , SKETCHES OF PROMINENT TENNESEANS, p. 346
3. 1860 Drew, Arkansas census
4. 1850 US census l Lawrence County, Alabama
5. Find A Grave Memorial# 101099950

This biography is included in the E-Book Biographies of Notable and Not-so-Notable  Alabama Pioneers Volume II.

and

First Families of Lawrence County, Alabama Volume I

About Donna R Causey

Donna R. Causey, resident of Alabama, was a teacher in the public school system for twenty years. When she retired, Donna found time to focus on her lifetime passion for historical writing. She developed the websites www.alabamapioneers and www.daysgoneby.me All her books can be purchased at Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble. She has authored numerous genealogy books. RIBBON OF LOVE: A Novel Of Colonial America (TAPESTRY OF LOVE) is her first novel in the Tapestry of Love about her family where she uses actual characters, facts, dates and places to create a story about life as it might have happened in colonial Virginia. Faith and Courage: Tapestry of Love (Volume 2) is the second book and the third FreeHearts: A Novel of Colonial America (Book 3 in the Tapestry of Love Series) Discordance: The Cottinghams (Volume 1) is the continuation of the story. . For a complete list of books, visit Donna R Causey

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