Andrew Jackson McCurry: Tales Told

Painting of MM and AJ McCurry

All my life I've heard a story told by my father Hyluard McCurry about his grandfather, Andrew Jackson McCurry, in the Civil War.  Dad said his grandmother (Mary Margaret Adams McCurry) told him when he was a little boy that Andrew Jackson McCurry (AJM) and his younger brother went off to fight the Civil War for the Confederacy and the brother died.  AJM blamed his commanding officer for the death, took his brother home for burial, then deserted and joined the Yankees.

But how much of this was true? I know Mary Margaret Adams McCurry died in 1934 when my father (born June 13, 1910) was in his early twenties.  Just how much would a small boy remember of tales from so long ago?  How much was legend and how much was truth?  How accurately do I remember what Dad told me when I was in grade school?  Luckily I live in northern Virginia, a state still obsessed with the Civil War because of all the battles fought here.  Winchester, the largest town in my immediate area, changed hands at least seventy times during the battles of 1860-65.  With that much fighting, the locals remember the Civil War far more than people living in Wyoming, for example.  There are several good local museums with large local history collections, so I made time to visit Balch Library in Leesburg, VA and started researching.

The trail led me many places, both online and in local libraries.

The photograph of the oil painting above was taken by my brother Mark Hyluard McCurry.  I believe the oil painting was done from the old tintype photo we have.   The painting is in my brother's possession.  I think my mother (Imojean Childress McCurry Morris) refinished the frame.  I remember the frame as being very dark when I saw this as a child at George Washington (G.W.) McCurry's house.  But this may be a different painting than the one G.W. had.

signed, Jane McCurry Wood