Mark Perrin Lowrey

Mark Perrin Lowrey
Mark Perrin Lowrey
	Blue Mountain College.
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Mark Perrin Lowrey (December 30, 1828 – February 27, 1885) was a

Blue Mountain College

.

Early life and career

Mark Perrin Lowrey was born in 1828, in

Mexican War, Lowrey enlisted as a private in the 2nd Mississippi Volunteers in 1847.^[4] Neither he nor his regiment ever saw action in the conflict, and Lowrey was mustered out in July 1848.^[5]

After the war with Mexico ended, Lowrey married Sarah R. Holmes in 1849. In 1853, he was ordained to the Gospel Ministry at Farmington Baptist Church in Farmington, Mississippi. That same year, he became a

Southern Baptist preacher, serving primarily around the village of Kossuth, Mississippi.^[1] After preaching for eight years, the American Civil War broke out and his congregation urged him to join the Confederacy.^[6] Lowrey also served as a captain in the Mississippi State Militia in 1861.^[4]

Civil War service

Lowrey entered the Confederate service in 1861 as the

Battle of Murfreesboro on January 1, 1863.^[7]

On October 4, 1863 at the age of 35 Mark Lowrey was promoted to a

Franklin-Nashville Campaign, an officer saw the flash of an enemy gun and yelled to Lowrey, who quickly lowered himself and the bullet stuck and killed a man behind him.^[7] Years of bad health and other reasons caused Lowrey to resign his commission as a brigadier general on March 14, 1865, almost one month before the Confederate forces surrendered at Appomattox Courthouse.^[7] Maj. Gen. Patrick Cleburne, Lowrey's divisional commander during the Franklin-Nashville Campaign, pronounced Lowrey "the bravest man in the Confederate Army."^[1]

Postbellum career and death

After the war, Lowrey moved back to

Blue Mountain College. Lowrey would also serve as president of the Mississippi Baptist convention from 1868 to 1877.^[1]

Lowrey then persuaded a friend, Colonel William C. Falkner, to run his railroad near the college. Since he was a major shareholder of Falkner's Railroad, the plan was soon carried out.

Blue Mountain College, Lowrey became very sick and, in 1882, his doctors alerted him that his heart was very weak.^[7] Then, on February 27, 1885, while buying a train ticket at Middleton, Tennessee, he turned, gasped, and fell to the floor dead.^[7]

Possible family wealth

Lowrey lore states that sometime after Mark and Sarah were married an English grandfather of Lowrey's mother, Margaret (Doss) Lowrey, died, leaving a six million dollar fortune to his descendants.[8] Before the arrangements could be made for the family to get the money, the Civil War began and the descendants became preoccupied with other matters. At the war's end, Lowrey once again tried to claim his share of the English estate left behind by his ancestor, but it was discovered that the papers pertaining to the money and estate were lost or destroyed.^[8]

Notes

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Wakelyn, p. 291.
^ Warner, p. 195.
^ ^a ^b Rosewell G. Lowrey's "Lowrey (Mark Perrin) Autobiographical Essay Summary" Archived 2008-10-06 at the Wayback Machine
^ ^a ^b ^c Eicher, p. 355.
^ Wakelyn, p. 291; Eicher, p. 355.
^ Mark Perrin Lowrey Biography
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f Jack D. Welsh's "Medical Histories of Confederate Generals" (1999) pg. 145.
^ ^a ^b ^c Annah Walker Robinson Watson's "Of Sceptred Race" (1910) pg. 151-53.
^ Elmo Howell's "Mississippi Home-Places: Notes on Literature and History" (1988) pg. 29.