24th Infantry

Private William Boyd Wheless

Company K (the “Poplar Springs Grays”), 24th Regiment N.C. Troops (14th Regiment N.C. Volunteers

William Boyd Wheless (1829-1872) farmed more than 270 acres in the Harris District, Franklin County, with his wife and three small children. He enlisted at Louisburg on June 17, 1861, in a company known as the “Poplar Springs Grays,” subsequently Company K, 24th Regiment N.C. Troops.

Wheless was plagued with a variety of illnesses during his first twenty-two months of service, including “general debility,” “catarrhus,” and diarrhea, and was in hospital or on sick furlough for most of that time. However, he returned duty on April 28, 1863, and was thenceforth reported present on all of Company K’s muster rolls, including the last one, covering January-February 1865. There are no further military records for him.

Image: Louis A. Wheless, Jr., descendant.

Source Note:
1860 U. S. Census, Harris District, Franklin County, North Carolina, population schedule, page 76, dwelling 549, family 542, William B. Wheless household; Manarin et. al., North Carolina Troops 7:348; service record files of William B. Wheless, 24th Regiment N.C. Troops, Compiled Service Records of Confederate Soldiers from the State of North Carolina (M270), RG109, NA.4