Sons of Seth Paddock and Jane Ruth Bigelow Storrs, the three Storrs brothers from Wetumpka were respected Officers in the Confederate States Army. Their grandfather, also named Seth Paddock Storrs, was the first Attorney General for the State of Vermont, a graduate of Yale and founder of Middlebury College. Their father was a graduate of Middlebury College. He removed to Covington, GA where he began a law practice and was appointed Colonel of the Georgia State Militia. The family moved to Wetumpka, AL where Seth was elected Mayor and also served in the State Senate in 1847 and 1849. He was later appointed Judge of the Circuit Court. The Paddock line of this family goes back to 1636 at Plymouth to Robert Paddock who was a blacksmith and a constable that worked with Miles Standish.
Lieutenant Henry R. Storrs - Wetumpka Light Guard, 3rd Alabama Infantry Regiment, Company I.
The eldest of the three brothers, Henry Reynolds Storrs, graduated from Princeton University in 1859. He was a young lawyer when he enlisted into the Confederate service as a member of the Wetumpka Light Guard. He enlisted at the rank of 2nd Lieutenant on April 27, 1861 at Wetumpka, AL. Service to country was cut short by his untimely death at the hands of a Confederate comrade. It is very possible that he was the first Military Officer from the State of Alabama to die in service of the Confederacy. His death is recorded below, exerpts from his hometown newspaper, "The Wetumpka Spectator"....
The Wetumpka Spectator - Friday, May 10, 1861:
With a sad heart we announce the death of Lieut. Henry R. STORRS, of the Wetumpka Light Guard. The circumstances of his death, as we learn them from the escort which accompanied his remains, are these; Lieut. STORRS and a comrade had been out to bathe, on returning, the sentinel, not performing his duty as required, he chided him for his negligence and passed in. About 10 o'clock, it being suggested that one of his company was sick and no physician could be found in the camp, volunteered to pass a messenger out to go for one. As he and Private BUTLER approached the same sentinel he had passed in the evening, they were hailed and the countersign demanded. As he advanced to give it, the sentinal, who is a Boston man named James P. HUNT of the Gulf City Guard of Mobile, brought his gun to a charge, and as some suppose, accidentally discahrged it. The ball entered the abdomen of Lieut. STORRS, and as he fell, he exclaimed, " I am a dead man. What a foolish sentinel, I had the countersign." Thus has a bright genius, which was proudly and gracefully rising to its culmination, been stopped in its career. Thus has closed a life full of hope and promise. The sad news fell crushingly on those who so fondly loved him, and rests like a pall on our community. And why shouldn't it, when a life, so rich in virtue and intellect, is thus untimely ended? "To all good-bye". These were the closing words of his address on the eve of his departure from us. Circumstances have made it a final good-bye. He returns, but not as he left us. The parlor of death rests upon that brow once "the dome of thought - the palace of the soul". Those manly limbs return fettered in grave clothes. That noble form enclosed within the coffin lid. Oh!, what a lesson does it teach the living, when the grave closes on one just on the threshold of life, so rich in talent, with a soul so noble, and a will so patriotic. Truley does death love "a shining mark".
The Wetumpka Speculator - Friday May 17, 1861:
The body of Lieut. STORRS arrived in our city yesterday at 5 o'clock under the escort of Lieut. HAVIS, and Privates FITZPATRICK, TRIMBLE, ROBINSON, and TOMMY. At the outskirts of the city, it was met by the remaining members and the Honorary members of the Light Guard, who escorted it to the family residence. The funeral services took place this morning at 9 o'clock, at the graveyard, attended by an unusually large congregation. Deep solemnity pervaded the crowd and every heart sympathized with the bereaved with the relatives.
Wetumpka City Cemetery
(note: death year on marker should be 1861)
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