William Thomas Duggins, P. O., Slater. Of English descent; is the son of Thomas C. and Elizabeth W. Duggins, and was born May 28, 1838, in Saline county. His great-grandfather married an Irish lady in the city of Dublin, and when he died his widow, with her only child William, grandfather of the subject of this sketch, crossed the Atlantic, and settled in Fredericksburg, Virginia. She afterward married Robert Wilkinson, by whom she had three children, and then died in Fredericksburg. William Duggins (the grandfather) served through the revolutionary war, and after the war married Miss Elizabeth Perkins, daughter of William Perkins, of the well-known South Carolina family of that name. He was a member of the Episcopal Church, and a devout Christian. On the maternal side the great-grandfather of Mr. Duggins, Daniel White, was also a revolutionary soldier, and was present at the surrender of Lord Cornwallis. His maternal grandfather, Thomas Jackson, was a cousin of General Andrew Jackson. Mr. Duggins received a good education, and from 1858 to 1860 was engaged as salesman in a store in Cambridge, in this county. In the spring of 1861 he enlisted in Capt. Ed Brown’s company, M. S. G., then in the Confederate army, where he continued until the close of the war, 1865. In March, 1866, he married Miss Annie Pulliam, daughter of John C. and Catherine J. Pulliam, of this county. Her father was born in Tennessee, and her grandfather in Raleigh, North Carolina, August, 1771, and died August 9, 1849, in Saline county. Her grandfather, Col. Ben. Chambers, was an officer in the revolutionary army. Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, their home, was named for Gen. James Chambers, whose sword is now in the Pulliam family. Of this marriage there are four children: Kate W., Dora D., Mary C., and Clarence M. Mrs. Duggins died February 9, 1875, and he is still unmarried. Since the war he assisted his father in the management of his farm, on which he now lives since his father’s death, his mother living with him. The homestead contains 1,200 acres of magnificent land.
