SUBMITTED BY: Gary White; Edited by Cheri Todd Molter
The words of David Franklin Aman:
“Many years ago, after a great storm on the coast, beachcombers found a little boy among the wreckage washed ashore. One exclaimed ‘It’s a man!’ He was cared for and called Philip Aman from that day. He was my grandfather and became a soldier in the Revolutionary War. His son William was my father; he married Elizabeth Garret, whose mother lived to be 107 years old, all of Onslow County, North Carolina.
I was born in the same county, August 4, 1827. My father died when I was 14 years old, leaving mother with 10 children, 5 boys and 5 girls. Four boys served in the Confederate Army; two were killed, Jesse and Henry. Gerry and I got home. One was mortally wounded at Manassas, another killed after a year in prison at Point Lookout. I volunteered and enlisted April, 1861, at the age of 34, at Jacksonville, North Carolina, serving in Co. A, 35th N.C. Regiment of Infantry, the command of Major Petway and Col. James Sinclair, Ramson’s Brigade.
Taken prisoner, sent to Point Lookout….paroled at the end, without a cent, weak, and starving, barefooted, bareheaded, and in rags. In this condition, I walked home. It was a long journey, but I survived it. On August 4, 1930, I completed my one-hundred-and-third year. I can walk 5 miles a day, before breakfast. I am in full possession of my faculties, with [a slight hearing impairment].
I have lived to see our bruised and broken south arise in a new glory and again give a peerless army to the world.”