“As a youth (prob c1848) he went to “Millport” (prob present Milltown on the Blue River, in the adj Co. of Crawford) where he was employed in the saw mill and on the “much-talked-of Plank Road.” He became quite skilled in carpentry & cabinet work. Here, one Sunday night, while attending church, country hooligans cut to pieces his prized saddle, for which he had spent his first earnings. (EAR:39)

During the war between the states, he was a cptain, USA. As told by Elizabeth (Attkisson) Berkey: “At the time of Morgan’s raid through Salem, Indian, July 10, 1863, my uncle, Capt. Stephen Curtis Attkisson, was home on furlough, having been wounded in battle. We were sitting on the front porch of my father’s (Horace Newland Attkisson) home on North High Street, when a detachment of Morgan’s men rode up. They saluted my uncle, who was in uniform, and asked him why he was there. He returned the salute and pointed to his crutches. They answered and rode on.” (EAR:39)

At the close of the war, he was appointed Collector of Internal Revenue, “Cherokee Strip”, or “Northern Georgia,” with headquarters in Atlanta but he established his home in Cumming, Forsythe County, where five of his six children were born and where two of the first born died.

After a number of years in Cumming, the family moved to Rome, Floyd County, Georgia, on the Georgia-Alabama border. The family travelled in a rock-a-way, a carriage, the body of which was swung by heavy leather straps. The household goods were transported by covered wagon. The “boarded” during their first year in Rome, then established a home on Broad Street. Here Edith Attkisson-907 attended SHorter College, a girls school, which provided classes for children.

Mrs. Rudder provides an interesting commentary concerning the time of their move from Rome, Ga., to Salem, Indiana, her father’s birth place. She was desolated that they were unable to take Myrie, a colored servant, “colored people were not tolerated in Salem.” Salem cousins were pleased with her pretty clothes, from smart Atlanta shops, but laughed at her for asking at the store for “goobers,” told her to say “porch,” not piazza, “veranda,” not gallery, and corrected her pronouncing Mary with a long “a.” She wanted grits, but no one in Salem had ever heard of grits.” 252