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BIOGRAPHIES
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THOMPSON,
William Naylor, treasurer Florida Central and Peninsular
railroad company, was born at Harper's Ferry, Va., Sept. 17,
1842, of Scotch-Irish ancestry, his grandfather having
emigrated from Ireland to Charleston, S. C, and subsequently
removed to Hampshire county, Va. He served in the
revolutionary war with the Virginia troops. He married
Martha Baird of Philadelphia. Their son, the father of
William Naylor, was educated for a lawyer, but preferring a
mercantile life, he settled at Martinsburg and removed to
Harper's Ferry, Va., in 1841. He married Elizabeth Glass of
White Past, Va. He removed to Florida in 1859, settling on a
plantation near Gainesville. When the civil war broke out
the son was a lad nineteen years old. He enlisted, however,
in the 7th Florida infant rv, commanded by Gov. Madison
Perry, and fought under Gens. Kirby,Smith, Bragg, Johnston
and Hood. He was wounded before Atlanta July 22, 1864, and
incapacitated from further service. After the war he entered
the East Florida seminary at Gainesville and studied for two
years, when he took up cotton planting, and in 1869 entered
the service of the Florida railroad as clerk in the
treasurer's office. He was soon after appointed paymaster
for the road, serving in that capacity for twenty years. In
1889 he was made treasurer of the combined roads. He was
elected a representative in the state legislature in 1876,
the first democrat elected from Nassau county after the war.
He served on the judiciary, railroad and other committees.
In 1878 he was elected to the state senate. In the
presidential campaign of 1892 he was elector from Florida,
and carried the vote of the state to Washington, polling it
for Cleveland and Stevenson. He was married Nov. 22, 1871,
to Olivia McGehee, daughter of Dr. Wylly McGehee of Wakulla
county, Fla.; her mother was Evelyn Byrd, a descendant of
the Virginia Byrds, both parents having died when she was
quite young. She was brought up in the family of her uncle,
Judge John C. McGehee of Madison county, who presided over
the secession convention at Tallahassee in January, 1861.
They have five children. Mr. Thompson is a Royal arch Mason,
and commander Nassau county Confederate veterans.