JOHN H. GRIDER was born December 27, 1844, in Jackson County, Ala. His father, Ananias A. Grider, was born in Putnam County, Tenn., in 1812. He married Miss G. Bullington, a native of the same county. To this union seven children were born, our subject being the fifth. Ananias A. Grider died August, 1856, and his wife died in the same month. Our subject was educated in the country schools of his native county.
In May, 1861, he enlisted in Company I, Seventeenth Tennessee Regiment, and served with this command up to and including the battle of Chickamauga. During this time he never was absent from his command a single day. The principal battles were Wild Cat Mountain, Fishing Creek, Perryville, Stone River and Chickamauga. At the latter place be was captured and taken to Camp Douglas, at Chicago, Ill., where he remained until March 23, 1865.
He was then taken to Point Lookout, Md., where he took the oath of allegiance, was released and returned home. He then worked two years on the Nashville & Chattanooga Railroad, and ever since then has followed farming in Bedford County, where he now resides. On July 1, 1866, he married Mrs. Sarah J. Mooney, and to this union were born five children. Mr. Grider owns a farm of 135 acres in District No. 3, and he and wife are worthy members of the Methodist Episcopal Church South.
Transcribed by Kathryn Hopkins
Goodspeed Publishing Co. History of Tennessee from the Earliest Time to the Present: Together with an Historical and a Biographical Sketch of Maury, Williamson, Rutherford, Wilson, Bedford & Marshall Counties, Besides a Valuable Fund of Notes, Reminescences [Sic], Observations, Etc., Etc. Easley, S.C.: Southern Historical Press, 1988.