When the Civil War began in 1861, Augustus became the leader of what is now known as the Stonewall Brigade Band and Mem played the B cornet in the unit with his father from 1 Apr to 22 Aug 1862. He enlisted in the 14th Virginia Cavalry band on 1 Aug 1863. He was serving with that unit when captured at Winchester, Virginia on 30 Apr 1865 and paroled. He was just 17 years old.
Mem returned to his family in Staunton. The Stonewall Brigade Band was reformed in 1869 with Augustus as the leader and Mem as the Assistant Leader. He began working as a piano tuner and music teacher. Memory married Miss Katherine C "Kate" Grimes of Carroll County, Maryland on 28 Mar 1872. The couple were married in Warren County, Virginia by Reverend Amasa Converse who had officiated at the Edgar Allen Poe's wedding. The couple lived near Charlestown and a daughter was born to them there. Mem lead/instructed the Charlestown Cornet Band in 1874 and 1875.
In 1876 the family moved to Lewisburg, West Virginia where Memory worked as a jeweler/goldsmith/watchmaker and undoubtedly continued to tune pianos. He directed the Lewisburg Concert Band.
The family again moved in November 1879, returning to Staunton where they lived at 12 Madison Street. He again played in the Stonewall Brigade Band and also directed the Stonewall Octette, a vocal group associated with the band. He also composed music writing "Hancock's Grand March" for a politician and "Garfield's Funeral March" on the occasion of President Garfield's assassination. During this time he operated a jeweler's shop at 102 East Beverly Street (the main street of Staunton) where he repaired watches and jewelry as well as tuning musical instruments. He would continue to tune pianos to the end of his life.
The family returned to West Virginia and lived in Hinton and Alderson where Kate died on 14 Oct 1888. Memory returned to Lewisburg with his three living children in 1889. It was there that his oldest son was killed at the age of 14 when he fell headfirst into a vat of boiling water at the Greenbrier Cannery.
After his son's death he again returned to Staunton where he lived at 213 West Beverly Street. It was at this time that he became the director of the Blackford Cornet Band at the Western Lunatic Asylum where he was paid $6 a week and earned an extra $3 if he tuned the pianos. In this time before recorded music the band provided a welcome relief from boredom at the asylum for staff and inmates alike as well as visitors to the institution.
On 15 Feb 1893 he married Virginia Anne "Nannie" Wyatt in Harrisonburg, Virginia. She died in childbirth a little more than a year later, on 9 Mar 1894 in Staunton.
In 1896 and 1897 he was in Baltimore and Gaithersburg, Maryland, again teaching music but soon relocated again, this time to Norfolk, Virginia where he would live out his life teaching music and tuning pianos. He married Mary F. Goddard of that place sometime in 1900. Thomas died at the age of 70 on 2 Sep 1917. He was buried in the Forest Lawn Cemetery in Norfolk, Virginia.
Note: This memorial was published on the 75th anniversary of his passing.
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