Charles W. Adams

Charles William Adams (August 16, 1817 – September 9, 1878) was an American Confederate States Army colonel during the American Civil War. In 1864, he was commander of the Confederate Northern Sub-District of Arkansas, within the Union Army lines. He had the title, although not the formal rank, of "acting brigadier general." He was not officially appointed by Confederate President Jefferson Davis and confirmed by the Confederate States Senate to brigadier general grade, even though some sources identify him as a brigadier general.

Adams was a planter, lawyer and judge before the war and a lawyer after the war. As a delegate to the Arkansas secession convention, he was an ardent secessionist. He was a law partner of United States Senator William K. Sebastian before the war and of Confederate brigadier general and Sovereign Grand Commander of the Scottish Rite of Freemasons Southern Jurisdiction, Albert Pike, after the war. He was the maternal grandfather of Helen Keller.

Early life Charles W. Adams was born Charles William Adams in Boston, Massachusetts on August 16, 1817. His parents were Benjamin and Susannah (née Goodhue) Adams.

In 1819, the Adams family moved to New Albany, Indiana, where Charles was a clerk in a mercantile house between 1830 and 1835. In the early 1840s, Adams entered into a law partnership with William K. Sebastian, who became a United States senator in 1848.

Adams was a presidential elector for John Bell in 1860. He was elected to the Arkansas secession convention in 1861 and vigorously advocated for secession of that state from the union.

American Civil War service In 1861, Charles W. Adams first served the Confederacy as a major and quartermaster of Arkansas state troops under Brigadier General Thomas Bradley, soon succeeded by Major General James Yell. The Provisional Army of Arkansas was dissolved and incorporated into the Confederate States Army later in 1861. Adams was elected colonel on April 25, 1862.

At the Battle of Prairie Grove, Arkansas on December 7, 1862, Adams's regiment was ordered forward after the battle had started, to fill a gap in the Confederate line. They headed directly for the sound of the firing, lost their way and ended up in a deep ravine from which they had to be extracted to take their place in the line. Most of the men, except for some veterans of the Battle of Wilson's Creek in the two veteran companies, then fled the field. Adams and his remaining men fell in with Colonel Emmett MacDonald's Brigade of Brigadier General John S. Marmaduke's Division. Adams served as acting assistant inspector general and chief of staff of the division.

In his 1887 history of Arkansas, John Hallum says that Adams won a brigadier general commission for his gallantry on the field at the Battle of Missionary Ridge, November 25, 1863. Adams returned to Arkansas in December 1863.

Later life Adams briefly returned to Helena, Arkansas after the war.

Charles William Adams died on September 9, 1878, of yellow fever at Memphis, Tennessee. He is buried in Elmwood Cemetery, in Memphis.

Charles W. Adams was the maternal grandfather of the author, political activist, disability advocate and lecturer Helen Keller, who overcame deafblindness to achieve her many accomplishments.