Hello Terry,
There are a lot of CS Graves around here. I know of a cemetery just peppered with small CS flags from where the SCV place them on graves. I will walk around one day and see if any are navy. Also, at the Confederate Memorial Park in Marbury, Alabama there are three all confederate cemeterys there. It was the site of a large Confederate Soldiers' Home back in the day. Now all that remains it the old chapel, the cemeteries, and a nice museum. Anyway, if I am not mistaken, only one or two of the guys buried there are navy. I am not sure about CSMC. I will check on that. I don't know if John Ellis has any of those or not. I will check that out too. I will check with the local SCV and see if they know of any Navy and CSMC graves around here in the surrounding counties.
Terry, below is an excerpt from my Wife's Gaither Family Line file. It is my wife's gr gr grandfather and I think you will find it interesting:
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REV. JOHN JEFFERSON GAITHER, B. 8/2/1839 in Huntsville, Limestone County, Al.--D. 9/16/1915 in Ironton, buried in Providence Baptist Cemetery, Guntersville, Clay/Talladega County line, Al..
Note: His tombstone says he was born Aug. 24, 1842--d. 9/15/1915. He was a Confederate Veteran. His tombstone has "C.S.A." on it. According to some Gaither relatives and researchers he served first in the C.S. Army and then the C.S. Navy during the War for Southern Independence. Others, non family folks, simply say that it is possible that after he got out of the army he worked as a civilian worker for a company that worked in the Mobile Confederate Naval Shipyards. No one can find proof that he joined the actual CS Navy, but his wife was adament until the day she died and is handed down in the family that after two years in the CS Army he went into the CS Navy and served at Mobile.
I finally went to the Archives Building in Montgomery, Al., on 9/3/04 and viewed his records there. A pension application filed by he and then again his widow stated that he was first in the Army and then the Navy. He first served in Co. "I", 18th Ala. Vol. Infantry as a Private. Again according to those same researchers and relatives, he was ill much of the time and even spent some time in a C.S. Hospital in Mississippi and was Medically Discharged from the Army in 1862 because of an enlarged heart and heart desease. He immediately went and joined the C.S. Navy, serving in the C.S. Shipyards of Mobile, Al..
I saw on one of the pension or pension application papers on file in the Alabama State Archives in Montgomery it says he was released in Mobile, Alabama by a Capt. Swopes in the Spring of 1865, and paroled in Talladega, Clay Co., Al. in May or June of 1865.
There is some confusion in his records and pension papers in Montgomery. Some say he got out of the army in 1862, and 1864, and some say he enlisted in 1862 in Harpersville, Shelby Co., Al. in 1862. Another says he enlisted in 1862 in Mobile, his Captain being a Capt. Barney or Basney (could not tell if it was an "s" or an "r"). His Confederate Military Records state that he was 5' 10" tall, had black hair and grey eyes. In 1908 he was awarded the Southern Cross of Honor by the Taledega Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy. In 1870 he was working on the railroad in Dallas Co., Al. and living in a boarding house. He purchased land in Taledega Co. in 1871. He had been a Confederate soldier, a C.S. Sailor or Naval enlisted man, a farmer, RR worker, etc., and later became a Baptist Minister. He died of Bright's Desease in 1915. (Kidney Desease).
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It would be neat to find his Naval records and what he did or exactly how he served; aboard some ship or at a Naval base.
Take care,
Dave
Alabama