1. State your full name and present post office address:
Answer: William Thomas Fields, 105 Washington St., Newbern, Tenn.

2. State your age now:
Answer: 81 yrs

3. In what State and county were you born?
Answer: Tennessee, Gibson County

4. Were you a Confederate or Federal soldier?
Answer: Confederate

5. Name of your Company?
Answer: Company A; 12th Tennessee

6. What was the occupation of your father?
Answer: blacksmith and farmer

7. Give full name of your father: Thomas Finley Fields; born at ___; in the County of Carroll County; State of Tennessee; He lived at Newbern, Tennessee, Dyer County.
Give also any particulars concerning him, as official position, war services, etc.; books written by him, etc.:
Answer: He was Justice of Peace before the war

8. Maiden name in full of your mother: Elizabeth Hendricks; she was the daughter of: (full name) Daniel Hendricks and his wife: (full name) Ibby Hendricks; who lived at: Newbern, Dyer Co., Tenn..

9. Remarks on ancestry. Give here any and all facts possible in reference to your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, etc., not included in the foregoing as where they lived, offices held, Revolutionary or other war service; what country they came from to America; first settled-county and State; always giving full names (if possible), and never referring to an ancestor simply as such without giving the name. It is desirable to include every fact possible, and to that end the full and exact record from old Bibles should be appended on separate sheets of this size, thus preserving the facts from loss.
Answer: Dont know the maiden name of my grandmother Hendricks. But do know that she came from Ireland when a small child. My grandfather's people at the same time were coming from Holland. The families settled together in North Carolina, the children grew up and married.

10. If you owned land or other property at the opening of the war, state what kind of property you owned, and state the value of your property as near as you can:
Answer: Did not own any

11. Did you or your parents own slaves? If so, how many?
Answer: No

12. If your parents owned land, state about how many acres:
Answer: Sold out just before war.

13. State as near as you can the value of all the property owned by your parents, including land, when the war opened:
Answer: ___________________________

14. What kind of house did your parents occupy? State whether it was a log house or frame house or built of other material, and state the number of rooms it had:
Answer: log house 2 story 2 rooms down stairs and 2 rooms up stairs.

15. As a boy and young man, state what kind of work you did. If you worked on a farm, state to what extent you plowed, worked with a hoe and did other kinds of similar work. (Certain historians claim that white men would not do work of this sort before the war.)
Answer: blacksmith

16. State clearly what kind of work your father did, and what the duties of your mother were. State all the kinds of work done in the house as well as you can remember - that is, cooking, spinning, weaving, etc.:
Answer: Father was blacksmith and made everything for a farmer, such as hoes, plows, chains, horse shoes, wagons, etc. Mother cooked and also spun and wove all the everyday clothes for twelve in family (children and grownups).

17. Did your parents keep any servants? If so, how many?
Answer: two or three hires

18. How was honest toil - as plowing, hauling, and other sorts of honest work of this class - regarded in your community? Was such work considered respectable and honorable?
Answer: a man that wouldn't work wasn't thought much of. Work was considered respectable and honorable.

19. Did the white men in your community generally engage in such work?
Answer: Yes

20. To what extent were there white men in your community leading lives of idleness and having others do their work for them?
Answer: There wasn't much idleness everyone had to hustle for a living.

21. Did the men who owned slaves mingle freely with those who did not own slaves, or did slaveholders in any way show by their actions that they felt themselves better than respectable, honorable men who did now own slaves?
Answer: Yes, as a general rule all people if they were respectable and honorable mingles, whether they owned slaves or not.

22. At the churches, at the school, at public gatherings in general, did slaveholders and non-slaveholders mingle on a footing of equality?
Answer: yes

23. Was there a friendly feeling between slaveholders and non-slaveholders in your community, or were they antagonistic to each other?
Answer: all were friendly

24. In a political contest, in which one candidate owned slaves and the other did not, did the fact that one candidate owned slaves help him any in winning the contest?
Answer: no, the best man won.

25. Were the opportunities good in your community for a poor young man, honest and industrious, to save up enough to buy a small farm or go in business for himself?
Answer: yes, if he would save his money.

26. Were poor, honest, industrious young men, who were ambitious to make something of themselves, encouraged or discouraged by slaveholders?
Answer: They were encouraged, the slave holders would help

27. What kind of school or schools did you attend?
Answer: pay school

28. About how long did you go to school altogether?
Answer: 4 or 5 off and on

29. How far was it to the nearest school?
Answer: about 2 miles.

30. What school or schools were in operation in your neighborhood?
Answer: Poplar Grove, Newbern, Tenn.

31. Was the school in your community private or public?
Answer: private

32. About how many months in the year did it run?
Answer: about 5 or 6 months

33. Did the boys and girls in your community attend school pretty regularly?
Answer: Some did and others didn't. Both boys and girls worked during crop time.

34. Was the teacher of the school you attended a man or woman?
Answer: Had a man and woman.

35. In what year and month and at what place did you enlist in the service of the Confederacy or of the Federal Government?
Answer: In Newbern Dyer County May 23, 1861 in service of Confederate government

36. After enlistment, where was your Company sent first?
Answer: Jackson Tennessee

37. How long after enlistment before your Company engaged in battle?
Answer: ___________________________

38. What was the first battle you engaged in?
Answer: Belmont, Missouri

39. State in your own way your experience in the War from this time on to its close. State where you went after the first battle - what you did and what other battles you engaged in, how long they lasted, what the results were; state how you lived in camp, how you were clothed, how you slept, what you had to eat, how you were exposed to cold, hunger and disease. If you were in the hospital or prison, state your experience there:
Answer: After last battle went to Corinth Miss then went to Shiloh and fought April 6, 7 Sunday and Monday. The battle of Shiloh on Monday I was wounded just below the ankle by a spent ball. After week or two was transfered to blacksmith work, shoe the mules and horses also to keep the wagons in repair.

40. When and where were you discharged?
Answer: Gainsville, Alabama. May 23, 1965

41. Tell something of your trip home:
Answer: Rode horseback

42. Give a sketch of your life since the close of the Civil War, stating what kind of business you have engaged in, where you have lived, your church relations, etc. If you have held any office or offices, state what it was. You may state here any other facts connected with your life and experience which has not been brought out by the questions:
Answer: At first I helped my uncles harvest their wheat crops.

43. What kind of work did you take up when you came back home?
Answer: Went in the Blacksmith business and grocery business. Have followed blacksmith business all my life until I quit work on account of old age. About 10 yrs. ago joined the Cumberland Presbyterian Church.

44. On a separate sheet, give the names of some of the great men who you have known or met in your time, and tell some of the circumstances of the meeting or incidents in their lives. Also add any further personal reminiscences. (Use all the space you want.)
Answer: ___________________________

45. Give the names of all the members of your Company you can remember. (If you know where the Roster is to be had, please make special note of this.)
Answer: Quincey Dickey, R.F.D. Newbern, Tenn; Jim Dickey, Dyersburg, Tenn.

46. Give the NAME and POST OFFICE ADDRESS of any living Veterans of the Civil War, whether members of your Company or not; whether Tennesseans or from other States.
Answer: Creed Haskins, Newbern, Tenn.; George Fuller, Newbern, Tenn.; John Wynne, Newbern, Tenn.; Bill Pope, Newbern, Tenn.