WILLIAM H. GRIFFITH is a native of Macon County, Tenn., born January, 1848, and is the eldest of a family of six. children, born to Byron and Maria (Rison) Griffith, of Welsh origin. His father was born about 1821, in Jackson County, Tenn., and his mother was a native of Huntsville, Ala. His great grandfather Griffith, was born in Wales, and when five years old, was kidnapped and brought to America. At the early age of fifteen years our subject enlisted in Company B, Thirty-seventh Kentucky Mounted Infantry, and after a faithful service of almost two years, was honorably discharged in January, 1864. He then worked on a farm for one year; afterward clerked in a store for the same length of time, and then for one year traveled through the country selling clocks for the firm of Moore Brothers. In 1867 he came to Petersburgh, where he has since resided. Mr. Griffith was married, in 1868, to Miss Ellen Wise, a native of Jefferson County, Ky., born January 3, 1850, and who came to what is now Webster County when about one year old. This marriage has been blessed with six children: Frank, Charles, Effie, Roy, Guy and Edward. Mr. Griffith advocates the principles of the Greenback party for all national issues. He erected the first business house in Sebree. Mrs. Griffith is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church South.
Source: J. H. Battle, W. H. Perrin, & G. C. Kniffin. Kentucky. A History of the State. Louisville, KY, Chicago, IL: Battey, 1885. Page 1034.