Palestine High School Alumni Association

02 / 11 / 1893  –  01 / 04 / 1973

Burial Here For Library Benefactor 

Lt. Col. William John Blackshear, who would have turned 80 on February 11, died January 4, in a Santa Barbara, California hospital where he long had been a patient.

The decorated World War 1 hero, who had been an Episcopal rector in New York and Austin and in later years operated a rare book shop in Santa Barbara, several months ago donated his private collection of books and memorabilia to the Palestine Carnegie Library.

Born February 11, 1893, in Palestine, Col. Blackshear lived a full and colorful life.

The funeral will be held Monday at 3 p.m. in St. Philips Episcopal Church, with the Rev. Joe Routh officiating. Burial will be in Palestine’s Old Cemetery beside the grave of Col. Blackshear’s father, with Masonic graveside rites.

Member of an old distinguished family of plantation owners, William J. Blackshear was the son of Nathaniel Witherspoon Blackshear and Mamie Elizabeth Rollins Blackshear.

Members of the Blackshear family had two plantations in Leon County, where William spent part of his boyhood. He also lived for a while as a boy with kinsmen in New York who included a cousin whom he called “Big Sister”. She is Mrs. Zuleika Hicks, now of Carmel, California.

He graduated from Palestine High School in 1912 and after World War I graduated from the University of Texas in 1920 with a Bachelor of Literature degree.

His seminary training for the Episcopal priesthood was at Virginia Theological Seminary, from which he received his BD degree in 1924; in 1938, he received his Master of Arts from the University of North Carolina. He received an honorary degree from Daniel Baker College and did graduate work in Harvard University, Oxford in England and Yale University.

He attended the First Officers Training Camp at Leon Springs in May, 1917, receiving his lieutenant’s commission before having finished the training period.

During the war in Europe that followed, Blackshear advanced rapidly to first lieutenant to captain; he had been commissioned in the Infantry.

In 1918, as the war approached its climax, Blackshear on two occasions distinguished himself for bravery beyond the call of duty to such an extent that each time he won the Silver Star Medal, second only to the Congressional Medal of Honor, which in that war only Alvin York and a handful of others lived to wear.

Justly proud of his military career of an unusually varied and active life, Blackshear closed out his war record by promotion to the duties of aide de damp to Gen. U.G. McAlexander, one of the AEF’s great brigade commanders. He retired from military service with the rank of lieutenant colonel.

Returning to his native land, Blackshear, a handsome and extremely charming young man – turned to the Episcopal priesthood after receiving his University of Texas degree.

By his own confession, he did not consider himself a fit spiritual leader. He left that position and moved to California, where he pursued his latter-day role as a bookman. He owned and operated a rare books shop in Santa Barbara for a number of years, adding to his personal collection, which ranged the gamut of literature.

The residue of that unique collection he willed to the Palestine Carnegie Library in a personal and intimate document which was officially accepted and executed by California authorities while he remained a patient in the Santa Barbara hospital.

It bestowed thousands of books, papers, and many pictures to the library, along with a great double door, ostensibly a fabulous relic from a ducal palace in Spain. Col. Blackshear requested that if ever a public art museum is created in Palestine, the ducal palace doors – a gift to him by a close friend from New York – be installed in that museum as his contribution.

Source: Palestine Herald-Press 01-12-1973