Stories from the Great War: Private Zebedee Haywood
In late September 1918, Talladega’s newspaper, Our Mountain Home, issued a somber notice on the death of Private Zebedee Haywood. Born on September 21, 1898, in Coosa County, he was the firstborn son of Phillip and Loula Haywood. His young parents were sharecroppers who married the previous year. By 1910, the Haywoods were living in Clay County. Phillip Haywood worked in a sawmill and Loula took care of Zebedee and his three younger siblings. To help support his family, twelve-year old Zebedee “hired out” as a farm laborer.
By the time he enlisted in the U.S. Army in May 1917, Zebedee Haywood’s family had relocated to a rural section of Talladega County, where his father had resumed farming. Haywood was assigned to Company B of the 167th Infantry, the fabled Rainbow Division. He departed for France from New York in November 1917.
On July 26, 1918, in the midst of the Rainbow Division’s fierce fighting during the Battle of Croix Rouge Farm, Zebedee Haywood was killed. The regiment succeeded in forcing a German retreat, allowing the Allies to cross the Ourcq River, who thereafter routed the German troops from their entrenched positions in France. But it was a costly battle; over 150 Alabamians died that day alongside Haywood.
Readers of Our Mountain Home read of Haywood’s death on September 25, four days after what would have been his twentieth birthday (it erroneously lists his death as July 31.) In noting Haywood’s sacrifice, the paper quoted from a letter that Sergeant Edward R. Wren wrote about his friend in the weeks before he died: “In case you or father have the opportunity, please tell Zebedee Haywood’s people that he is well and happy, and just as good a soldier as ever wore the khaki. We are all proud of him in the company, and all Talladega should be proud of him. He always wears a smile and cheers up all who see him, regardless of the number of shells and how close.”
Talladega County was proud indeed of Private Haywood and the nine other local men who were killed in the Great War. In February 1920, the local American Legion post hosted a ceremony presenting the Gold Star families with memorials supplied by the French government. Sergeant Wren served as master of ceremonies. In 1923, civic clubs in the county created a memorial garden in honor of the men.