William Carl Roeck

William Carl Roeck. 1836~1920. Born and educated in Baden, Germany, and educated as a horticulturist, William Carl Roeck arrived in America in 1854 at the age of eighteen and engaged in extensive travels. He later enlisted in the Confederate Army, serving four years in the Second Tennessee Infantry, where he was wounded in the Battle of Chickamauga. At war’s end, he settled in Dadeville, Alabama. In 1874, he married Catherine Elizabeth Sanford. They had two children: Katie (b. 1875), who married A.L. Temples, and Frederick William (b. 1877), who died at the age of fourteen., Local politics dominated much of Roeck’s postwar life. He was elected as a Tallapoosa County Commissioner in 1884 and soon thereafter was appointed circuit clerk by Gov. Edward A. O’Neal. He later received two separate appointments as probate clerk and served again as circuit clerk. Roeck was Master of Dadeville Lodge, No. 71, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and High Priest of Dadeville Chapter, No. 56, Royal Arch Masons, and a member of the Knights of Honor. Listed among the inductees of “Notable Men of Alabama,” he died on October 26, 1920.