Kate’s notes: I am aware of a Graniteville, South Carolina but not a town of that name in Georgia. If anyone can provide more information as to the identity of this boy’s family, drop me a line at hpuppet@frontier.com

Telegraph and Messenger
Macon, Georgia
15 July, 1871

SAD OCCURRENCE – A NOBLE BOY. – A very sad accident occurred in the village of Graniteville yesterday. A little girl, the daughter of Mr. John L. Atkinson, while attempting to cross the trestle of the Charlotte, Columbia and Augusta Railroad over the Graniteville Canal, fell in. A small boy, only ten or twelve years of age, named Dempsey Gilliland, saw the child when she fell and immediately leaped into the canal to her rescue. The gallant little hero, though he was only a few years the senior of the little girl, and of a very delicate organization, succeeded in swimming with her nearly to the bank, when her struggles and convulsive grasp caused him to sink with her, and they were both drowned.

-transcription by Kate Maynard, 2012