John L. G. Williams was born around 1833 in South Danvers, Massachusetts, to Henry and Mary Williams. His father worked as a stone cutter. Williams attended school in Essex County, Massachusetts, before beginning work as a shoemaker. He married Mary Elizabeth Walcott on November 28, 1857, but she may have died shortly afterward. He married Ann Greenhalgh in Salem, Massachusetts, on April 11, 1860. They lived in South Danvers, and Williams owned $50 of personal property in 1860. Their daughter Mary Ann was born sometime in 1861, but she died of convulsions only ten days later.

 

Williams enlisted in the Union army on September 20, 1861, and mustered in as a private in the 2^nd Massachusetts Sharpshooters later that day. The company was attached to the 22^nd Massachusetts Infantry soon afterward. Williams fell ill with typhoid fever during the summer of 1862, and he was sent to the hospital at Harrison’s Landing, Virginia, on August 11, 1862. Doctors sent him to New York, and they eventually allowed him to return home to South Danvers to recover his health. Military officials mistakenly labelled him as a deserter on October 3, 1862. Williams wanted to rejoin his regiment in November 1862, but a local doctor insisted that the “continuance of the diarrhoea and attending debility disqualified him.” He recovered by March 1863, and by May 1863, he had returned to duty. His health, however, remained poor, and army officials sent him to the hospital again in May 1864. He mustered out on October 17, 1864.

 

Williams moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, after leaving the military. His wife Anna apparently died around the mid-1860s, and he may have married a woman named Mary soon afterward. Their son Harry was born around 1868. By 1870, Williams was working as a laborer in Philadelphia, and he owned $600 of personal property. He died sometime after 1874.

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