Wiley M. Belsher was born in Tennessee around 1827 to Wiley Belsher and Eliza Hardin. His father was a farmer who owned at least $4,000 in real estate and at least one slave. The family moved to Mississippi sometime in the 1830s. Belsher married Louisa Clayton on August 12, 1853, in Carrollville, Mississippi, and they had at least two children: Alma, born around 1855; and Eliza, born around 1856. By 1860, Belsher was living in Carrollville, Mississippi, where he worked as a farm laborer and owned $250 in personal property.

 

Belsher enlisted in the Confederate army on August 1, 1861, and mustered in as a private in Company A of the 4th Mississippi Infantry later that day. According to his service records, he was 5 feet, 10 inches tall, with brown hair and a dark complexion. The regiment took part in the Battles of Chickasaw Bayou, Port Gibson, and Big Black river Bridge before being captured at Vicksburg in the summer of 1863. The men were eventually exchanged and returned to duty, but Belsher was captured again near Corinth, Mississippi on October 6, 1863. He spent the winter of 1863-1864 in the prison camp near Alton, Illinois, and the Union army transferred him to Fort Delaware, Delaware, in March 1864.

 

Belsher may have been released soon afterward. Confederate military records show him mustering into Company D of Ham's Mississippi Cavalry Regiment on April 30, 1864. By October 1864, however, he was apparently back in Fort Delaware. He was released from prison on June 11, 1865, after swearing an oath of allegiance to the federal government.

 

Belsher returned to Mississippi after the war and worked as a clerk. His wife Louisa died on December 27, 1867. Belsher retired from work sometime in the 1870s, and by 1880, he was living with a brother in Columbus, Mississippi. He apparently disappeared from the historical record after 1880.

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