Laban Wingate was born in February 1831 in Mississippi to Robert P. Wingate. His father was a farmer who owned $1,000 of real estate by 1850. Wingate grew up and attended school in Hancock County, Mississippi. He married Missouri Carroll, and they had at least six children: Caroline, born around 1853; Frances, born around 1855; Walter, born around 1856; Louisa, born around 1858; Samuel, born around 1864; and Thomas, born around 1868.

 

They lived in Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, and Wingate earned a living as a farm laborer. He served as a 2^nd lieutenant in the Louisiana militia during the Civil War. He apparently moved to Newton County, Texas, during the war. He enlisted in the Confederate army on January 24, 1863, and he mustered in as a private in Company B of the 11^th Texas Battalion. Confederate officials detailed him to the Engineering Department in November 1863. He remained in the army until at least October 1864.

 

Wingate returned to Calcasieu Parish after the war. By 1870, he was working as a lumberman, and he owned $100 of real estate and $200 of personal property. His wife probably died in the early 1870s, and he married Sarah A. Nealy on October 18, 1875. He became a local postmaster in February 1884. By 1900, he was working as a farmer in Upper Sabine, Louisiana. He died in June 1908.

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