YEARY, MAMIE ANN (1876–1922). Mamie Yeary, compiler of Confederate memoirs, was born on October 10, 1876, to James Knox Polk and Mary L. (Bickley) Yeary of Farmersville, Texas. She grew up in Farmersville in a family and region sympathetic to Confederate ideals long after the Civil War. Due to a long-term physical ailment, Mamie remained with her parents into adulthood, allowing her mother to care for her. The family eventually moved from Collin County to McGregor. In 1912 Yeary published Reminiscences of the Boys in Gray, 1861-1865. This 904-page book comprised memoirs submitted to her by Confederate Army veterans living in Texas at the time of writing. To these records she added the constitution of the Confederate States of America and a complete listing of Civil War engagements. Although the book received minimal attention in Yeary's lifetime, renewed interest in genealogy and Civil War history later in the century encouraged a reprinting. Morningside House, a Dayton, Ohio, publisher, reissued the book with an index in 1986. Mamie Yeary died on June 15, 1922, and is buried in Fairmount Cemetery in San Angelo.
