PAUL S. KING, a leading citizen of Leighton, and a member of the mercantile house of F. R. King & Co., the largest house of the kind in the place, was born in Lawrence county, Ala., July 20, 1849. He is the son of Hartwell R. and Mary H. (Smith) King, the former of whom was a native of Wake county, N. C., born in 1820, and the latter of Lauderdale county, Ala., born in 1830. she is the daughter of John and Susan Smith. The grandfather of Paul S. King was Hartwell King, a native of North Carolina, who reared a large family and died before the war. His widow died in 1871 aged eighty-eight years. The father of Mr. King entered the confederate service as a member of Captain Parker Rand’s company and served until the close of the war. He died December 11, 1872, and his widow still lives. There were eight sons and one daughter born to the, three of the sons and the daughter being still alive, viz.: Paul S. and F. R., of Leighton, W. O., living in the vicinity of Nashville, Tenn., and Susie, wife of George Gilchrist, of Courtland, Ala. Paul S. King was reared in Lawrence county on the farm. His early education was secured at the common schools, and he then graduated from Bryant 7 Stratton’s business college in St. Louis in 1870. The same year he commenced business as a general merchant at Leighton, where he has ever since remained in the same business and has also carried on farming and stock raising to a considerable extent. While Mr. King has never been an aspirant for public office he has always taken an active interest in politics and public affairs of the county and state, and has rendered his party assistance both in time and money. In politics he is a democrat, and he is a member of the Masonic fraternity, of the Knights of Pythias and of the Knights of Honor. He was married in 1876 to Miss Debbie E. Simmons of Iuka, Miss. She died December 25, 1879, leaving two children, one of whom survives. IN 1882 Mr. King married Miss Steppi L. Pickett, daughter of Judge R. O. Pickett, of Florence, Ala., and by this marriage has four sons.

[SOURCE: Memorial Record of Alabama. A concise account of the state’s political, military professional and Industrial progress, together with the personal memoirs of many of its people. In Two Volumes. Illustrated. Brant & Fuller, Madison Wis., 1893. Volume I. pp. 694 – 5.] 

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