Copyright Notice: This article is from the Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, 6 volumes, edited by William S. Powell. Copyright ©1979-1996 by the University of North Carolina Press. Used by permission of the publisher. For personal use and not for further distribution. Please submit permission requests for other use directly to the publisher.

13 Aug. 1842–11 June 1920

See also: The Lost Cause on ANCHOR

Eliza Hall Nutt Parsley, painting, date unknown. Image used courtesy of the United Daughters of the Confederacy North Carolina Division, Inc.
Eliza Hall Nutt Parsley, painting, date unknown. Image used courtesy of the United Daughters of the Confederacy North Carolina Division, Inc.

Eliza Hall Nutt (Hallie) Parsley, founder of the North Carolina Division of the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC), was born in Wilmington. She was the daughter of Louise and Henry Nutt. She was educated at St. Mary's School in Raleigh. On 2 Sept. 1862, she married William Murdock Parsley, a captain in the Confederate army. He was wounded three times during the war and was sent home to recuperate. Near Richmond, Virginia., shortly before Appomattox, he was fatally wounded. Parsley and their two daughters, Amanda and Janie, were then refuging at Sleepy Hollow in Bladen County but soon returned to Wilmington. There she spent the remainder of her life, supporting herself and her daughters by teaching. In 1894 she opened her own school for children at 619 Orange Street.

During the war, Hallie Parsley worked to provide medical care to Confederate soldiers. After the war, she worked with the Confederate Memorial Association of Wilmington. Among other things, its members decorated the graves of the seven hundred Confederate dead there.

There were similar organizations elsewhere in the state and the members learned of the United Daughters of the Confederacy that had been established in other states. Parsley was named chairperson of a committee to inquire about the purpose of this body. She received information, a charter, and authority to establish units in North Carolina from the original chapter in Nashville, Tennessee. In December 1894, she organized the Cape Fear Chapter of the UDC, and in April 1897 she formed the UDC's North Carolina Division. Parsley was the division's first president, a post she held for two years. She soon became a public figure, advising women who wanted to create new chapters, traveling frequently throughout the state and elsewhere on behalf of the UDC. She also was involved in arranging the production of amateur plays, pageants, and musicals in Wilmington in the 1890s.

Parsley spent her final years at her home on Red Cross Street, Wilmington. She died June 11, 1920. An Episcopalian, she was buried in Oakdale Cemetery, Wilmington.

References:

Lucy London Anderson, North Carolina Women of the Confederacy (1926)

Charlotte Observer , 25 Apr. 1937

Confederate Veterans Magazine , 3–4, 6, 8–11, 15, 19, 23, 25, 28, 36, 38 [consult index] (1895–1930)

Eliza Hall Parsley Papers (Southern Historical Collection, University of North Carolina Library, Chapel Hill)

Louis H. Manarin, comp., North Carolina Troops, 1861–1865: A Roster , vol. 3 (1971)

Minutes of the Twenty-fourth Annual Convention of the United Daughters of the Confederacy . . . New Bern (1920)

Raleigh News and Observer , 14 Sept. 1937

Lou Rogers, Tar Heel Women (1949) and "Eliza Nutt Parsley," We the People 3 (November 1945)

Wilmington Morning Star , 12–13 June 1920

Tony P. Wrenn, Wilmington, North Carolina: An Architectural and Historical Portrait (1984)

Additional Resources:

Janney, Caroline E. "The Lost Cause." Encyclopedia Virginia. Virginia Humanities: December 7, 2020. https://encyclopediavirginia.org/entries/lost-cause-the/ (accessed January 21, 2025). 

Medlin, Eric. "Redemption and Redeemers in the South." NCpedia. Accessed on January 21st, 2025. https://www.ncpedia.org/anchor/redemption-and-redeemers (accessed January 21, 2025). 

Medlin, Eric. "The Lost Cause." NCpedia. Accessed on January 21st, 2025. https://www.ncpedia.org/anchor/lost-cause (accessed January 21, 2025). 

Image Credit:

[Eliza Hall Nutt Parsley.] Painting.  Date unknown. Photo courtesy of United Daughters of the Confederacy, North Carolina Division, Inc.  http://www.ncudc.org/NCDivHistory.html (accessed August 14, 2012).

Citation

Powell, William S. "Parsley, Eliza Hall Nutt (Hallie)." NCpedia. Dictionary of North Carolina Biography, University of North Carolina Press. Accessed on February 15th, 2025. https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/parsely-eliza.