Wiley Franklin Jordan, who appeared in Confederate records more commonly as Francis Jordan and sometimes as Franklin Jordan... but never as Wiley Jordan... and in late life was called W. F., was the husband of a granddaughter of Richard White's 3-great grandparents Thomas Prevatt, III, and Elizabeth Ward.   Their daughter Permelia Prevatt married James Joshua Dawsey, and their daughter Harriet Dawsey married Wiley Franklin Jordan in Henry County, Alabama, on 20 January 1859.  (NOTE:  Jordan is pronounced "Jerdan".)

Franklin Jordan was enrolled as a private in the Henry Volunteers, Company A of the 37th Alabama Infantry Regiment, at a date not recorded... but probably on or around 13 May 1862 when the 37th Alabama was mustered in at Auburn, Alabama.  This regiment's records are extremely fragmentary.  What can be determined from those fragments is that Franklin Jordan was captured twice... first at Vicksburg, Mississippi on 4 July 1863, and secondly at Missionary Ridge, Tennessee, on 25 November 1863.  He was transferred as a prisoner of war to Louisville, Kentucky on 7 December 1863 and on 9 December 1863 was sent from there to the Union prisoner of war camp at Rock Isle, Illinois.  He was released on parole at Vicksburg, which meant that he was not to take part in active military operations till he was exchanged, and his Union prisoner of war documentation states that he had taken up arms in violation of his parole.  However, the Compendium of the Confederate Armies states that the 37th Alabama Infantry Regiment was "declared exchanged in November 1863."

The written record of Franklin Jordan's Confederate military service ends with his transfer to Rock Isle POW Camp.  However, he did survive the war, and oral history says that he returned to the 37th Alabama and was present at their surrender at Durham Station, North Carolina, on 26 April 1865.

W. F. Jordan was born in Georgia on 10 June 1833 and married Harriet Elizabeth Dawsey at her parents' home in Henry (now Houston) County, Alabama, on 28 January 1859.  He became a charter member of the Smyrna Baptist Church in Henry County, Alabama, in late June of 1865, was its first superintendent of Sunday Schools, starting on 6 May 1876, and was elected church clerk in 1869... a duty he filled for 25 years.  Harriet Dawsey and her only child died in childbirth on 30 August 1888.  W. F. Jordan later married Lilla Bruce.  He died in Houston County, Alabama, on 21 May 1907.  W. F., Harriet and Lilla are all buried at the Smyrna Baptist Church cemetery.