He originally opposed secession, but heartily sustained the decision of his State, and in 1861, though far past the age for military service, accepted the position of paymaster of the army, under Magruder, on the peninsula. He served in this capacity until the reorganization, when his physical condition made it imperative that he should retire from active duty, but he retained his rank of major during the existence of the Confederacy. He died in 1868, leaving his widow, Ann Massenburg, daughter of William Massenburg, a merchant of Hampton. She was born in 1816, married in 1833, and after a noble and devoted life died July 17, 1897, at which time seven of the eleven children who were born to her survived.
Captain Richard M. Booker, oldest son of the foregoing, was born at the family home, two and a half miles from Hampton, February 3, 1837. He was educated at the military academy of John B. Carey, at Hampton, and in William and Mary college. So full of faith was he in the justness of the Southern cause and so enthusiastic in its support, that he left home and kindred in February, 1861, to enlist in the Confederate service in Georgia. In March he became a private in the Oglethorpe Light infantry, organized at Augusta under Captain Clark. The company went into rendezvous at Macon, was assigned to the First Georgia regiment, and thence ordered to the navy yard at Warrenton, opposite Pensacola. In July the command was ordered to Richmond and Private Booker went ahead in order to visit his parents, then in refuge at Williamsburg. On rejoining his regiment, he found awaiting him a commission as lieutenant in the regular army, C. S. A., which had been forwarded from Montgomery. He was at once detailed as drill-master at Camp Lee, and later ordered to report to Captain Todd, a half-brother of Mrs. Lincoln, with whom he served until February, 1862; in the conversion of several tobacco warehouses at Richmond into military prisons. He subsequently served for several months upon the staff of General McLaws, at Yorktown, and assisted his father in the duties of paymaster under General Magruder until just before the battle of Williamsburg, when he was ordered by the secretary of war to Richmond, where he was appointed assistant provost-marshal for the western district of the city. He rendered faithful duty in that capacity for more than a year, after which he served until November, 1863, as a member of the general court-martial of the Confederate army, under Colonel Nolan. Then applying for orders to the field, he was promoted captain and assigned as adjutant of the post at Fort Caswell, at the mouth of the Cape Fear river, under Col. T. M. Jones. He continued in this duty and that of boarding officer for the blockade-running squadron until Christmas, 1864, when, being crippled by rheumatism, he was carried under fire of Butler's guns to Wilmington, and thence to Petersburg, where he lay in hospital for some time. He left Petersburg with the army, was captured in Amelia county, April 6th, but escaped and was paroled at Richmond two weeks later. The devotion which characterized his entrance into the Confederate service was manifested throughout his military career. He was an able, conscientious and useful officer, and did his whole duty in whatever capacity he was called upon to act. His career since the war has been quite successful. He left the farm in 1870 to enter the oyster trade at Hampton, in which he continued ten years, and then gave his attention to the manufacture of brick, which he has developed into
