William Ruffin was a graduate of the University of Mississippi at Oxford and also of the University of Virginia. He obtained a law degree from Cumberland University, practicing a short time, when he was elected secretary of the Memphis Gaslight Company, of which his grandfather, a very wealthy financier, was a charter member, and for several years its president. Upon the death of his grandfather, William Ruffin was elected to the same position and for some years controlled the States of Mississippi, Tennessee and Arkansas, in the interest of the Missouri Valley Life Insurance Company. In January 1858 he married Sarah Shelton White, daughter of David Shelton White and Catherine Elizabeth Rucker White at the home of the bride's father in Panola County, Mississippi. The Rev Stephen G. Starks performed the ceremony. The young couple's fathers went together to purchase the Linwood plantation for them as a wedding gift. When the War started, Ruffin enlisted in Company B, Wood's Cavalry Regiment as a Private. He eventually made the rank of Captain and worked with the Commissary. They had three children who lived to adulthood: David White, Rosa May, and Katherine Rucker Ruffin. Once again from DW Ruffin's family memoirs: "My father was a fluent speaker and a born leader of men. He was mayor of the town of Enid, Mississippi for a number of years before his death, and was Mayor of the town when the district convention was held at Charleston, the county seat of Tallahatchie County, which nominated J.N. McCloud of Enid for the state senate of Mississippi ... Senator McCloud, after my father's death and the death of his first wife, married my father's youngest daughter, Katherine Rucker Ruffin."
William Ruffin was a graduate of the University of Mississippi at Oxford and also of the University of Virginia. He obtained a law degree from Cumberland University, practicing a short time, when he was elected secretary of the Memphis Gaslight Company, of which his grandfather, a very wealthy financier, was a charter member, and for several years its president. Upon the death of his grandfather, William Ruffin was elected to the same position and for some years controlled the States of Mississippi, Tennessee and Arkansas, in the interest of the Missouri Valley Life Insurance Company. In January 1858 he married Sarah Shelton White, daughter of David Shelton White and Catherine Elizabeth Rucker White at the home of the bride's father in Panola County, Mississippi. The Rev Stephen G. Starks performed the ceremony. The young couple's fathers went together to purchase the Linwood plantation for them as a wedding gift. When the War started, Ruffin enlisted in Company B, Wood's Cavalry Regiment as a Private. He eventually made the rank of Captain and worked with the Commissary. They had three children who lived to adulthood: David White, Rosa May, and Katherine Rucker Ruffin. Once again from DW Ruffin's family memoirs: "My father was a fluent speaker and a born leader of men. He was mayor of the town of Enid, Mississippi for a number of years before his death, and was Mayor of the town when the district convention was held at Charleston, the county seat of Tallahatchie County, which nominated J.N. McCloud of Enid for the state senate of Mississippi ... Senator McCloud, after my father's death and the death of his first wife, married my father's youngest daughter, Katherine Rucker Ruffin."
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