We met Dr. James A. Battle, born in Wilson in 1885 to Parker and Ella Battle,here. His granddaughter, Mae Castenell, recently shared several family photographs.
Dr. Battle and wife Della Plummer Battle. Della Battle’s sister was E. Courtney Plummer Fitts, who lived in Wilson.
The Battle house on West 4th Street in Greenville, North Carolina. The Battles and their young daughter Ella are seated in the lawn.
Dr. Battle, seated at left, with an unknown group of young African-American men.
Born in 1885 to Parker and Ella Daniel Battle, Battle graduated Leonard Medical School at Shaw University in Raleigh and soon established a practice in Greenville, North Carolina. In 1914, he married Della Mae Plummer of Warren County. They had one child, daughter Ella Elizabeth. Dr. Battle is credited as the first African-American physician to gain practicing privileges at Pitt County Memorial Hospital.
Greenville News, 23 February 1918.
Death certificate of Ella Lea Battle, Dr. Battle’s mother. Dr. Battle served as informant for the document, and Dr. Michael E. DuBissette, of Afro-Caribbean descent, certified it.
Pittsburgh Courier, 27 June 1953.
Journal of the Old North State Medical Society, volume 3, number 1 (October 1953).
Dr. J.A. Battle’s home at 1208 West 4th Street, Greenville. Photo courtesy of B. Forbes and published here.