Wallace, Lew

Description

Lew William Wallace was born on September 27, 1918, in Asheville, North Carolina, to Josephine (Parrott) Wallace and Lew William Wallace. He had one brother and two sisters. Lew was a graduate of the Hill School and Yale Law School. In Rye his family lived on Purchase St. and were members of the Apawamis Club.

Lew was the great-grandson of a famous author and soldier, Gen. Lew Wallace, of Crawfordsville, Ind., who wrote “Ben Hur” and was an outstanding officer in the Union Army campaigns of the Civil War.

After over a decade in Rye, Lew’s father sold their house in 1942 and moved to Crawfordsville, IN, the Wallace ancestral home.

Lew enlisted and served in the U.S. Army during World War II. After the war, he went back home to Indiana where he was an attorney and had offices in Indianapolis at the Fletcher Trust building.

His uncle, Robert B. Parrott of Indianapolis, was one of the principal stockholders of the Miller-Parrott Baking Company in Terre Haute, IN. and Lew was elected secretary of the company.

He frequently travelled to Terre Haute for consultation in the affairs of the bakery. Late Friday evening September 17, 1954 after concluding his work at the local firm, Lew spoke to Maynard Spear, sales, department official stating he had to return to Indianapolis to keep an urgent business appointment Saturday morning.

He suffered fatal injuries when his car struck the rear of an east-bound tractor trailer on US 40, a mile east east of Manhattan, IN, in Putnam county, a little more than half way to Indianapolis.

Lew William Wallace, great-grandson of Gen. Lew Wallace, author of ”Ben Hur,” was killed in a car-truck crash on U.S. 40 in Putnam County at the age of 36.

At the time of his death, he was survived by his mother, Mrs. Josephine Parrott Wallace of Southport, Conn., two sisters. Mrs. Nellie Drake of New Rochelle, N.
Y., and Mrs. William Miller of Southport, . Conn., a brother, William N. Wallace, New York City; the uncle, Robert B. Parrott of Indianapolis and an aunt, Mrs.
Mary Parrott Failey also of Indianapolis.

The funeral was held Monday at the Fall Creek mortuary of Flanner and Buchanan with burial in Oak Hill Cemetery, Crawfordsville, IN.