He was a leader-type Christian follower of Jesus all of his life. He was the grandson of John Shaw, his immigrant ancestor. Ervin was the fifth child & eldest male in the second marriage of David Shaw with Sarah Douglass. He & siblings were orphaned upon his parents' nearly sudden & simultaneous deaths in 1843 when Ervin was 9 years old. The only living older son by his father's first marriage (John Gadson Shaw) migrated to Mississippi between 1841-47. His only other growing-to-adulthood brother (David Calvin Shaw) migrated to Florida. I presume that Ervin first owned his father's home just east of Alligator Branch, on the south side of Brewington Rd., at Shaw's Crossroads.

E. J. Shaw's grandson-to-be, Ervin David Shaw, would be the namesake for Shaw Air Force Base in Sumter, S. C.

He married at age 20 and was a farmer of his share of his father's 2000 acre plantation straddling present-day Shaw's Crossroads.

On Dec. 20, 1860, South Carolina seceded from the USA. On 12 April 1861, the South fired on Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor. Entering war at about age 26, Ervin was in the War Between the States for most of its duration. Enlisting 13 Nov. 1861, he was mustered in on 18 Nov. 1861 in Charleston, S. C. as a 3rd corporal, Capt. T. V. Walsh's Company (Claremont Cavalry), Holcombe Legion. At least as of Nov. 1862, it had became Co. A, Cavalry Battalion, Holcombe Legion, South Carolina Volunteers. The cavalry battalion was later separated out and increased to regiment size as 7th Regiment, S. C. Cavalry. Records show him as a Sgt. in early 1862. Records show him on leave between March/April 1863-June 1863. Daughter Lillie was born the following March but died the same year.

As he left originally for war, he and Lillis already had 4 very young children. Lillis kept his Masonic emblem in case the yankees came to burn the home down (if a Mason were among the yankee band, the home would not be burned). In the March-June 1863 musters, he was home on a sick furlough. While on that leave to home, Lillie (5th child) was generated and born in 1864 (and died very young). Ervin spent most of the War in the Richmond area. As far as anyone knows, Ervin made it through the entire war without injury bad enough to be remembered. But, he was injured returning from war when his mule misjudged a jump across Alligator Branch at the end of his journey home, right there at Shaw's Crossroads! He brought a rifle home from the war which came into the possession of his great-grandson, W. J. "Will" Shaw, Jr. & then to Will's daughter, Lucia. In about 2013, Lucia gave it to her cousin, Dr. E. B. Shaw who...a few years later with Lucia's permission...gave it to the South Carolina Military Museum near Williams-Brice Stadium in Columbia, S. C. It was not a rifle issued by the Confederacy.

Ervin was 4 years ruling elder of Concord Presbyterian Church on the current-day Brewington Road eastward of Shaw's Crossroad. He and Lillis had a total of 10 children.

An (church?) obituary: "In Concord Township, Sumter County, May 18th, 1879, Mr. Ervin J. Shaw, aged forty-five years and six months. His memory is worthy of a brief record to be read by his surviving friends and ___. He was a child of the covenant. His __ was an elder in Concord Church and in ___ trained up in its faith. From his youth to ___, he was upright and honorable _______________ in the spirit of ___. ____ feelings of others and ___. _____________ in patriotic character."

"______ with Concord Church at an early ___________ consistent and faithful to the discharge _____ duties. Though quiet and unob___ __ _s manners,his influence for good ___________ __ause of truth was not less felt by _____. He was like many others financially _____ by the results of the late war; _________ willing to suffer self-denial and do ____________ in order to meet his obligations ____. ____ was elected an elder in the Concord ___. ___ was an earnest and devoted officer ______ the discharge of his duties; generous ______ __rts to sustain the institutions of the ______and faithful in his example of piety ___ all. He loved the worship and services of God's house, and rarely was he absent from them."

"His Christian character ripened and matured gradually under these means of grace and the disciplining hand of the Heavenly Father, for disease was making inroads upon his health, and thus he was being prepared for his early removal. His end though sudden was not unexpected, and we trust that he was ready to meet it. We mourn his loss to our church. His bereaved family mourn their greater loss and by the whole community among whom he lived, he will be greatly missed."

That old single-story, 3 bedroom home (13 foot ceilings) on Brewington Road survived until maybe 1960 or so and was last occupied by a man named Rand Britton. It is marked on the printed 1959 U. S. Army Corps of Engineers map of Sumter County, S. C.