Obit – Mrs. Debra Courtney

Mrs. Debra Courtney of Carthage was pronounced deceased at 7:38 a.m. Thursday morning August 17, 2023 at the Riverview Regional Medical Center E.R. after going into cardiac arrest at her Jefferson Avenue West home. Mrs. Courtney was 65.

Mrs. Courtney was at the Carthage Chapel of Sanderson Funeral Home and had requested to be cremated. The cremation was performed at the Cumberland Family Services in Algood. 

Memorial services from the East Carthage Missionary Baptist Church are scheduled to be conducted on Saturday morning August 26th at 11 a.m. with Eld. Rickey Hall officiating assisted by Bro. Harold Halliburton.

The family will receive friends at the church on Saturday morning from 10 a.m. until the memorial services at 11 a.m.

She was born Debra Louise Smith in Noblesville in Hamilton County, Indiana on October 2, 1957 and was the daughter of the late Ralph Eugene Smith who died at the age of 61 on January 20, 1986 and was preceded in death by her mother, Mary Lou Chaffin Smith, only twenty three days earlier and who died at the age of 84 on July 25, 2023.

Three half-sisters preceded her in death, Patricia Ann Smith Robertson, Shirley Jean Smith Yancey who died April 8, 2011 at the age of 66 and Dimple Dean Smith Featherstone who died December 25, 1993 at the age of 47.

She attended Smith County High School and received her General Education Degree.

In Hinesville, Georgia she was united in marriage to Benny Eugene Courtney on January 30, 1987.

Mrs. Courtney was a paralegal for seventeen years employed in the law offices of Esq. James Dance in Carthage.

Surviving in addition to her husband Benny, of over thirty six years, is a brother, Travis Smith and wife Betty Gillespie Smith of the Rawls Creek Community; nephew, Matt Smith and wife Vanessa of the Hogans Creek Community; four fur babies, Miley, Bailey Ann, Ashlee Grace, and Abbigail.

The Courtney family requests memorials to the Smith County Humane Society.

SANDERSON of CARTHAGE