| History and Genealogy | |
Jefferson County, Iowa BiographiesJames A. Brannon Although still a young man, the gentleman whose name heads this personal history has accomplished much in the way of securing for himself a good home and competence, gained through strict attention to his duties in carrying on successfully a thirty-acre farm on section two, township seventeen, range thirteen, in Valley county Nebraska. The greater part of his life has been spent in that state, and he has become well and favorably known to all residing in the vicinity of his home. James A. Brannon was born in Fairfield, Iowa, on December 18, 1868. His parents died when he was but eighteen months old, and he was adopted at that age by Mr. and Mrs. Lemuel Cross, who came into Hamilton county, Nebraska, in 1879, bringing our subject with them, and his early education was acquired in the schools of that county, later attending the Valley county schools, as the family moved to the latter county in 1884. At the age of twenty-one James went into Custer county and pre-empted eighty acres in Sargent township, although he still made his home a part of the time in Valley county with his foster parents. Mr. Cross served all through the civil war. He was a member of Company E, of the Second Iowa Infantry, and achieved considerable distinction as a brave soldier. He died in July, 1881, and left behind him many sincere friends in Hamilton county. His widow now resides at Comstock, Nebraska. On April 19, 1893, Mr. Brannon was married to Sylvia E. Green, who was born and raised in Valley county, a daughter of Joseph and Emeline (Van Horn) Green, they being early settlers in the locality. The father was a native of New York, while the mother was born in Ohio, her parents moving to Clinton, Iowa, while she was a girl. Mr. and Mrs. Brannon have one son, Riley U. Brannon, who lives at home, and also Elsie M., an adopted daughter. The family have a very pleasant and comfortable home, consisting of thirty acres of the original Green homestead, the estate lying one and a half miles south of North Loup. Mr. and Mrs. Brannon are members of the Seventh Day Baptist church. He affiliates with the Modern Woodmen of America, and is a populist and prohibitionist in political views. [Compendium of History, Reminiscence and Biography of Nebraska, 1912, submitted by CD=FOFG] George T. Chapman George T. Chapman is a native of Jefferson county, Iowa, where he was born on October 12, 1864, and is the son of Benjamin F. and Mary E. (Cooley) Chapman, the former of the same nativity as himself and the latter born in Indiana. The father was a farmer in his native state, but believing in the possibilities of the father west, in 1868, he brought his family to Colorado and settled them near Canon City. For a number of years thereafter he was occupied in freighting out of that city to Fairplay and other points, working hard at his business but making good profits from his labor. He died at Canon City in 1881, and three years later the mother moved with her children to Mesa county, where in time she became the wife of James L. Duckett, a sketch of whom will be found on another page of this work. His educational advantages were few, however, as he was obliged to go to work for himself at an early age and continue to make his own living from that time on. When he was but fifteen he owned a team and freighted between Canon City and Leadville, the intervening country then being wild and unsettled and his business being almost every hour fraught with danger and excitement. At the age of seventeen he sold his outfit and found employment on a ranch in Wet Mountain valley; and two years later he rented land in that valley which he farmed on his own account until 1884. At that time he moved to Mesa county with his mother and younger brother, and soon afterward he rented land near his present home and engaged in farming continuing his operations in this way for a number of years. In 1892 he bought twenty acres of the land on which he now lives, subsequently adding by another purchase the other ten. To the improvement of his farm he has sedulously devoted his energies, and it is now one of the choice farms of the neighborhood and is enriched with a comfortable cottage dwelling and other necessary buildings. Mr. Chapman was married on November 28, 1888, to Miss Martha A. Smith, who was born in Marion county, Illinois, on April 12, 1869, and is the daughter of Robert and Anna (Ferguson) Smith, the former a Kentuckian by birth and the latter a native of Illinois. The mother died when Mrs. Chapman was about seven years old, and in 1880 the father came to Colorado and became a farmer in Wet Mountain valley. Two years later Mrs. Chapman joined him there, and she has been a resident of this state ever since. He died at Pueblo in 1898. Mr. and Mrs. Chapman have two children, Elsie and Roy Manson. Mr. Chapman is a Prohibitionist is politics and he and his wife are charter members of the Methodist Episcopal church at Bethel, which they helped to organize and of which he was one of the first trustees. He is still serving the church as a trustee and is one of its most zealous and useful members. [Progressive Men of Western Colorado, Publ 1905. Transcribed by Kim Mohler] Rev. Harvey D. Crumly The offspring of Quaker parents, and bred in the lessons impressively inculcated by the members of that faith, Rev. Harvey D. Crumly, of Mesa county, living on a good ranch six miles northwest of Grand Junction, has exemplified in his life the principles of peaceful industry, fair dealing and considerate interest in the welfare of mankind which distinguish the sect. He was born in Jefferson county, Iowa, near the village of Pleasant Plain, on February 2, 1868, and is the son of Isaac H. and Rachel (Beals) Crumly, natives of eastern Tennessee, where they were reared and educated. From there they accompanied their parents, respectively, to Jasper county, Iowa, and there, soon after reaching years of maturity, they were married. In a short time after their marriage they settled on a farm in Jefferson county, that state, where the father died in 1896. The mother is still living there on the old homestead. The father was held in high esteem in the county and was chosen to administer some of its official duties from time to time, serving as county surveyor for twelve years. He had been previously married and had four children by the first union. Of the second marriage there were seven children, six of whom are living, the Rev. Harvey being the fifth born. He was reared in his native county and attended the public schools there, afterward taking a course at the Pleasant Plain Academy, being graduated there in 1890. He then entered Penn College at Oskaloosa, from which he was graduated in 1895. For three years thereafter he was principal of the Haviland (Kansas) Academy, and to the duties of this position he brought the wisdom gained in teaching two years previously during the vacations in Iowa. In October, 1898, he came to Colorado and located in Mesa county where he taught school two years. He then bought the farm of thirty-one acres on which he now lives, making the purchase in December, 1898. Two years before, in the fall of 1896, he had been ordained minister in the Friends church, and in 1903 he served the church at Glenwood, Iowa, as its pastor. With the exception of that year, he has resided on his ranch ever since purchasing it. But his interest in the church has never waned, and he has devoted his energies to its welfare in the section of his present home, helping to organize a mission of the Friends at Pomona schoolhouse, of which he is now pastor. His ranch is devoted principally to fruit. He has eighteen acres of apple and peach trees, nearly all in good bearing order, and a considerable space in strawberries. His business is prosperous and its returns are commensurate with his efforts and intelligence in conducting it. On August 5, 1897, he was united in marriage with Miss Olive Folger, a native of Illinois, but reared and educated in Kansas. She is the daughter of the Rev. Thomas and Josephine (Cutler) Folger, natives of Illinois, the father being a minister in the Friends church. They reside near Carthage, Missouri. Mr. and Mrs. Crumly have one son, Lorenzo T., now five years old. In politics Mr. Crumly is independent, a Prohibitionist in principles. He and his wife have passed many of their winters in evangelistic work, devoting their summers to their ranch, on which they have recently completed and now occupy a comfortable and convenient residence. [Progressive Men of Western Colorado, Publ 1905. Transcribed by Kim Mohler] Currency A. Gummere A stanch veteran of the Civil war, where he shouldered the musket of freedom and did the service of a patriot, shedding blood for the cause, and later assisting in various places to develop and build up the country that he had helped to save, and now one of the substantial and leading agriculturists of this county, we are pleased to grant to this gentleman a representation in his county's history, where he is eminently entitled to consideration. Mr. Gummere was born in Clarke county Ohio, on March 22, 1842, being the son of Harlan and Mary A. Gummere. The father was a carpenter and in politics an active Republican. The family removed to Indiana soon after the birth of Currency and there he received his first schooling audience, later they removed to Jefferson county, Iowa, and two years later to Oskaloosa, farming in both places. In 1859 they returned to Illinois. In 1861, at the age of nineteen, our subject enlisted in an Iowa regiment, having been twice rejected previous to that in Illinois on account of his size, or rather lack of size. His was in the Sixth Iowa Infantry and he was soon plunged in the famous battle of Shiloh, where a musket ball pierced his lung and he was placed in the hospital for recovery but soon he was out and with the boys again handling the weapons of warfare as skillfully as before. At Kenesaw Mountain he stopped another Rebel bullet, this time in his left shoulder, and again he was sent for healing in the weary war hospital. He seemed to devote his energies to healing for soon he was out and this time just soon enough to join his command in the famous march to the sea. He staid in the conflict until the conflict was no more and then received an honorable discharge at Louisville, Kentucky. And for this loyal service he is now drawing a pension of seventeen dollars per month, which is dearly bought money. He left the ranks for the prairies of Illinois and two years later, at Champaign, in that state, he married Miss Elizabeth Huston, the date of that happy event being March 14, 1867. Six years later they removed to Aurora, Nebraska, and farmed a homestead for ten years, after which they went to Valley and did well in the stock business and farming for six years and then sold out and went to Sheridan county, and pre-empted a quarter and thence in 1893, they came overland to Latah county. He has a good farm six miles northeast from Moscow, and raises oats, hogs and horses and is prosperous and well to do. The subject of this sketch and his estimable wife have become the parents of eighteen children, twelve of whom are living, as follows: William H. married and in Oklahoma; Sheridan A., in Nebraska; Lottie, wife of Harry Hodden, in Colorado; Orison O. in Alaska; Anna M., wife of A. J. Draper, of Moscow; Daisy, wife of Oscar DePartee, in Moscow: Nellie, wife of Frank Frazier in Latah county; Currency I. in Whitman county, Washington; Ida, wife of Gene DePartee; Frank R., in Montana; Mabel H. and Leonard R., at home. [An Illustrated History Of North Idaho Embracing Nez Perces, Idaho, Latah, Kootenai, Shoshone Counties, State Of Idaho, Western Historical Publishing Company, 1903, submitted by Barb Z.] Owen W. Hoskins The fast-fading race of western pioneers, whose history at different time and places has varied in incident and feature but has been the same in privation, danger, heroic endurance and magnitude of achievement, is an oft told tale which never loses its interest, has an illustrious member in the person of Owen W. Hoskins, of Mesa county, this state, and others in his parents and other members of his family, This story is one of continual aggression against the wilderness and its savage denizens, and an unebbing tide of conquest over tremendous odds, where the spread and perpetuity of human civilization was the stake, and wherein men, beasts and nature herself seemed arrayed in arms against the aggressors. Their paths were choked with difficulties, but their bodies and souls were hardened to meet them; they were beset with dangers, but these were the very spice of their lives; and the wilderness, rough, harsh and inexorable as it was, had for the hardy pioneers, fired with the spirit of conquest or the hope of gain, charms more potent in their seductive influence than all the lures of luxury and sloth. And the work of these conquering armies endures among us in busy cities, mighty marts of commerce, enormous industrial activities, and rich, powerful and beneficent commonwealth bright with all the radiance and fragrant with all the flowers of the most advanced and progressive civilization to which they opened the way. Mr. Hoskins was born at Pleasant Plain, Jefferson county, Iowa, on November 26, 1864. He is the son of Ellis and Ruth (Jones) Hoskins, the former of whom was born in Ohio and the latter in Indiana. They became residents of Jefferson county, Iowa, in 1839, and were married there in 1844. They were pioneers in that region and had the usual experiences of the class on the frontier. The woods were full of wild beasts and wilder men, the soil was resolute in its tendency to natural luxuriant and untamed growth and yielded tardily to systematic culture. And the conveniences of life were almost wholly lacking. The father was a farmer and took up extensive tracts of land, at one time owning four hundred acres, and brought them to fertility and bountiful productiveness, reaping rich harvests of profit from his labors and becoming wealthy after the manner of his day and locality. The most of his land is still in the possession of the family, belonging now to his children. He died in the home of his choice on January 16, 1879. His widow survived him twenty-five years to the very day, passing away on January 16, 1904. Both were members of the society of Friends. They were the parents of twelve children, of whom the first and second born are dead. Owen was next to the youngest of the family. He grew to manhood on the paternal homestead and was educated in the public schools and at Pleasant Plain Academy, remaining at home until he was twenty-four, when he married. His father died when the son was fourteen and after that the sons carried on the farming operations. After his marriage Mr. Hoskins of this sketch bought eighty acres of the home farm and farmed it four years. He then sold it and moved to a farm which he purchased in Wayne county, Iowa, but soon afterward returned to Jefferson county, and for three years was successfully engaged in the real-estate business at Fairfield. In September, 1903, he came to Colorado and located in Mesa county, where he bought for eight thousand dollars the fruit farm of eighteen acres on which he now lives, one mile and a half north of Grand Junction. His land is all in fruit, apples, peaches, pears and plums, with a considerable acreage in small fruits, and his crop of 1903 paid him twenty per cent, on his whole investment in the property. On January 26, 1888, he was married to Miss Josie Jones, a native of Brighton, Iowa. They have three children, Mary E., Hugh and Esther. In politics he is a stanch and active working Republican, and in church affiliation is a Presbyterian holding an active membership in the church at Grand Junction. [Progressive Men of Western Colorado, Publ 1905. Transcribed by Kim Mohler] Allen G. McClelland Allen G. McClelland son of J.C. and Elizabeth (Fox) McClelland, was born July 12, 1860 in Mercer County, Missouri. He was married September 07, 1884, to Mary N. Boyd, daughter of Charles and Susan (Atkinson) Boyd. They have twelve children living, one dead: Alva Earl, born June 28, 1774, died December 17, 1888; Enola B, September 15, 1887; John, December 01, 1889; Frances E., December 29, 1891; Charles B., November 16, 1893; Robert B., September 15, 1895; William W., May 29, 1897; Mary M., April 25, 1899; James C., December 22, 1900; Allen G. Jr., November 08, 1902; Madge N. July 12, 1907; Geanell E, April 20, 1909. Mrs. McClelland was born June 06, 1864 at Lineville Iowa. Mr. McClelland moved with his parents to Decatur, Iowa, when only one year old. They lived there two years, then went to Fairfield, Iowa, remaining there until the spring of 1866, when they moved to Adair County, Missouri. He lived at home till about grown, then went into the railroad train service, working for several different companies. He worked at this for thirteen years, then in February 1889, quit railroading, returned to Adair County, and resumed the occupation of farming. He has been there since that time. In 1904 he formed a partnership with Dr. Halladay, in his big farm. They own 480 acres, eight miles northeast of Kirksville. The home is no doubt the best country home in this county, or one of the best in North Missouri. It has twelve rooms besides basement, all of them large. It is thoroughly modern in every way, having its own light, heat and water plants. There are two bathrooms, concrete walks, fountains, etc. He raises Shorthorn and Hereford cattle (running a dairy), and Berkshire hogs. [The History of Adair County Missouri, by E.M. Violette, 1911, submitted by Desiree Burrell Rodcay] C. M. Parr This gentleman, who is one of the leading members of the bar in Butte and is also interested in the mining industry and fruit culture, has lived in three states of the American Union and had a varied and instructive experience in each. He therefore entered upon his professional career with a broad knowledge of men and the springs of action that animate them, and with extensive information of the country, and the pursuits and customs of its people in different and widely separated localities. For from his youth he has been studious and observant, laying all the lessons of experience to heart and making the most of them for his own advantage. He became a resident of Hamilton, in June, 1912. Mr. Parr is a native of Jefferson county, Iowa, where his life began on September 2, 1859. He is a son of William and Susannah Parr, both of Pennsylvania. The father was born at Uniontown, Pennsylvania, but both he and his wife passed the greater part of their lives in Iowa, and both died in that state, well esteemed by the people among whom they lived and labored, and known far and wide for their uprightness and usefulness. Their son, C. M. Parr, received his academic education in the public schools of Burlington, Iowa, and in 1885, came west as secretary to the superintendent of the Oregon Short Line Railroad. His residence during this employment was at Pocatella, Idaho, and there he remained three years, acquiring a good knowledge of the railroad business and also of western country, as his duties obliged him to spend much of his time in travel. The life had variety and spice enough in it to give it zest for him, but he had aspirations to become something more than a clerk, and bent his energies toward the goal of his desires. In 1888 Mr. Parr came to Butte and the next year was appointed court reporter for the fifth judicial district of Montana. This position proved to be the very avenue to his ambition that he needed, and he made progress toward the destination he aimed at during every hour he occupied it and with all the powers and facilities at his command. While he occupied the office he studied law with diligence and acuteness, and on completing his preparation in 1893 was admitted to the bar. He has ever since been actively engaged in the practice of his profession, with a steadily growing clientage and a steadily rising and extending reputation as a lawyer and counselor. In obedience to the bent of his mind and his interest in the welfare of his state and country, Mr. Parr has always been very active in political affairs. For a number of years, during the infancy of the party in this country he was a leading Socialist in his locality. But he is now affiliated with the Republican party and is loyal and serviceable to its principles and candidates from the conviction that their supremacy will afford the best guarantee of good government, local, state and national. Mr. Parr has, however, allowed neither professional claims nor political contentions to employ all his time and faculties. He has a business turn of mind, as well as a professional one, and he has given it scope also. He has bought a fine fruit farm, the home of the late Marcus Daly, three miles from Hamilton, Ravalli county. Mr. Parr intends to move to this farm at an early date, and make it his future home. In the fraternal life of the community, Mr. Parr has taken an active part as a Woodman of the World and a Modern Woodman of America. In the former of these two fraternities, he holds the rank of past commander of Camp No. 153, Butte, and in both his membership is highly valued because of his enterprise in their behalf and the intelligence with which his efforts are directed. While he seeks no prominence in them, he has an earnest desire to make them as influential for good and as useful as possible, and he works for them effectively with these ends always in view. On July 1, 1891, he was united in marriage with Miss Olive May Sweet, the daughter of Oliver and Mary E. Sweet. The father was a pioneer in this part of Montana, locating in the Alder Gulch, in 1865. He joined the Vigilantes, and gave them the aid of his best powers in their efforts to suppress lawlessness and rid the region of road agents and other criminals, when the arm of the law was too short and too feeble to deal effectively with them. Mr. Sweet also figured conspicuously in the Indian wars of this section, always holding himself in readiness to obey any call to duty for the safety and well-being of its people. Mr. and Mrs. Parr have one child, their son Chadwick. The father is considered not only one of the leading lawyers of Butte, but one of the best and most progressive citizens of Montana, and is esteemed in accordance with this high rank, which, however, is well deserved and has been fairly won. ["The History of Montana" by Helen Fitzgerald Sanders, Volume 3, 1913 - Sub. by Denise Hansen] Frank Simmons For a period of nearly thirty years Frank Simmons, an active, energetic and progressive ranchman of Delta county, living and conducting a prosperous business a mile and a half from Cory of the Grand river, has been a resident of Colorado, having come into the state in 1876. He has lived in various places in the commonwealth and taken part in a number of its leading industries. He has therefore an extensive knowledge of its people and their occupations, and also a good record of industry and citizenship to his credit. The place of his nativity was Jefferson county, Iowa, and he was born there on March 1, 1855. His father, William R. Simmons, a native of Tennessee, moved to Iowa at the age of nineteen years, and there he met with and married Miss Salatha Crenshaw, who was born in Illinois. They were industrious and well-to-do farmers in Iowa, where the father died, the mother now living. In 1873, when he was eighteen years old, and after receiving a common-school education, their son Frank left his father's home and started out in life for himself, going to Nevada where during the next two years he occupied himself in prospecting, teaming and ranching. In 1875 he returned to Iowa, and in the spring of 1876 once more turned his face toward the setting sun, joining the stampede to the Black Hills where he mined until fall. At that time he came to Colorado and took up his residence in Douglas county. During the first three years he worked in the employ of a large cattle man, then engaged in freighting between Leadville and Colorado Springs. In the spring of 1880 he bought a team, and locating at Leadville, passed three years teaming in and around that busy and prolific camp. In 1883 he moved to Grand Junction, the next year to Delta county, where he improved and sold a ranch, and in the fall of 1884 when to Sagauche county and started an enterprise in the cattle industry which he carried on until 1889, when he returned to Gunnison county, and after prospecting there four years, located at Lake City, where he remained until 1901. He then changed his residence to Delta county once more, and in the spring of 1903 bought his present home, a ranch of sixty acres, which he is steadily improving and getting in order for raising vegetables on a large scale. He has a portion of the land in alfalfa and much of the rest is devoted to growing potatoes. On November 27, 1899, he was married to Mrs. Lucinda Flanary, a native of Illinois and a widow with one child dead and five living, one of whom has a home with Mr. Simmons. In national politics Mr. Simmons is a devoted member of the Democratic party, but in local affairs his first concern is the general welfare and advancement of the community, in which he takes an active and helpful interest. He is prosperous in business, enterprising in the development of the section of his home, faithful in all the duties of citizenship and generally well respected by his fellow men. [Progressive Men of Western Colorado, Publ 1905. Transcribed by Kim Mohler] Mrs. Alta H. Sullivan Mrs. Alta Haskell Sullivan, of Fairfield is one the women to whom has been given the highest honor in the gift of the members of the Iowa grand chapter Order of the Eastern Star, that of worthy grand matron. She was born in Monroe county, Iowa, July 28, 1864, the daughter of the Hon. Lorenzo Osborn Haskell and Angelina Bay. She was educated in Howe's Academy and in the Iowa Wesleyan University at Mt. Pleasant. Howe's Academy was one of the oldest preparatory schools in Iowa, and the Iowa Wesleyan is the oldest University in Iowa. In recent years the two schools have been combined. Mrs. Sullivan also attended the State University of Nebraska at Lincoln. For two years she was principal of the schools at Almena, Kansas. On Oct. 24, 1887, she was married to William Parris Sullivan, at her home in Norton, Kans. She is a member of Log Cabin Chapter, D. A. R., her mother being of Revolutionary descent. She joined Original A, chapter of P. E. O., in the days when it was a college sorority. She is a patroness of Achoth Sorority, of Iowa City. For many years she has been a prominent member of the Order of the Eastern Star, serving as grand matron in 1912-13. Her compilation of the memorial given at the grand chapter in October, 1913, is especially admired by the order. She is now chairman of the Board of Custodians of the Order. Mrs. Sullivan has fine literary taste and is a woman of wide reading along many lines. She has a fine appreciation of art. She believes that women have the inalienable right to franchise and should be given the privilege. She is a careful housekeeper and a devoted home-maker, and the other things among her activities have been incidental to her home-making. [The Blue book of Iowa Women, by Winona Evans Reeves, Publ. 1914, Transcribed by Sally Masteller] Benjamin F. Walker One of the early settlers of Cushing, was born in Iowa in 1843, and is a son of Jesse C. and Angeline (Ownesby) Walker, of French and Scotch parentage. The Walkers settled first in Virginia, and from there the grandfather of Benjamin, Joseph Walker, moved to the Green river section of Kentucky when it was only a territory. His father served in the war with Mexico, and died shortly after his return home. Jessie C. Walker was born and reared in Kentucky, and when he reached the age of twenty-one years he came with his mother to Illinois and settled in Pittsfield, Pike County, where he remained ten years. He next located in Jefferson County, Iowa, where he entered land for one dollar and a quarter per acre. This part of the state was then wild and unsettled, and the place he first entered in 1839 is the ground on which now stands the city of Fairfield. He lost the first entry through some error of the land office, and later took another one hundred and sixty acres close to where the town was afterward built. He converted this land into one of the finest and best improved farms in that section of the state, and lived there many years. In 1805 he moved to Neosho County, Kansas, and took up another unimproved farm of one hundred and sixty acres. He made improvements, and when the price of land advanced and people began crowding in he sold his farm and removed farther west, into Cowley County, Kansas, where he subsequently died, leaving his wife and children. Two years later his widow died on the same farm. Of their ten children nine grew to maturity. They are: Emily, deceased wife of George Peck, of Indianola, Iowa; Nancy, who married first Marion Martin and for her second husband Henry Martin; Martha, deceased wife of Ephraim Routson, whose children are scattered; Thomas, an old soldier who lives in Grant County, Oklahoma; Benjamin F.; Joseph G., deceased; James, of Pierce, Colorado; Mary, wife of Elias Weidner, of Chandler, Oklahoma; Eliza, wife of M. I. Boyles, of Clashing; and William, of Mulhall, Oklahoma. Benjamin F. Walker received his education in the country schools of Iowa, supplemented by a term at Howes Normal College at Mount Pleasant, Iowa. When eighteen years of age he entered Company F of the Fourteenth Iowa Infantry, and was in the Sixteenth Army Corps. Besides numerous small engagements Mr. Walker participated in the following hard-fought battles: Fort Donelson; Shiloh, where he was wounded in the thigh, taken prisoner, sent to Memphis and transferred to various places, until reaching Macon, Georgia, where he and many others were paroled. Two months afterward he was exchanged and returned to his old command. At the time of his capture the whole regiment was also taken, among them General Prentice, brigadier commander. Although history reports that the general surrendered at one o'clock, this did not actually take place until six P. M., although from twelve until six he held no communication with the main army. After rejoining his old command Mr. Walker fought in the Meridian Raid, leaving for Meridian from Memphis, and a number of serious encounters took place, the principal one being battle of Meridian. After this the regiment was changed from Sherman's Division and they were detached with General A. J. Smith's army, operating mostly along the Red River in Louisiana, under General Banks and Mr. Walker was under the immediate command of General Smith. The first battle was at Fort DuRussie, where Smith's men had been sent; the Federals took the Rebels in the rear, and with a yell captured the fort; the enemy were not even able to use their siege guns. They afterward proceeded with Banks up the Red River, and the next engagement was the battle of Pleasant Hill, where Colonel Newbold of the Fourteenth Iowa was killed. Continuing up the river, they were within seventeen miles of Shreveport when Banks ordered a retreat, and for the next thirty-one days they were under fire from the pursuing Confederates until they reached the Mississippi. The boats were loaded with cotton and the soldiers marched through the swamps on foot; here the Rebels returned to upper Louisiana. About this time the time of the Iowa Fourteenth had nearly expired, and they were ordered to Davenport, Iowa, to be mustered out. When they arrived at St. Louis General Price of the Confederate army was making his last raid through Missouri and Kansas, and the regiment was asked to assist in driving him south, which they did, and followed him to the Big Blue, near Kansas City. They afterward proceeded to Davenport, and were discharged in November, 1864. Mr. Walker's brother Joseph was severely wounded at the battle of Pleasant Hill by a bursting bomb, which tore away a portion of his scalp and a part of his foot. At the close of the war Mr. Walker returned to Henry County, Iowa, and that fall was married, after which he moved to Kansas and settled on raw land in Neosho County. He entered this land from the government, and after slightly improving it sold the same and moved to Cowley County, Kansas, and there pre-empted one hundred and sixty acres of raw land, on which he made valuable improvements. He afterward sold this and located in Madison County, Arkansas, where he took up a homestead and remained five years. Returning to Cowley County, Kansas, he again pre-empted land, this being in 1876, and remained there six years. He then settled at Winfield, Kansas, on a piece of land which he made the finest fruit farm in the county, remaining there ten years. He located in the town of Hoisted, and a short time later removed to Payne County, Oklahoma, where he improved eighty acres of fine land, and then sold it and located in Cushing. He settled in Payne County in 1895, and in 1901 came to Cushing. It was then the old town of Cushing, and when the new town was organized in 1902 he continued in the old town. He has become a prominent citizen, and is actively interested in public affairs. Politically Mr. Walker is a Republican. He is a member of Cushing Post Number 54, Grand Army of the Republic. Mr. Walker married, in Des Moines, Iowa, Letitia, daughter of Abijah and Mary Hartley, natives of Ohio and early settlers of Iowa. Mr. and Mrs. Walker have eight children, namely: James and Edwin, of Payne County; Jessie; Mary, wife of Levi Pearson, of Kansas City, Kansas; Mabel, wife of John Service, of Supply, Oklahoma; Winfield, of Cushing; Benjamin A., of Supply, Oklahoma; and Letitia E., wife of L. Heavner, of Payne County. [Submitted by Dale Donlon] 
Copyright © Genealogy Trails | ||
