The DeWane Family

Friday, March 18, 2011

Following the blight of the potato in 1845-1847, starvation and typhus pushed thousands of Irishmen in cheap passage ships to an underpopulated Canada.  An estimated 15,000 died crossing the Atlantic and many more when they arrived in Canada or the United States.

St. Cronan's in Parish Roscrea, Diocese of Killaloe, in county Tipperary, Ireland was the home parish of Denis D-Wane & Mary Maher/Meagher before coming to America around 1851. This picture shows the remaining facade of the monastery that exists on the site of the church. A copy of the record of their son Denis's baptism from March 9th, 1832 is among papers the family has. Other D-Wanes were also baptised there. Dr. Francis Dewane and his wife Mildred viewed the documents during a trip to Ireland in the 1970s.  Photo and description from Dianne Dewane Vadney's web site.

During this time, Denis DeWane and Mary (Maher) DeWane, whom were both born in Tipperary, Ireland, left their home in County Tipperary and with their six children--four boys and two girls--came to America.  The trauma of being uprooted, the long boat journey and the strangeness of the new world were too much for Denis.  He died and was buried in New York state.

Mary and her six children went west to Illinois where Mary succumbed and was buried.  The children came north into Wisconsin and, in 1853, settled in the township of New Denmark.  The six children were:
1)  James married Mary Lynch  (or Lyon?)
2)  John married Mary Finnel.
3)  Timothy, my ancestor, married Bridget Cook.  Bridget Ellen Cook/e was the second child of James and Mary (Burns) Cook/e.
4)  Bridget married Patrick Ryan.
5)  Mary Ann married John Cooney.
6)  Denis married Margaret Scanlan. 


James and Mary DeWane Family



Denis and Margaret DeWane Family

 Timothy and Bridget settled in Franklin where they were among the first settlers of the town.  They purchased a tract of virgin land and transformed it into one of the finest farms in Franklin.   

Timothy and Bridget had eight children: 
1) William married Mary Gorman, no children.
2) Ellen married Walter Duggan, no children.
3) Alice married Pat Shea and had two children--a baby who died in infancy and Roland Shea.
4) Tim married Mary Quincanon and had three children:  Larry, Arleen Farrell and Mary Hogenson. 
5) Thomas married Angeline Bos.  They had five children: Abbot Evermode (Tom) of St. Norbert Abbey; Gordon (Gordy and Tommy DeWane's father); Lois Cawley; Gladys Jentz and Marilyn Marsh. 
6) James married Elizabeth DeBeukelar and had four children:  Walter, Francis, Helen Liedeka and Ethel DeFrance.  (I lived in the upstairs apartment of the home of Ethel DeFrance when I moved away from home at age 18.) 
7) Dennis DeWane never married.
8) Mary Ellen DeWane married Terrence Ambrose Tracy.  They had five children:  Roland, my grandfather; Cyril; Alice Olsen; Ethel Schmidt and Odessa Mueller. 

Bridget (Cook) and Timothy DeWane Family
Left to right behind parents:
Tim, Ellen "Nel" Duggan, Will, Tom, Dennis, Alice Shea, Jim, Mary Ellen Tracy
Mary Ellen is my great-grandmother

Timothy was born April 15, 1834 and died October 10, 1919.  He is buried next to Bridget, who was born May 3, 1845 and died August 9, 1924, in the cemetery at St. James Church in Cooperstown, Wisconsin.


Obituary of Timothy DeWane


Bridget's father, James Cook, died March 20, 1890 at 78 years of age and his wife, Mary (Burns) Cook, who was born August 15, 1822, died October 19, 1902.  They are buried at St. Isadore Catholic Cemetery in Manitowoc County, Wisconsin.

Photos and Timothy DeWane's obituary is from Dianne Dewane Vadney's excellent genealogy website.

On the Hunt for the Elliott Ancestors

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

When you love genealogy like I do, it's exciting to find a new clue about your ancestors.  Unfortunately, sometimes the clue doesn't get you anywhere; it just gives you more ideas for more places to search.  Follow the trail with me as I take an ancestor hunt.       

For many years, I have been looking for the father of Chester Elliott.  In fact, my very first blog entries described the family mystery surrounding his identity.

It is important to identify Chester Elliott to help confirm or rule out the claim that our earliest Elliott ancestors in America were the parents of Deacon Jacob Elliott who came to Boston in 1630.

So, when a google search turned up this listing from the Yearbook of the Wisconsin Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, 1896 for the father of Chester Elliott (as part of the documention for George W. Wing's SAR membership), I thought I was on to something!

Page 104 of the SAR Yearbook lists these details about David Elliott according to the application filed by George W. Wing. 

"...enlisted July 12, 1781 as a fifer in his brother Captain Joseph Elliott’s company of Colonel William Thomas’ regiment of the Massachusetts troops of Sutton, Massachusetts.  David served four months and 23 days in the Revolutionary War. 

Authorities:  War Records of Massachusetts; Records of Sutton"
Massachusetts soldiers and sailors of the Revolutionary War, Vol. 5, pg 287

Armed with this information, I was on the trail.  At least I thought I was.

I looked at the Revolutionary War lists for soldiers from Massachusetts named David Elliott, Captain Joseph Elliott and Colonel William Thomas.  Nothing conclusive jumped out at me.

I looked at the Sutton Vital Records and came up with two David Elliotts:

1)  David, son of Joseph and Jerusha, b. Oct 11, 1734
2)  David, son of Joseph Jr. and Susanna, b. Feb 19, 1766

And two Joseph Elliotts:

1)  Joseph, son of Joseph and Jarusha, b. Nov 17, 1731
2)  Joseph, son of Joseph Jr. and Anna, b. August 19, 1775

One pair seemed too old: 1) David, 47 and Joseph, 50; and the other is definitely too young: 2) David, 15 and Joseph, 6, on the enlistment day in 1781.  While fifers did enter the service as young as age 9, it is impossible that set 2) could be right because this Joseph could not be a captain at age 6. 

Then, assuming that set 1) David IS the father of Chester Elliott and Chester was born somewhere between 1774 and 1780, David would have been 40-46 years old when his son Chester was born and 41-47 when he enlisted in 1781 .  His older brother, Captain Joseph Elliott, would have been about 50 when David went into the service.

To consider if it would have been plausible for David and Joseph to be in the Revolutionary War between the ages of 41 and 50, I read the Militia Act of 1792 (written just 10 years later).  It clarified whom the militia consisted of.  The Act reads: 

"Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, That each and every free able-bodied white male citizen of the respective States, resident therein, who is or shall be of age of eighteen years, and under the age of forty-five years (except as is herein after excepted) shall severally and respectively be enrolled in the militia, by the Captain or Commanding Officer of the company, within whose bounds such citizen shall reside, and that within twelve months after the passing of this Act..."

That tells me it is reasonable that these brothers could be serving at their ages.

Then I e-mailed the Town of Sutton offices and their historical society.  Both responded with suggestions and contact addresses for further research but did not have any information except a record that "a David Elliott" died at age 27, no date of death available.  They had no record for children of David Elliott.

On my next blog entry I'll provide an update on the hunt for the elusive David Elliott.

This information turned out to be inaccurate.  See the post called Elliotts of Sutton, Massachusetts for an update.

My Grandparents

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Roland and Helen (Tooley) Tracy

I found this beautiful family tree form and decided to fill it in--one for my grandmother's ancestry and one for my grandfather's family.

Click on the tree diagram for a close-up view.  Then use the back arrow to return to the blog.

Helen Winifred Tooley Tracy

 My (paternal grandmother's) earliest ancestors to arrive in America (as far as I know with documented proof) were Betsy Benjamin's g-g-g-grandparents, John Benjamin and Abigail Eddye Benjamin.  The Benjamins came from Cranbrook, Kent, England on the ship "Lion" and joined Governor Winthrop's Colony in Massachusetts in 1632.

My grandmother Helen Tooley's great-grandmother, Jane Nelson, who was born in Ireland, was referred to as "Scotch-Irish"--a term descriptive of her Protestant faith rather than her place of birth.  Patrick McDonald was born in Ireland.   Rebecca Page and William James Tooley lived in England (where James William Tooley was born) but I don't know their ancestral parentage.  Ancestors of the Crofoots and the Elliotts came from England. 

Roland Martin Tracy

 My grandfather's grandparents--DeWane; Tracy; Cook/e; and O'Brien families--were all born in Ireland and settled in Franklin and Cooperstown, Wisconsin around 1854.  Bridget Cook was born in County Limerick, Ireland.  Dennis DeWane and Mary Maher were born in Tipperary in Roscrea County, Ireland.   

After the War

Monday, March 7, 2011

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences.

Michael McDonald mustered out on October 9, 1865 at Mobile, Alabama. 

Upon his return to Ahnapee, (now Algoma, Wisconsin), his home, Michael captained the first regularly organized militia company ever perfected in the county.  It was organized in the spring of 1866.  Comprised of late veterans of the Civil War, it numbered some 60 men.  Their uniforms consisted of bright red flannel shirts with black trousers and the company, according to "Pioneer Story" written and printed by George Wing in the Algoma Record Herald in 1914, "made quite a natty appearance when it appeared upon the streets for drill."

Veterans, who were bonded like brothers by their Civil War experiences, held reunions for many years after the war. 

Michael McDonald (center) and his brother John (right)

In the summer of 1866, at 21, Michael married Ella Louise Elliott, the 17 year-old daughter of George W. and the late Juliana Elliott on July 23 in Ahnapee. 

The Civil War had taken a toll on Ella's family as well.  All of her four brothers: David, 26; Charles, 20 (of the Iron Brigade); Park, 17; and Irving, 16, served in the Civil War.  Only two returned.  Park was killed on the battlefield at Chaplin Hills, Kentucky on October 8, 1862.  Charles was wounded but recovered and went on to be a prominent newspaperman in Pennsylvania.  Irving was in Washington, D.C. and shouted with the others as President Abraham Lincoln and his wife passed on the way to Ford's theater and wept with the rest of the soldiers as they passed his bier where the body of the martyred president lay.  A month later Irving, in the 32nd Wisconsin, took part in the Grand Review.  A printer, Irving was also in the newspaper business and published the Algoma Record from 1908 to 1918.  He was the oldest surviving Civil War veteran of Kewaunee County and perhaps the oldest Mason (member of the Masonic order) in years of membership at the time of his death in 1941.  (Read Irving Elliott's letters home from the war here.)  David never came home.  Some claimed that David deserted over a disagreement with his superiors.  He may have died--as so many soldiers did--from illness.  I've never found a definitive explanation for David's disappearance.      

Charles Elliott of the Iron Brigade (from THE OWL)

(The amazing story of Park Elliott is told in my September, 2000, volume 3, issue 9 of Family Times, "Ancestor Anthology--Park Benjamin Elliott:  A Boy Lost Too Soon.")

After the war, Michael, barely 21, bought the Sherman House and became a hotel proprietor, then sailed upon the lake on the "Bessie Boalt" and fished for a few years with his brother John (the one-armed ship captain who lost his arm in the Civil War) and bought and attempted to clear a farm near Brummer's Mills.  Then Michael conducted a store in the village and, finally, studied law and opened a law office with Judge Parker.  He was a police justice of Ahnapee and deputy sheriff of Kewaunee County and active in politics.  He established and edited the Algoma Press and finally, broken in health, almost totally blind, and so deaf that he could only hear with the greatest effort, and stricken with paralysis, he gradually dropped out of the life of the town.  He died at the National Soldier's Home in Milwaukee on May 20, 1914 at age 69.
       

Michael McDonald

The End.

The Grand Review

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences. 

At the close of the war, a Grand Review of the Armies procession was held in Washington D.C. to honor the troops with the soldiers parading before dignitaries including President Andrew Johnson (Abraham Lincoln was assassinated the month before).  Here is Michael McDonald's personal account of that day, May 24, 1865.

The Grand Review (photo from Wikipedia site)

I have a distinction that I desire to lay claim to at this time.  I was the last man to pass the reviewing stand on the day of the historic Grand Review at Washington at the close of the war.  It happened this way.  Company E was the only company in its regiment to make the through trip with Sherman (William Tecumseh Sherman) on his memorable march, and it had been attached to the 1st Missouri Engineers in charge of the pontoon train.  At the Grand Review, the pontoon corps brought up the rear of Sherman's army--the engineers marching ahead and the wagons following.  The 1st Missouri Engineers was a good regiment but it had never been in battle, while Company E had memories of Shiloh, Corinth, Vicksburg, Atlanta, and a score of lesser engagements, and so, in our soldier pride, we refused to march with our Missouri command, detaching ourselves from the regiment and falling behind the wagons.  There were only 30 or 40 of us but on that day we were the veteran 14th Wisconsin Infantry, and I was the last man in the company ranks.


                                                              Michael McDonald

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The Final Days

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences.

Captured by the Confederate soldiers, Michael McDonald was sent to the Salisbury Prison.

...woke up the next morning to find ourselves at Salisbury--Salisbury notorious for its rebel prison pen!...


But only a day or two before our arrival, Kilpatrick had been through there with his Union troopers and had burned the prison stockade.  We were marched out to the prison grounds, a dead line established, and guards stationed around us.  We were the last guests at this celebrated southern hostelry upon ground that ought to be sacred in American history; where thousands of our brave fellows had suffered death by starvation.  Heretofore we had shared rations with our guards, but now we were placed upon the regular Salisbury diet--a pint of corn meal per day!  The lack of water was the cause of our greatest suffering.  Plenty of good water could be had just outside the prison grounds, but although the agonized cry of "water! water!" went up from three or four hundred parched throats hourly, it was not brought to us nor were we permitted to go for it,  and were obliged to content ourselves with what could be found in the stagnant pools within the grounds.  A young lady living in the vacinity subsequently told me that distressed by the cries of the suffering prisoners, she had repeatedly sent her colored servants with supplies to relieve their thirst, but that the guards invariably refused them admission. 


Luckily our days of imprisonment were to be few.  The southern confederacy was falling to pieces around us.  Day by day we observed that our guards treated us with increasing consideration, respect and deference.  And then the joyful hour came when they stacked their guns and shouted across the dead line, "Johnson's army has surrendered!  We are the prisoners and you are free!"


Perhaps we didn't cheer!

(Shirley's note:  Perhaps this was not "Johnson's army, but Confederate General Joseph Johnston's army that surrendered?  General Robert E. Lee surrendered to General Ulysses Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia on April 9, 1865.  News, however, didn't travel fast.  According to war department documents, Michael McDonald was taken prisoner near Raleigh, North Carolina four days later, on April 13, and returned to duty April 30, 1865.)

Given our liberty, we wandered around the houses of the neighborhood in search of something to eat, and were generally treated kindly.


Transportation was finally furnished us to Raleigh by rail and we bade Salisbury and its hateful memories anything but a fond adieu.  As our train passed by a camp of confederate soldiers we could not resist the temptation of cheering.  Exasperated by our elation, some of the men in camp seized their guns and poured a volley into our crowded car, seriously wounding two of our number.  It was the last time I was under fire from the guns of the Southern Confederacy in four years' service.


Arriving in Raleigh, Pete and I found that Company E was encamped four miles out from the city and we set out to make the distance afoot.  Both were weak from our prison diet and it took us many hours to make the journey, but by dint of frequent rests and helping each other along we finally came within sight of the camp and our ears were greeted with the shout, "Here comes Mike and Pete!" and the boys came streaming out to meet us.  We had to fight them off and keep them at a distance, while we called for water and clean clothes.  We were literally alive with vermin.  But a bath in a neighboring creek, wholesome (food and clean) clothing and the services of Sloggy, the company barber, soon made us presentable.  And it was thus that the bummers of Company E got back to camp.

Click here for next entry.

Taken Prisoner

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences.

This is how he was taken prisoner. 

One night the bummers of Company E failed to return to camp and were not heard from officially for several days.  It was during the closing hours of the dying Confederacy;  the day after Sherman's army left Goldsboro, closing in upon Johnson.  The company commissary was well stocked and Captain Henry had told us we need not go out that day, but the spirit of adventure and habit was upon us.  My regular partner, Joe, concluded to stay in camp and Pete Staley volunteered to accompany me.


The morning was wet and misty as we rode up to a plantation some distance in advance of the army.  Owing to the dampness, we thought it advisable to examine our weapons and we had just finished overhauling and re-loading our revolvers and I remarked to Pete, as we returned them to their holsters, "Now we are good for half a dozen Johnnies," when we discovered about that number of horsemen, enveloped in their ponchos, riding toward us from the direction we ourselves had just come.  Believing them to be a party of bummers out for forage, we permitted them to ride up to us unchallenged.  When close to us, half a dozen revolvers flashed in our faces and a demand was made upon us to surrender. 


All sorts of "horse play" was common among the bummers themselves to get the advantage over rival parties, and only a short time before I had heard of a party being captured by another party of their fellow raiders and having their revolvers taken from them.  Believing this to be a similar attempt upon ourselves, I reached around for my weapon with the laughing remark, "Well I suppose you want our revolvers."


"You needn't mind pulling the gun, Yank; just unbuckle the belt and pass it over," observed one of the men covering me.  At the same time their ponchos were thrown back revealing the Confederate uniform.  That settled it.  We were prisoners.


"Got any money?" was the next demand.  We emptied our pockets.


Our captors soon started on with us to join their command.  During the course of the day this same party picked up a federal lieutenant and two men and we had company.

Confederate Currency

The next day they sold my horse to a farmer for $3,000 in confederate money.  About the same time a ragged-rebel soldier with exceedingly dilapidated foot-wear came up and looking me carefully over with a speculative eye, said:  "I reckon them shoes of you's will fitten me Yank.  Pull-em off an' let's see."

I reluctantly took off my shoes, and he very deliberately proceeded to try them on.  They evidently fitted, for he threw his old pair of holes at me with the remark, "I reckon we'll trade even, Yank."  The humor of the man still pleases me.


The second day we were taken into Hillsboro, where about eighty Union Prisoners had been collected.  While going into town we saw the streets and side-walks lined with citizens and soldiers and at a distance of a block or two from us a carriage was slowly driving through the streets in which were seated two men, one of whom appeared to be bowing, gesticulating and talking to the assembled crowd as he passed along.  Our interest in this scene was intensified when our rebel guards told us that the talking man in the carriage was President Jefferson Davis, taking his farewell leave of Johnson's army.  He had then fled from his captured capitol and was making for a place of safety with the archives of the confederate government.  We then knew that our days of captivity would be few. 


We were put aboard the cars at Hillsboro and started south, not knowing our destination, but woke up the next morning to find ourselves at Salisbury--Salisbury notorious for its rebel prison pen!  The cold shivers ran up and down my spine at the name. 

Click here for next entry.

Reminiscences of a Bummer

Sunday, March 6, 2011

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences.

His own words continue with his explanation of the realities of the war.  Among his responsibilities was helping to provide for the troops when they were cut off from the supply base.  Please keep in mind what was acceptable language in the 1800s and the dire needs of the soldiers when you read this account.  Here is Michael's story--his "Reminiscenses of a Bummer."
 
From Atlanta down to the sea and northward, my comrade Joe Deffoe and myself had been detailed as the official foragers of Company E.  We were two of that necessary and much talked about, somewhat unique branch of the military establishment of the civil war known in history as "Sherman's Bummers."


The great army cut loose from its base of supplies at Atlanta and marched into the vital parts of the Confederacy, depending upon the country it passed through for its daily food.  It was our business to get this food for Company E and it has never been charged that the supply failed.  Our duties were hazardous and always exciting.  The retreating rebels were but a few miles in advance of us.  It was our daily business to mount our horses and start out in the morning to visit the neighboring farm houses, keep along in the advance of the army and return into camp at night with our plunder.  Skirmishes between the bummers and the enemy were of daily occurrence and our risk of being captured great, but we enjoyed the exciting experience.  The race among the bummers to first reach a plantation caused them to take many chances.  We usually found no one at home but the women and the colored folks, the provisions hid, and the darkeys willing to give away the hiding place under threat or promise to take them along with us.


One day's experience will suffice for many.  My associate bummer and myself rode up to a planation house, dismounted, make a careful search of the house, barns and outbuildings but found nothing eatable.  Finally we caught a colored boy and a conversation like this followed:


"Sam, where are those hams?"


"Fo' de Lo'd, massa, I, douno."


"Yes you do, you black rascal.  Tell us where those hams are."


"But my massa don' shore kill dis here darkey if he ebber tell about dem 'yar hams."


"But we'll kill you if you don't.  See here, Sam; tell us and we'll take you along up north."


"Shore, massa, wont yo' do dis boy no ha'm and tak him norf wid yo's?"


We solemnly promise.  Sam finds a shovel and leads the way to the smoke-house.  The floor is removed and a few feet beneath the surface half a wagon-load or more of ham and bacon are found securely buried. 


"Now, massa, I'm gwine ter show yo' wher' dat ches' am buried."


And with visions of buried treasure, we follow Sam out into the fields and stand by while he unearths a large wooden chest, which, upon investigation, we find contains a few silk dresses and other female finery, an old fashioned white stove-pipe hat and an antiquated swallow-tail dress coat. 


That night the foragers of Company E drove into camp upon a wagon loaded with hams, bacon, cornmeal, poultry, vegetables and other luxuries of the season.  The wagon was drawn by a mule and the mule was driven by Sam.  The writer was attired in the swallow-tailed coat and white plug-hat, and Joe, his fellow bummer, in an equally fantastic costume. 


We fulfilled our promise to Sam.  He came North as the servant of Major Worden, commanding our battallion of the 14th Wisconsin. 


But one night the bummers of Company E failed to return to camp...

My next blog will describe the story of his capture and imprisonment.

Click here for next entry.

Predominating Impressions

Thursday, March 3, 2011

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences. 

In another of the amazing stories, Michael McDonald shared a second "Predominating Impression."  In his own words...

...It was at the crossing of the Saluda River; the day before Sherman’s army captured the city of Columbia.

All the way from Atlanta down to the sea and on the march northward, I had been the boatman of the pontoon train of the 15th and 17th Army Corps. Our Company had been temporarily attached to the 1st Missouri Engineers, and captain Henry, knowing of my experience as a boatman on Lake Michigan, had recommended me for this somewhat hazardous position.


It was my particular business to run the first line across the unfordable rivers we came to with a light skiff. With this line the heavy pontoons were placed in position. Thus it happened that during the entire march, I was the first man to cross the rivers we came to. With rear guard of the retreating enemy lurking in the bushes of the opposite bank to oppose a crossing, you can well imagine that my duties were no sinecure, and were not considered conductive to long life.


Sherman’s army had arrived in front of Columbia, and, as usual, the bridges had been burned to prevent us from crossing the river, or rather, rivers, for the Saluda empties into the Broad opposite the city, and it was necessary for our army to cross both streams.


The enemy were stationed in a thicket a short distance back from the high bluffs of the opposite shore, prepared to resist the crossing. The scene was somewhat spectacular. Our army lined the river bank and Logan, the “Black Eagle,” was there in person to superintend operations. The prospect of being the central figure for the next few minutes in what appeared certain to be a tragedy had no particular charm for me at the time.


To a surety, the rebels under cover on the other shore would make every effort to kill the boatman and prevent the line from being run. I had been in several unhealthy localities before during the great rebellion, but I think now, after mature reflection, that I shook hands with Death at the Saluda River.


But under the eye of Logan and in the face of the army, it required more courage to flunk than it did to cross the river.


My skiff was carried down the steep banks on the shoulders of the men and before it touched the water it had been perforated by two rebel bullets. I made my preparations carefully, jumped into my frail craft, took the oars and pushed into the stream. My friends and fellow countryman, have you ever been upon the water in a summer hail-storm? If you have, you can comprehend what happened around me for the next two or three minutes, or until I could get under the shelter of the opposite bank. That I survived the fusilade is one of the incomprehensible mysteries of life. Logan ordered up a battery and drove off the enemy.


The line was fastened upon the hostile shore, the pontoons were laid and the army crossed over. That night I ran another line across Broad River, and early the following morning Sherman’s army marched into Columbia.


My boat was perforated by several bullets. The boatman came off without a scratch, but he has a powerful impression that the late Southern Confederacy meant to do him some harm on that particular occasion.

Click here for next entry.

In His Own Words

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences.

Some of my best treasures are the stories written by my ancestors about their pioneer lives.  Among my favorites are those written by Michael McDonald.

Once, when asked “What one incident in your life as a soldier made the greatest impression upon you?” he wrote the following piece for the family newsletter, The OWL.

The low rumble of heavy guns in action came down the river in the early morning from Shiloh—twelve miles away. The battle was on! A thousand boys, fresh from the farms and pineries of Wisconsin, listened with hushed voices to the deep intonations of war!


All the morning long we bent the straining ear to catch the ominous sounds that came from afar and clamored with our officers to be taken to the scene of the combat. Later on in the war we would have used more prudent discretion, but at that time the Fourteenth Wisconsin Infantry had yet to win its title of the "Fourteenth Wisconsin Regulars."


Fresh from the North, a few days before, we were doing guard duty at Savanna. We had no particular business at Shiloh, and possibly might have kept out of the fight, but we argued the matter with our captains, and the captains with the colonel and the colonel with the general. About noon there came an order for us to exchange places with a regiment on its way up the river to the front, and soon afterward, embarked upon a transport, we swung off into the river. At last we were going to the place where there was real war!


It was eleven o’clock at night when we pulled in to Pittsburg Landing. Beuel's army was coming to the rescue. Steamboats were discharging their cargos of human freight; shouts, commands, cries, confusion! In the midst of it all down came a heavy rain-pour that lasted all the long night. We went shore in the darkness and rain, and saw dense masses of men cowering under the river banks. It seemed as if the whole of Grant’s demoralized army was there, but there are still other thousands, up over the banks, out in the darkness of the woods valiantly holding the shattered lines.


We march over and through the skulkers and jeer them for their cowardice as we pass. They shout back at us: "You will all be here to-morrow night!"


We are taken up over the muddy banks out into the woods beyond the landing and halted and there we stood, at "secure arms," in mud ankle-deep, in the darkness and drizzling rain through the long hours of the night.


Who that spent that vigil of the night upon the battlefield of Shiloh will ever forget it! Around and behind us lay Grant’s tired and shattered army. In the dark woods before us were the victorious rebel host, massed, as we fancied in imagination, for a sudden midnight assault. We pictured the dead and wounded in the uncanny and weird shadows of the forest and wondered what the morrow would bring forth for us. The long ranks of the regiment were strangely silent. There had been considerable loud talk on the steamboat that afternoon coming up the river, but now, in the awful presence around us, each man was busy with his own thoughts. I was only a lad of sixteen then, but a thousand memories of home and friends by the far-away blue waters of Lake Michigan hurried across my mental vision. Occasionally during the night, a shell from the federal gunboats howled and shrieked over and through the woods on its way to the rebel lines, and then, again, some excited picket would discharge his gun at some spectral or fantastic shadow in the darkling shades of the bushes. And so the long night wore away; daylight came, and with it, action—a blessed relief to our overstrained nerves.


We were ordered to advance. The first sight of the horrors of war, were two dead men setting up against a tree with their brains oozing out and spattered over its trunk—the work of a cannon ball.


That night we stood around the captured cannon of the famous Crescent battery—our trophy after three desperate charges—and shouted ourselves hoarse. Our ranks were a little thin and one could walk across the open field we had just crossed upon winrows of dead bodies; we had had nothing to eat since noon the day before, but in the delerium of our first victory we recked not—we had passed through the baptism of fire; we were soldiers at last!

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Wisconsin Before the War Between the States

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences.

Wisconsin, in the year 1860, was a fledgling state just a dozen years past the inception of statehood. Economic problems and political conflicts plagued the state and the response to the abolition movement and the call to defend the union were met with a mixture of substantial vigor and patriotism, and conversely, revolt and apathy.

The state’s populace was made up primarily of eastern Yankees and newly settled Europeans and totaled 775,881. Although a few slaves had been used in the mining industry, less than 1% of the population had been born in the slave states. Blacks of African descent totaled 1,171 (1860 census), less than .2% of the total population. Almost all blacks in Wisconsin were American born. Native American populations were not accurately enumerated. Germans, Norwegians, and Irish were the primary immigrants with most people living along Lake Michigan or in the southern counties and clustered in groups with others of their own nationality. This diverse population reacted differently to the abolition movements of the 1850’s.

Wisconsin had become a leader in state’s rights in defying federal authority and opposing the institution of Negro slavery. Additionally, liberals and reformers who fled Germany after collapse of the revolutionary movements of 1848 actively supported abolition. On the other hand, many Wisconsinites had no use for abolitionists. Negrophobia abounded among the foreign-born residents.

Some newspapers fueled the bias. They editorialized that the state’s Republicans were “know nothings” who believed that the Negros were born to command equally with native white men—superior to the German, French and English races. They insinuated that political equality would mean social equality. One Madison paper asked, “Shall Negroes marry our sisters and daughters and smutty wenches be married to our brothers and sons?”

The Republican papers countered these raw racial slurs. One paper declared “All men are created equal” is the first proposition in our political catechism and there is no reason why the few hundred persons of African descent who reside in Wisconsin should be denied its benefits, except a stupid prejudice, which every sensible man ought to be heartily ashamed of.”

But the state’s economy caused people to fear for their livelihood. Most German and Irish Americans feared emancipation of the slaves would release a flood of cheap labor into the North, cutting living standards even lower.

Times were difficult. The banking system was unstable and there was significant political conflict between the Dems and Republicans including temperance issues.

For the election of 1860, Dems were split within their party—some supporting Stephen Douglas while those loyal to Buchanan felt obligated to oppose Douglas. Republicans were confident.  Abe Lincoln’s name wasn’t even mentioned even though he had visited Milwaukee, Beloit and Janesville.  Closer to the election, Republicans became more inclined toward supporting the Lincoln ticket. They approved of the homestead and ‘no slavery in the territories’ platform. They identified with Lincoln who was a Westerner and common man. Republicans carried the state.

Lincoln’s election brought immediate action by South Carolina to call special conventions for secession. Then Alabama and Mississippi followed as well as other deep Southern states.

Wisconsin residents worried and disagreed about the action that should be taken by the government in response to Southern secession.  They echoed Horace Greeley who said “let the wayward sisters go in peace.” But Wisconsin Governor Alexander Randall said, “Wisconsin would never consent to a disunion of the States.” He opposed slavery and secession. Randal could foresee the coming war. He urged the legislature to strengthen militia laws and ready the state for war.

In 1860, 42 uniformed volunteer companies at various levels of efficiency were organized and armed. They were comprised of free white males from 18-45. But they were far from ready for war. The main purpose of these companies seemed to be to manufacture military titles for aspiring politicians. On the local level, they were social clubs and parade units. The companies obtained their own uniforms which varied in color. The state was to supply muskets for infantry and cannons for artillery units. The typical company seldom met to drill but Wisconsin was in a a better position of readiness to meet Lincoln’s call for troops than any other Midwest state.

Word reached Milwaukee and Madison on April 14, 1861 that South Carolina troops attacked Fort Sumpter. Lincoln called for 75,000 troops to address the “insurrection.” Newspapers whipped up emotion and citizens sponsored war or indignation meetings. All ideas of compromise were dismissed. The slavery issue was overshadowed. The rebels had started the war and Wisconsinites vowed that right must prevail. They were ready to go to battle for honor. Patriotism and loyalty boomed. Once organized, troops left to the sound of church bells, bands, cheers and, of course, tears.

There were many reasons why men enlisted. Some for the money—soldier’s pay and the bounties offered. Some sought adventure and travel, even the free food. Patriotism and personal achievement were also motivators.

Not all men were eager to enlist. Some were cynical. They felt the war didn’t serve the Union, just the officers, speculators and dealers. They didn’t want to fight for the Negroes. Emancipation didn’t concern many soldiers, but for those that it did, it didn’t necessarily mean they had sympathy for the slaves. Some felt slavery was the cause of the rebellion and should be abolished, but they wanted to get rid of both slaves and the Negro and favored colonization. They objected to having freed blacks among them.

The war both unified and divided the populace. Soldiers joined in comradeship, but not always in purpose. They differed in why they fought, in their response to the South, and their opinions of the southern people. Citizens and troops disagreed about army politics, party politics and military leadership. The stories of Wisconsin’s response to abolition, slavery and the Civil War are as many-faceted as the people themselves.

My next post will share the personal war-time experiences of my g-g-grandfather Michael McDonald, in his own words.

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Michael McDonald's Civil War Experience

Michael McDonald photo taken in Vicksburg, 1863

In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, I would like to honor my great-great grandfather Michael McDonald in a series of blogs including his written accounts of his Civil War experiences.     

The year was 1861.  Barely 16 years-old, "Mike" McDonald tramped down the beach from his Algoma home to Manitowoc to get a chance to enlist with Sloggy, Bill Fagg, the Perry boys and others in the "Manitowoc and Wolf River Rifles."  On October 8, 1861, he enlisted as a private in Company E, 14th Wisconsin Infantry.  Four long years later, he mustered out at the close of the war, October 9, 1865.

Michael McDonald served valiantly in Company E at Shiloh, Corinth, Vicksburg, Atlanta, and all the way down to the sea with Sherman.  One of the most successful of "Sherman’s bummers," he told tales of keeping the commissary of Company E well supplied with the delicacies of "Dixie."  He also shared harrowing stories of illnesses and near death experiences including the time, in the closing days of the war, when he was made a prisoner and confined in the Salisbury prison pen.

Join me as I share his Civil War experiences.

Michael McDonald's Civil War Discharge

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