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Civil War Blog

A project of PA Historian

“It would have been better if Mr. Ryan had not seized the pistol….”

On 14 March 1901, a Civil War veteran, Charles W. Ryan was shot and killed during a robbery at the Halifax National Bank in Halifax, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, by one of the two men committing that robbery.  Ryan, who was serving as cashier at the bank, was also one of the bank’s founding shareholder members.  […]

Jacob Zerby of Elizabethville – Cavalryman and Blacksmith

Jacob Zerby, Civil war veteran of the 9th Pennsylvania Cavalry, died on 19 November 1913.  His death was reported in the Harrisburg Telegraph of the next day: Elizabethville — Jacob Zerby, a member of Sherman’s Cavalry during his famous march “to the sea,” died of the infirmities of old age yesterday after a year’s illness […]

John W. Simonton – President Judge, 12th Judicial District of Pennsylvania

John W. Simonton, the presiding judge at the trial of Keiper and Rowe, the two Halifax National Bank robbers and murderers of bank cashier and Civil War veteran Charles W. Ryan, was himself a Civil War veteran, having served as a Private in the 1st Pennsylvania Infantry (Militia of 1862), Company K.  The biography and […]

Isaac Lyter, Bank Teller – Another Look

Isaac Lyter (1844-1912) was previously featured here as part of a series of posts on the Halifax Bank robbery.  The following biographical sketch is from the Biographical Encyclopedia of Dauphin County, published in 1896 by J. M. Runk and Company of Chambersburg.  While it sheds little light on his military service, additional interesting information is […]

Civil War Burials in the Halifax United Methodist Church Cemetery (Part 5 of 5)

The Halifax United Methodist Church Cemetery is located at the corner of Rise Street and Wind Hill Drive in Halifax, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania.  The graves of twenty Civil War veterans are easily located in this cemetery.  A prior post described the cemetery and showed old maps with its location noted.  Today, Part 5 of a […]