Civil War Blog

Posted By Norman Gasbarro on April 5, 2016

Daniel Williard is buried at Zion (Klinger’s) Cemetery at Erdman, Lykens Township, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania.  His grave marker is a government issue stone which notes that he served in the 177th Pennsylvania Infantry, Company I.

Daniel Williard is honored on the Lykens G.A.R. Monument.  He’s named as a Private who was a member of the Heilner Post.

From the grave marker, it is clear that Daniel Williard served in the war. Since he died on 5 December 1885, prior to 1890 when the requirements were liberalized to include old age as a valid reason for a pension, it is not unusual that there is no record that he applied for a pension for himself.  However, a pension application was located for his widow, Elizabeth [Long] Williard, who applied for benefits in 1887.  Mrs. Williard did not receive her husband’s pension.

In looking into this further, it was found that Elizabeth [Long] Williard had been previously married to a Michael Spatz (or Spotts) and had a child with him, Samuel Spotts (1841-1862).  Samuel Spotts was a Civil War soldier who served in the 35th Pennsylvania Infantry (6th Pennsylvania Reserves), Company B, as a Private.  The record shows that Samuel died by drowning in the James River near Harrison’s Landing, Virginia.

The Pension Index Card (above, from Fold3) for Samuel Spotts (or Spatz) shows that his mother applied for a survivor pension on 9 October 1890, about 3 years after her widow’s pension application was made.  Since she could only get one pension, she was awarded benefits based on her son’s service, not her deceased husband.

Samuel Spotts was previously featured in a blog post entitled Samuel Spotts – Drowned in James River Near Harrison’s Landing, Virginia.

From a speech given by Ned Weaver, the following information is given:

Daniel Williard of Capt. Evitts’ Company I, 177th, died in Lykens, 5 December 1885 or 1886, confusing dates.  His widow Elizabeth claimed in 1889 that he died died of consumption and dropsy contracted while in the service those ten months in 1862 and 1863.  One wonders.  They had 7 children, William Henry Williard, born November 1845; Mary Ann Williard, born 1847; Rebecca Jane Williard, born February 1849; Mary Elizabeth Williard, born August 1852; John William Williard, born August 1855; John Adam Victor Williard, born February 1865; Daniel Frank Williard, born 29 March 1863, who she must have been expecting when Daniel was drafted in October 1862.  However, she had 8, one single with Michael Spotts of Northumberland County, before she married Williard, a boy Samuel Spotts who enlisted in the 6th Pennsylvania Infantry Regiment [35th Pennsylvania Infantry] and was evidently killed [sic] during service.  She received a $100 bounty in April 1877 for his service.  Michael, the father was also in, but returned and was evidently living in Dalmatia, Northumberland County in 1891.

Elizabeth and Daniel Williard were married by a J. P. in Berrysburg, 20 January 1847.  When one of the J. P.’s filed her application for pension as being married in 1845, she got all upset and dictated a letter to C. P. Well of the Pension Office, stating that she had no Bible record of the marriage, but she knew when she married, that the oldest boy was two years old, so there!  Anyway, she claimed that Daniel caught colds every winter and then couldn’t work, and it was the army’s fault.

Some selected items from the pension applications files of Elizabeth [Long] Spotts Williard are presented below. For each of the pages, click on the thumbnails to enlarge.

For the Service of Samuel Spotts:

For the Service of Samuel Williard:

Category: Research, Resources, Stories | Comments Off on Selected Items from the Pension Files of Mrs. Daniel Williard
Tags: Berrysburg, Dalmatia, Erdman, Lykens Township

Posted By Norman Gasbarro on April 4, 2016

Previously on this blog, a brief discussion of the Elizabethville Railroad Station (Lykens Valley Railroad) mentioned the following:

The railroad station at Elizabethville, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, which was built about 1872, still stands today and is one of the oldest stations still in existence in central Pennsylvania.  The tracks, which once ran through this borough, were torn up in the 1970s, and a street and parking lot exists where once there was a roadbed.  Some early pictures are available of the 1872 station but are mostly from the turn of the twentieth century.  Unfortunately, no pictures have yet been found of the first office, a log building which opened on the north side of the tracks in 1845 and served the community until the first actual station was built in 1858 at 37 South Market Street, also on the north side of the tracks.  The 1872 station was built on the south side of the tracks.

Currently, the third building which was built seven years after the Civil War, is in disrepair and does not appear to be used for any active business.

The second station, built in 1858, and which served Elizabethville during the Civil War, was demolished some time in the 20th Century.  It was built on the north side of the tracks.  That second station has been located in a 1911 panoramic photograph of Elizabethville which appeared in the 1967 souvenir book for Elizabethville’s Sesquitennial.

The railroad station is identified as the building at the lower center of the picture.  In enlargement, it is shown below:

Since the panoramic picture is from 1911, the second station built in 1858 (shown above on the North side of the tracks) and the third station (on the South side of the tracks) built in 1872, co-existed for many years.  However, during the Civil War years, 1861-1865, Elizabethville‘s only railroad station was the one pictured above.

The panoramic view does show the configuration of the tracks running west to Millersburg, past the Swab Wagon Company buildings (the 3-story brick building and factory buildings behind it).  From the 1911 photograph, the two tracks that service the two station buildings merge back into one track alongside the Swab factory.

Looking East from the single track line alongside the Swab factory, the above picture-post-card photo shows both the Civil War station (the two story building at the center) and the 1872 station (at the right).  The brick 3-story Swab building was built in the 20th Century.

The Civil War station can be seen at left in the above rare photo from the files of the Interstate Commerce Commission, Washington, D.C., probably taken at about the time of World War I.

It is likely that the 1906 photo (above) was taken from the front of the 1872 station.  However, the two tracks that went past the 1858 station were possibly there at the time of the Civil War as trains needed “passing” sidings en route on single track lines.  Track switches were of the stub type until after the Civil War when many were replaced with the more modern type of switches.  From a prior blog post:

“Old Style Switches” were of the “stub” type rather than of the modern “point type”.  In the “old style” , the ends of the rails were aligned to move trains from one track to another.  Modern switches, which came into use after the Civil War, moved a taper-ended rail against the inside of a solid rail to divert the train to a different track.  Stub connections are still used today at ferries and in turntables/roundhouses.

An earlier view of the Swab Wagon Company (above), taken from about the same location but prior to the construction of the 3-story brick building, shows the factory as it appeared in the 1880s and 1890s.  The photograph was probably taken a few feet west of the 1858 and 1872 stations.

The above 2-track photo may be from East of the railroad stations.  The small structures along the tracks  are not identified and it is not known if they were there during the Civil War.

A 1900 photo of the 1872 station shows a planing mill in the background, and while hardly noticeable, part of a section of track in front of the 1858 station (at left), indicating that at one time a siding may have ended in front of the Civil War station.

Elizabethville‘s water tank was necessary to re-fill the steam engines that used this route.  The above photo appeared in the Elizabethville Sesquicentennial Book and was dated 1918.  The photo location was given as “East of Campgrounds, South of Bender Street.”

The 1916 photograph from the Interstate Commerce Commission shows the same water tower but gives its location as “at the Elizabethville Campgrounds.”

Finally, the above badly damaged photo pictures the trackside tool sheds which are supposedly to the left of the water tower.  Source:  Interstate Commerce Commission, Washington, D.C.

The water tower and the tool sheds may be post-Civil War additions structures.

There are no known photos of the 1858 railroad station that were taken during the Civil War.

Readers are invited to comment on this post.

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The Elizabethville Sesquicentennial Book is available in DVD format at the web site for the Elizabethville Bicentennial Committee on their merchandise page.

Category: Research, Resources, Stories | Comments Off on Civil War Railroad Structures of Elizabethville
Tags: Elizabethville, Millersburg, Railroad

Posted By Norman Gasbarro on April 1, 2016

A listing of the March 2016 posts on The Civil War Blog with direct links.  Click on any title to go directly to the post.

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Featured this month were two posts describing (1) how the By-Laws of the Gratz Historical Society have been completely ignored resulting in an illegal takeover of this Pennsylvania non-profit organization –

The Illegal Takeover of the Gratz Historical Society

and (2) by showing how more than $30,000 is now missing from the Society’s Preservation Endowment Fund –

“Cooking the Books” at the Gratz Historical Society

The By-Laws of the Gratz Historical Society were presented on a separate blog page –

By-Laws

and the actual Annual Financial Reports were also presented on a separate blog page –

Financial Reports

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Other posts for the month of March:

The Ku Klux Klan in Pennsylvania – Some Sources of Information

John H. Heckert – Buried at Millersburg

February 2016 Posts

Brave Johnny Hoover of Elizabethville

The Stites Family in the Civil War

Minutes of the Kissinger Post, G.A.R., Gratz – 1886

Daniel W. Tobias – Incident at Miners’ Bank, 1875

The Heckert Family of Northumberland County in the Civil War

Philadephia Flower Show Features Two Lincoln Displays

William Hicks, Served in Illinois Regiment; Widow was Postmaster of Waynesville

Charles Henning – Crushed to Death in 1906

Category: Overviews | Comments Off on March 2016 Posts
Tags: Table of Contents

Posted By Norman Gasbarro on March 30, 2016

From the Philadelphia Inquirer, 20 February 1906:

CARS CRUSH SHANTY:  KILL WAR VETERAN

Special to the Inquirer

SHAMOKIN, Pennsylvania, 19 February 1906 — While sitting in a shanty near the Reading Railway, near here, to-day, Charles Henning, an aged war veteran and well known local resident, met a horible death.

Two freight cars left the track, crashed into the shanty, and instantly killed the old soldier.  A stove was upset and the structure set afire.  Several men, after heroic attempts, saved the body from incineration.

And, from the Mount Carmel Item, 19 February 1906:

A WATCHMAN’S AWFUL DEATH

Every Bone of Man’s Body Broken at Royal Oak

Charles Henning, the aged watchman at the Royal Oak Colliery, Shamokin, met a horrible death this morning.

Henning was in his watch house when a fast moving trip jumped the track, the engine pushing through his house and forcing him against a stone embankment.  Every bone in his body was broken.  Deceased was a veteran of the Civil War and a member of Lincoln Post, G.A.R.

His death certificate notes that his death was accidental from injuries on the railroad, and that he died immediately.

Pennsylvania Civil War records show that Charles Henning served in the 48th Pennsylvania Infantry as a member of the regimental band, with rank of Musician.  He enrolled on 24 August 1861 and he died on 18 August 1862.  He was 26 years old at the time of enrollment, was 5 foot 6 inches tall, was employed as a miner, and resided in Pottsville.  He had dark hair, a light complexion, and gray eyes.

Federal pension records show that Charles Henning applied for disability benefits on 17 July 1890, which he received and collected until his death.

Census and other records indicate that Charles Henning was born in Germany, 29 May 1834; he lived in Tremont in 1870 and was employed as a miner;  in 1880 he lived in Porter Township, as was employed as a coal miner.  By 1900, he was living in Shamokin, where he resided at the time of his death.  He is buried in Shamokin.

If any reader has additional information about this veteran who met a tragic death, please submit it via comment to this post or submit via e-mail.

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Pennsylvania Veterans’ File Card is from the Pennsylvania Archives.  News clippings are from Newspapers.com.  Death certificate is from Ancestry.com.

Category: Overviews, Research, Resources, Stories | Comments Off on Charles Henning – Crushed to Death in 1906
Tags: G.A.R., Porter Township, Tower City, Tremont

Posted By Norman Gasbarro on March 28, 2016

William Hicks (1839-1904), who is buried at St. Paul (Bowerman’s) Lutheran Cemetery in Enterline, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, served in the 8th Illinois Infantry, Company D, as a Private.  There is conflicting data on his dates of service.  In one source, it is stated that he had three enlistments, while another source indicates his service as from 2 January 1864 through 4 May 1866.  In the 1890 Census for Waynesville, Wayne Township, Dauphin County, he gave his war-related disability as “wounded in thigh.”

On 4 June 1880, William Hicks  applied for a disability pension, which he received and collected until his death, which occurred on 22 December 1904.  [above Pension Index Card from Fold3].  Following his death, his widow, Hannah [Bowerman] Hicks applied on 7 January 1905.  She received widow’s benefits which she collected until her death.

The Harrisburg Telegraph provided a brief notice of William Hicks‘ death in its 28 December 1904 edition:

William Hicks, who died at his home at Waynesville last Thursday was buried Sunday morning at the Bowerman’s Church at 10 o’clock.  The Rev. G. W. Spotts officiated.  He was 65 years 10 months and 20 days old and is survived by a wife and two children and six grandchildren.  Mr. Hicks served as a soldier in the Civil War for five yeas.  The following were the pallbearers:  J. Dimpsey, Joseph Sponsler, John Corsnitz and Samuel Lebo.

Within days, on 30 January 1905, the Harrisburg Daily Independent reported that the widow, Hannah Hicks, was appointed postmaster:

Postmistress at Waynesville

by Associated Press.

Washington, 30 January 1905 — Hannah Hicks was to-day appointed a fourth-class postmaster at Waynesville, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania.

It is not known why Mrs. Hicks was appointed so quickly.  Had she applied for the job prior to her husband’s death?  Or, was her husband postmaster, and was she appointed to succeed him.  In checking the most recent census (1900), William Hicks‘ occupation was carpenter.  But that doesn’t mean that he didn’t become postmaster after the census was taken.  From the politics of the time, postmasters were appointed by the President, and the Republicans were in control in Washington at that time.  Another theory is that Mrs. Hicks’ maiden name was Bowerman – and the Bowerman family had great influence in the Enterline–Waynesville area.

But, by 1910, Hannah [Bowerman] Hicks was living in Halifax and working as a servant.  By 1920, still a widow, she was working as a housekeeper.  She died on 17 April 1931 in Steelton, Dauphin County.

Several news articles have been located post-1905 where Hannah Hicks was involved in real estate transactions, both buying and selling, and one article was located where she served as the executor of an estate.

Hannah [Bowerman] Hicks was the daughter of John Bowerman (1809-1894) and Anna Mary “Polly” [Woland] Bowerman (1803-1854). At least two of her brothers were Civil War soldiers:  Dr. Solomon Belle Bowerman (1829-1905) and George Washington Bowerman (1841-1925).

At this writing, nothing is mentioned in the Findagrave Memorial for William Hicks that he was a Civil War veteran.

Illinois Civil War records report that at the time of his enlistment, William Hicks was living in Olney, Richland County, Illinois, was 24 years old, and was a farmer.  Little else is known about his Civil War service.

If any readers can supply additional information about William Hicks or Hannah [Bowerman] Hicks, please do so by adding a comment to this post or by sending via e-mail.

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News articles are from Newspapers.com.

Category: Research, Resources, Stories | Comments Off on William Hicks, Served in Illinois Regiment; Widow was Postmaster of Waynesville
Tags: Enterline, Halifax, Wayne Township, Waynesville