Who We Were, Are & Will Be Our Family: August 2020

21 August 2020

Yearbook Photo of Thelma (Surpluss) Gibson (1903-1991), Age 16

My maternal grandmother. I miss her horribly.

19 August 2020

Lt. Col. Dr. Frank G. Porter (1821-1879)

One of the surprise discoveries of my listing my Civil War ancestors was that I have a Brigade Surgeon as a relative. Dr. Frank Gibson Porter was my 2xg-uncle, behind my Dad's mother. His history is rich and will require future fleshing out, but for now let us hear his Civil War record.

From Reavis, L. U. (1881). Saint Louis, the future great city of the world: And its impending triumph. St. Louis: G.A. Pierrot. --

Early in 1861, he joined the Union army as Brigade Surgeon. He remained in the army until the last days of 1865. He was with Generals Totten, Schofield, Herron, Fisk and Grant. He participated in thirteen hard-fought battles; quite a number of minor engagements; was "bushwhacked" three times, and captured once. At the battle of Prairie Grove, Arkansas, single-handed and alone, he turned back two six-gun batteries that were in full retreat, and thus saved the day for the Union. One of his most noted transactions during the war, was the planning and constructing of the most extensive field hospital of the Rebellion, at Hamburg, Tennessee, after the battle of Pittsburg Landing. Harper's Weekly reproduced it, and the New York Herald and Tribune noticed it in the highest terms of praise. The farthest east he was during the war, was Fort Donelson, Tennessee; south, New Orleans; west, Fort Gibson, Indian Territory, and north, Fort Laramie.

In the summer of 1865 he was ordered to Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, as his headquarters, where he remained until the last days of the same year, when he was mustered out of the service, carrying with him a commission from the Governor of Missouri, and three from the President of the United States : the first, that of Assistant Surgeon ; the second, that of full Surgeon, and the third, that of Lieutenant-Colonel by brevet.

During the war, for a period of nine months he had charge of the United States Marine Hospital in St. Louis, and aside from this he always held the position of Medical Director while in the army, his appointment being that of General Staff Surgeon, United States Volunteers. Upon his leaving the service he returned to St. Louis, and resumed his profession.

06 August 2020

Surprise Find is also a Reminder to Be Careful

Growing up we visited my maternal grandparents Bruce and Thelma Gibson frequently. And like most loving grandparents they had at least one picture of each of their grandchildren in their living room where everyone resided in the evenings. I got very familiar with the picture they had of me --

-- in a brass frame on a shelf next to where my grandmother would sit for hours and knit or crochet.

When my grandparents died, my aunt Barbara Butler was the executrix and she gave the picture to me still in its frame. Jump ahead almost twenty years, and my son asks for a baby picture of me to compare to his daughter, my granddaughter, whom he swears is my spittin' image.

I go to get the baby picture of me to scan and send to my son. When I open up the frame, I am surprised to find inside another picture --

-- My brother and I are confident that is a picture of my (living) aunt and maybe her prom date? We are pretty sure it is not our uncle.

So what's the sum? I went to retrieve a baby picture of myself, and in opening a frame that had not been opened in six decades I discovered another family picture behind it. Lesson learned? Don't assume what is inside things. Be they books, shoe boxes, pictures frames, or whatever. Look inside, you never know what you might discover.

03 August 2020

Civil War Relatives

For the last month I have been obsessed with the Civil War, from a family history perspective. I have been working on getting the National Park Service to give the grave of my gg-grandfather a marker; I have been researching the current location of the regimental flags for the 33rd Illinois, and I have been researching the oral history that one of my gg-grandfathers was a Union spy.

In the meantime, I did put together a list of all my grandfathers and granduncles who served. I have not done cousins yet. This list is complete as best as I can determine (the seven names of gg-grandfathers have been bolded; the five names of those who died in service have been italicized) --

RANK NAME REGIMENT STATE COMPANY

Henry M. Walker, Sr. 33rd Illinois A

Capt Harvey J. Dutton 33rd Illinois A

Horace S. Dutton 108th Illinois E

Charles H. Chesley 8th Cavalry Illinois K

John P. Chesley 13th Illinois G

Leonard Chesley 13th Illinois G

Sgt Luman F. Ward 98th New York D

David Ward 2nd Artillery Ohio C

Corp Arthur H. Needham 2nd Cavalry Iowa E

John H. Needham 155th Ohio A

Horatio E. Needham 29th Iowa E

Sgt George E. Needham 177th Ohio A

Benjamin E. Needham 41st Ohio D

Samuel R. Porter 17th Illinois I

Lt Col Dr. Frank G. Porter -- Surgeon --

Alexander W. Porter 39th Pennsylvania B

Sgt John W. Porter 39th Pennsylvania B

Corp Alfred Gibson 33rd Kentucky D

Sgt David Gibson 27th Kentucky E

Thomas R. Gibson 35th Kentucky B

William Gurwell 14th Ohio E

Jesse Jones 13th Kansas B

Lt Edward W. Hall 3rd Iowa B

George Hall 26th Illinois K

Corp Levi Hall 33rd Illinois C

Wilbur Hall 2nd Artillery Massachusetts M

Josiah McKee 33rd Illinois C

-- Twenty-seven names in total. All blue, no grey. My gg-grandfather James G. Gurwell is said to have served, but I can find no record, so he is not included. Six of these Illinoisans were at Vicksburg, and their names are cast in bronze inside the Illinois memorial there.

Expanding the list to include cousins will be quite a chore but is within my plans. I know that will expand my connection to the 33rd Illinois even further, at last count I had seven ancestral relatives in that regiment. And I am not sure, but I think I have one Gibson cousin who went to Texas and fought on the side the Confederacy, ruining my perfect record of all Union ancestral relatives.