Case, James M.

CASE

Posted By: Linda Ziemann, Monona CC (email)
Date: 4/27/2004 at 16:14:20

JAMES M. CASE. Though peacefully following the vocation of a farmer’s life upon his splendid 200-acre farm on section 23, in Sioux Township, the subject of this sketch has seen the hardships and endured the trials and dangers of life on the tented field. He is a native of Greene County, Ind., born July 13, 1840, and is the son of Francis C. and Mary Ann Case. A sketch of his father who was one of the pioneers of this county and one of its most prominent citizens, may be found elsewhere in the pages of this volume. His mother was born near Lexington, Mo., June 11, 1814, and was married in Jackson County in the same State, about 1833, and is yet alive, having had a family of eight children, of whom five are living.

When James M., the third child, was about one year old, the family removed from Indiana to Illinois, and in a couple of years came to this State locating at Fort Madison, Lee County. A short time thereafter they removed to Montrose, and three years later to Keokuk. After living in the latter place about two years and in Des Moines several more, they came to Council Bluffs in 1850, and to Monona County in 1853, and located upon a farm on section 5, Franklin Township, just west of the city of Onawa. There the father died and the family was broken up. All these years James was growing to manhood and, in 1862, taking up life’s burden, he went to Harrison County, where he was engaged in farming for about a year, and then, in response to the many calls for men to suppress the rebellion, December 27, 1863, he enlisted in Company L, Fourth Iowa Cavalry and was forwarded to his regiment as a recruit, and participated in the engagements at Guntown, Lexington, Mine Creek, Selma, Tupelo, White River, Osage, Lock Creek, Okalona, St. Francis River, and Columbus, Ga. One of the best authorities in the State says, “that the Fourth Cavalry was one of the bravest and most successful Iowa regiments in the field, and its services were of the utmost value to the Union arms.” Mr. Case was mustered out, with the regiment, at Atlanta, Ga., August 8, 1865, and received his discharge at Davenport, August 24, 1865. At once returning to the quite life of a farmer, he took up his home in Clay Township, Harrison County, where he remained until the fall of 1881, and then removed to a farm upon which he now resides, and which he has since occupied.

Mrs. Case was married April 19, 1866, to Miss Dorinda Martin, a native of West Virginia, and daughter of Benjamin and Rebecca Martin, and by this union had a family of eleven children, as follows: Friend, William F., Ida, Herbert, Emma, Oscar, Mary, deceased, Martin M., an infant that died unnamed; Bern and Effie A.