Darnell, M. B.

DARNELL

Posted By: Joyce Hickman (email)
Date: 9/5/2008 at 13:45:29

M. B. Darnell

(From the 1883 History of Pottawattamie County, Iowa, by J. H. Keatley, p.141, Layton Twp.)
M. B. Darnell, P. O. Walnut, was born May 19, 1827, in Champaign County, Ohio. Emigrated with his father's family, in 1839, to Hancock County, Ill. Attended the district school until he was in his seventeenth year, when he attended a seminary for about one year in Carthage, Ill. He had formerly attended a very good village school, taught by Miner R. Deming, in a small town called St. Mary's. Deming received a General's commission, and commanded the anti-Mormon forces which succeeded in arresting Joseph and Hiram Smith. As a result of the intimacy which existed between Mr. Darnell and the General in consequence of having been his pupil, he procured for him without his knowledge, a Lieutenant's commission for Gov. Thomas Ford, and was at once placed on his staff, and did duty as such officer throughout the entire campaign, and, a few hours after the troops were discharged, he was, by a mere coincidence, present at the jail and witnessed the killing of Joe and Hiram Smith. Was also present when a deputation of Mormons came to the jail and removed the bodies to Nauvoo. He was also a partcipant in all the "wars" (as they were denominated) which were organized for the purpose of ridding the country of the presence of Mormons. The 27th of March, 1850, he was united in marriage to Martha Craig, a lady of Southern birth, but residing then in Jacksonville, Ill. Has had four children, the eldest of whom is a daughter. One son, Murray A., who was a boy of unusual promise, just after he obtained his education, lost his life by an unfortunate accident at Sioux Falls, Dak., at the age of twenty-four years, which has cast a permanent shadow over the remainder of subject's life. Having been elected to the office of Justice of the Peace when only a few days over twenty-one years of age, he discharged the duties of the office for a time, and formed an idea that he would like the law; consequently removed to Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, and read law with Col. A. H. Bereman, now of Breckenridge, Colo. Was admitted to the bar in 1854, before R. P. Lowe, then Judge of the First District. he at once formed a partnership with Mr. Bereman, and remained in the practice until the second year of the war, when he enlisted in the First Iowa Cavalry. Was with the regiment about four weeks at Benton Barracks, St. Louis, when Mr. Bereman, who had received a Captain's commission in the Eighteenth United States Infantry, and was with the regiment at Camp Thomas at Columbus, Ohio, wrote subject that if he would get transferred into the Eighteenth Unietd States Infantry, he had assurances from Coll Carrington that in the near future he would get subject a Lieutenant's commission, and consequently was transferred by an order of Gen. Curtis, and upon arriving at Camp Thomas, Ohio, he found that the promise made to Mr. Bereman in his behalf was but a ruse to get his regiment supplied with competent men as First or Orderly Sergeants. He accepted the position, and served for about two years. he was under command of Gen Buell, and was discharged for disability at Louisville, Ky., directly after Bragg's raid on that city. Returning to his home in Mt. Pleasant, he found his practice gone and the profession very full, consequently he moved to Cass County, Iowa, and made a farm arriving there in May, 1864. He removed from there to Pottawattamie County in March, 1873, when he again engaged in farming, three and a half miles from Walnut, dividing his time between the farm and a limited law practice in Walnut and before country Justices in Cass, Shelby and Pottawattamie Counties. On the 4th of last March, he rented his farm, bought property in Walnut, opened an office, and is now engaged exclusively in the practice. During his residence in the county, he delivered a number of agricultural addresses, having delivered about half of them before the Cass County Society since its organization; one at Avoca three years ago. He had also delivered orations on the Fourth of July at Atlantic, Avoca and Carson, and during the campaign which has just closed, he made more speeches for the amendment than any other man in the east end of the county, closing the campaign before an immense audience at the Presbyterian Church on Sunday night before the election. It is the proudest recollection of his life that he was early identified with the anti-slavery cause. The Republican party came into existence in his boyhood. He at once espoused it, and was identified with the party from its birth, and contributed all he could in its behalf. He was editor and publicahser of a paper call the 'Republican News' from June, 1859, for the period of one and a half years, and sold out at a profit. He remained with the party until 1873, when he went off in the Greeley movement, and is out of politics today. He has one among the finest homes in this city, and is taking it as comfortable as he can. Although not living continuously in the State, it is now nearly forty-three years since his boyish feed trod the soil of Iowa, having been in Keokuk in 1839. During his residence in Mt. Pleasant, he was twice its Mayor, while they were building the Burlington & Missouri Railroad and the insane asylum. Saw the first dirt thrown on the Burlington & Missouri Railroad at Burlington in 1854, and the first stone laid in the foundations of the asylum at about the same time. He has believed ever since the war, that there was silently developing in the Government an antagonism between capital and labor, and that such tendency, connected with the well-known degeneracy and corruption of politics, is becoming a permanent menace to the institutions of our country. He believes that reform is wonderfully necessary in order to preserve the liberties and well-being of the people.