Anderson, Charles L. (1827-1914)

ANDERSON

Posted By: Karon Velau (email)
Date: 10/30/2017 at 10:29:46

ANDERSON, CHARLES L., farmer, Sec. 15, Richland Township; P. O. Hartford; born in Maryland, March 22, 1827; when only a few years of age his parents moved to Ohio, locating in Knox county; there he was raised on a farm: in the fall of 1850, he came to Iowa, and settled in Allen township, Warren county, which was then Polk county: he went to Hartford in the spring of 1852, and in 1855 was married to Miss Ellen Morgan; she died in the year 1860; on the breaking out of the Rebellion, he enlisted in the first company from Warren county, he being the first man from his township (Richland). On the organization of the company, he was elected 1st Sargent, which position he held until May, 1862, when he was commissioned 2d lieutenant of the company; he was in some of the hottest and most closely-contested battles of the war; he had many narrow escapes, having been marked by the rebel bullets three different times, one of which came near being fatal, being shot through the arm and body, November 5, 1862, in a hot but short engagement; after laying in the hospital for some weeks, he was granted a leave of absence: when again fit for duty, he returned to his command and remained with it until a few days after the siege and fall of Vicksburg, when on the 12th of July, 1863, he was taken prisoner by the enemy at Jackson, Mississippi; he remained in their hands nearly twenty months, being in Libby prison for nine months; the balance of the time he was at Macon, Georgia, Charleston and Columbia South Carolina, as well as other and less noted places of rebel torture and starvation; while at Columbia, he made his escape, and for three long weeks endeavored to reach the Union lines by traveling at night, and hiding in some secluded place during the day; but at an evil hour, when nearly worn out by fatigue and hunger, but still inspired by the love of liberty, the fatal moment came, and he was again in the hands of the enemy; about the first of March, 1865, he was exchanged near Wilmington, N. C. He was sent around to Anapolis, Maryland by ocean, and from there to Washington, District of Columbia, where, on the 12th of March, 1865, he was honorably discharged; he immediately came home, arriving there on April 16th, one day after the death of President Lincoln; July 30, 1865, he was married to Miss Ann F. Hancock, a native of Ohio: soon after his marriage, he purchased a fine farm of 138 acres near Hartford, upon which he still resides; they have a family of two sons and one daughter; Charles M., Stella P. and Ernest; one deceased, Delmer L.
Source: History of Warren County, Iowa, containing a History of the County, Its Cities, Towns, & etc., Union Historical Co.; Des Moines, IA, 1879, p.700