David S. Cole

COLE, WRIGHT, AULD

Posted By: J. Breen (email)
Date: 6/9/2015 at 20:23:15

David Smith Cole, a photographer of Washington, who has here been engaged in business since 1865, has done much notable work in the line of his profession as representative of different railroad companies and also in connection with military movements in the Philippines. He had but recently attain his majority when he located his studio in Washington, his birth having occurred in Franklin county, Ohio, November 22, 1843. His father, David P. Cole, was born in New Jersey in 1813 and in early life learned and followed the blacksmith's trade. When a young man he removed to Ohio and later became a minister in the Methodist Episcopal church but did not abandon the trade which he had learned. In 1855 he came to Iowa and for many years carried on blacksmithing in Washington. His business activity was interrupted, however, by his service in the Union army in the Civil war. In September, 1861, he offered his services to the government and at the same time his son, D. S. Cole, joined the army. The father, however, was rejected on account of his age. He later enlisted in the Thirty-seventh Iowa Volunteer Infantry, known as the Graybeard Regiment, serving his full time doing garrison duty at Columbus, Ohio, and at Rock Island, Illinois. He died in the soldiers’ home in Marshalltown, Iowa, at the venerable age of eighty-six years. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Martha Wright, was born in New Jersey in 1812 and they were married in Ohio. Her death occurred in Washington when she had reached the age of eighty-seven years. Their family numbered eight children: Emma C, deceased; Owen, Lucy and Benjamin, all of whom died in childhood ; Mrs. Sarah J. Beaty, living in Washington, Iowa; D. S.; William K., a resident of Michigan; and C. O., now deceased, who for seventeen years was a machinist on Government Island at Rock Island, Illinois.

D. S. Cole was only twelve years of age when brought to Washington and in the common schools here he continued his education and also assisted his father in the shop, learning blacksmithing when quite young. His taste, however, was along more artistic lines and he took up the study of photography, establishing his studio in Washington in 1865. He has done much notable work in the line of his profession, spending five years in making views for the Northwestern Railway and the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad Company in Montana, Wyoming and the Dakotas. In 1903 he was appointed by Secretary Root as official photographer for the Thirteenth Cavalry and spent a year and a half in the Philippines. He is an expert in his chosen line, thoroughly conversant with the most modern processes of the art and with clear understanding of the value of light, shade, form and color. He has in his possession many interesting views of the places he has visited and his mind is stored with pleasing, amusing and instructive recollections of his trips.

There is another chapter in the life history of Mr. Cole that is worthy of more than passing notice. In September, 1861, when he was yet a youth of seventeen years, he offered his services to the government, enlisting as a member of Company K, Thirteenth Iowa Volunteer Infantry. He was with that regiment in all of the engagements up to and including the battle of Atlanta, in which he was captured on the 22d of July, 1864. He was then sent to Andersonville prison, where he remained until April 28, 1865, when he was released fourteen days after the assassination of President Lincoln. Mr. Cole was mustered out at Davenport, Iowa, and then returned to Washington, where he has since made his home.

On the 2d of November, 1867, he wedded Miss M. C. Auld, who was born in Brighton, this county, in 1848 and is a daughter of J. H. and Hannah Auld, who settled in Washington county in the early '40s. The death of Mrs. Cole occurred December 27, 1882. Three children had been born of that marriage: Henry, who died in infancy; Ivy I., the wife of F. V. Boyce, of St. Louis: and M. C, a photographer of Alliance, Nebraska.

Mr. Cole cast his first presidential ballot for Abraham Lincoln and has never wavered in his allegiance to the republican party since that time, for he regards its policy as most conductive to bring about needed reform and improvement and to secure the passage of necessary regulative and constructive legislation. Fraternally he is connected with the Masons and with the Grand Army Post at Columbus Junction, Iowa, and finds pleasure in the camp fires of that organization. His chosen life work has been one of intense interest to him appealing strongly as it does to the artistic side of his nature, at the same time giving opportunity for the attainment of that success which follows as a logical sequence of laudable ambition and persistent effort.

Source: History of Washington County, IA - Volume II, page 199 (1909)