At the time of the removal to Whiteside county, Illinois, the family home was established in Genesee township and Jacob Gunder there attended school and aided in the work of the farm until eighteen years of age, when he offered his services to the government, enlisting on the 4th of October, 1862, as a member of Company E, Thirty-fourth Illinois Volunteer Infantry. He served with the Army of the Cumberland for nearly three years or until the close of the war and in the fall of 1863 veteranized with his regiment. He participated in the two days' battle of Shiloh, in the hotly contested engagement of Lookout Mountain and in the battles of Missionary Ridge, Buzzard's Roost, Resaca, Peach Tree Creek and Atlanta. In fact he went all through the Atlanta campaign, was with Sherman on the march to the sea, proceeded northward through the Carolinas and Virginia and in Washington, following Lee's surrender at Appomattox, participated in the grand review, when the victorious Union troops marched down Pennsylvania avenue amid the cheering thousands who welcomed their return. On the 12th of July, 1865, he received an honorable discharge and returned home with a most creditable military record.
Mr. Gunder joined his father's family in Whiteside county, Illinois, and came with them in October, 1865, to Iowa, the family home being established in Boone county. He remained a resident of that county until 1893, since which time he has lived in Story county. He always followed farming in this state until 1902, when he retired and took up his abode in Gilbert. He raised ten thousand bushels of corn and an equal amount of oats in 1895. He both owned and rented land and has been interested in Minnesota lands until a recent date when he sold. As an Iowa farmer he carefully cultivated his fields and his practical and progressive methods brought him success, which numbered him among the substantial farmers of the western part of the state.
On, the 23d of January, 1868, Mr. Gunder was married to Miss Margaret E. Linerode, who was born in Ohio, January 6, 1849, and came to Illinois in childhood with her parents, I. D. and Nancy (Thomas) Linerode. Mr. and Mrs. Gunder have become the parents of nine children : Ida, the wife of Ralph Zwickey, of Minnesota; Alice, who died at the age of twenty-five years ; Arthur, who died in infancy ; Elmer, who married Jean McDonald, of Forest City, Iowa; Roy, deceased; Clarence, who married Lena Thompson, also of Forest City, Iowa; Dora, the wife of Herbert Smalley, of Boone county; Mabel, the wife of Fred Watts, of Minnesota; and Tillie, also of Minnesota.
Mr. Gunder has always given his political allegiance to the republican party but has never sought nor desired office, preferring to concentrate his energies upon his business affairs, in which he has won notable and honorable success. In fact he deserves great credit for what he has accomplished. He lost his mother when four years of age and the following year was bound out to a man who ill treated him so that he had no oppor-