John F. Ely Surgeon, 24^th IA

On June 25, 1821, John Fellows Ely was born in Rochester New York. A bright boy from the upper middle class, he started school at age 3 and prepped for college at age 11. His family moved, however, delaying college while he and his family farmed in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, for three years. From there they moved to west Michigan, where the Ely family stayed until 1844. Young John’s main delights were hunting and fishing, and later, surveying and engineering. As a young man, he became the owner and publisher of a local paper, but none of these held his attention for long.

In 1844, John Ely decided to study medicine and surgery, so in the1845, he entered the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City. He graduated in 1848, but was called away from his home in New York to settle the estate of his brother, Alexander, who had died while living in Iowa. Intending only to stay a short while, John found, nevertheless, a home for himself and his practice in the growing city of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. In 1853, established and well off, he married his brother's widow, Mary, in the first month of the year. They had two children from this marriage- a son, John S. Ely, and a daughter, Mary Dickinson, who would die young in an accident on November 6, 1880.

Meanwhile, though, life was good for John. His several ventures into real estate and railroad construction had paid off well, and he was a prominent member of the First Presbyterian Church and a well-known community leader.

But on August 12 of 1862, he enlisted in and offered his services to the Union army. Appointed as surgeon to the 24^th Iowa Volunteer Infantry Regiment, he mustered in on September 17, 1862. He served only one year in the regiment, and resigned from his post on June 9, 1863, citing bad health caused by the "hardships of the service." He returned to Cedar Rapids, where he recovered nine to ten months later from various illnesses (most likely due to stress and fatigue), but did not return to the practice of medicine.

He lived out the rest of his life as a prominent leader and businessman in the community, and died at a ripe old age of eighty on March 14, 1902. He was buried in Oak Hill Cemetery in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.