Welcome to my new blog, Confederates from Iowa! If you have Iowa roots, or if you like to learn about the Civil War, this blog is meant for you.
When you think about Iowa and the Civil War, what comes to mind? Iowans flocked to enlist in the Union army and navy. Fifty-seven Iowans showed distinguished gallantry in battle and were awarded the Medal of Honor.
Did you know that these soldiers and sailors had counterparts in the Confederate service? A relative handful of Iowans served in the Confederate infantry, cavalry, artillery, and navy, and one Iowa resident is listed on the Honor Roll – the Confederacy’s highest recognition of valor in battle. Those men could be called shadow images or “Doppelgängers” of their Union counterparts.
Confederates from Iowa served in most theaters of the war, from the earliest days through Jefferson Davis’s desperate flight from Richmond in April and May 1865.
The stories of Iowa Confederates allow us to take a fresh look at the Civil War and the home front in Iowa. These men remind us that a scarlet ribbon of dissent runs through Iowa history.
I am not trying to defend them. I want to help us understand them. I love the words of the Hebrew Prophet Isaiah who wrote, “Come, now, let us reason together.”
So far, I have documented 73 Iowa residents who left Iowa and served the Confederacy. To put it in perspective, for every Iowan who served the Confederacy, about 1,000 served the Union. Iowans who served the Confederacy included students, farmers, clerks, merchants, lawyers, doctors, druggists, a printer, a newspaper editor, and two Iowa state legislators.
In upcoming blogs, I plan to address the following topics:
- Reasons why Iowa residents served the Confederacy
- Statistics about Iowa Confederates (place of birth, pre-war residences in Iowa, locations of Confederate service, etc.)
- Iowa home front: Dissent and violations of civil liberties
- Where I look for information
- Books that I recommend
- Interviews with historians and historical novelists
- My approach to thinking historically
Virginia
3 Apr 2015Looking forward to learning something new!
David Connon
3 Apr 2015Hi, Virginia.
Thanks for visiting my blog. I hope you’ll learn something new. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Joy Kidney
3 Apr 2015My Civil War ancestors moved here right after the war. My grandfather insisted that his grandmother got a pension because of her husband’s service. But I’d ordered John Neal’s record from the National Archives and learned that he’d soldiered for the Confederates (from Tennessee). But he insisted, so I sent to the Archives again, this time listing him among the Union soldiers. There he was! This time from Indiana (where he evidently met who became my gt. gt. grandmother). He had a brother, Jesse, who also served from Tennessee, Union side. . . so they started out on opposite sides. John is buried in the Dexter cemetery. I eventually found Jesse’s tombstone, just over the Adair County line from Madison County, in a very out of the way cemetery. Never learned anything about his descendants.
David Connon
3 Apr 2015Hi, Joy.
That’s a neat story. Thanks for sharing it. Research can sure take twists and turns!
Jeffry Burden
3 Apr 2015I’m looking forward to this! Given all the southerners who moved to Iowa in the pre-War years, I imagine there are even a few more Rebs in the attic. 🙂
David Connon
4 Apr 2015Hi, Jeffry. Thanks for reading my blog, and thanks for the chuckle! Historian Mike Vogt suggested that I may never document all of the Iowa residents who left Iowa and served the C.S.A.
Barry Bergman
4 Apr 2015The civil war reenactor group that I belong to does educational school presentations on the Civil War. I teach cavalry and southern perespective. I am really looking forward to learning more from your blog. Thanks for sharing.
David Connon
5 Apr 2015Hi, Barry.
Thanks for reading my blog. Your presentations sound interesting. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Linda Griffith Smith
4 Apr 2015Congrats on this endeavor, Dave. I’m looking forward to the information that you will be sharing.
I wanted to let you know that a group is meeting each Wednesday at the Madison County Historical Museum to research the Underground Railroad in Madison County. We are working under the direction of the State Historic Preservation Office and the Iowa Freedom Trail Grant Project guidelines. We are not only identifying UGRR conductors and Freedom Seekers, but also those who opposed the progression to and existence of the Civil War. We have biographical and incidental information for 10 dissenting individuals. Some of this information will be familiar to you, but we may have a few surprises!
Feel free to contact the UGRR group at MadisonCountyIowaUGRR@gmail.com.
David Connon
5 Apr 2015Hi, Linda.
Thanks for reading my blog. I appreciate your kind comments. Thanks, too, for letting me know about the U.G.R.R. research in Madison County. It sounds intriguing! I’ll contact your group soon.
jayjaygeorge
5 Apr 2015This is great!
David Connon
5 Apr 2015Hi, Jayjaygeorge.
I appreciate your kind comments. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Steve Hanken
5 Apr 2015David,
I have appreciated your presentations in the past and I am sure there will be lots to learn from your blog in the future! There are lots of complicated circumstances involved with Iowan’s who became Confederates. Stephen Hempstead is but one. On the face of it, being born in Connecticut and a lawyer in Dubuque it would automatically seem his feelings about the south would have been loyal to the Union. The facts would show the reason his son was at VMI and joined the Confederate Army may have much to do with Stephen Hempstead’s St. Louis family, his aristocratic clan who owned slaves which included two of Hempstead’s aunts who were married to two of the richest fur traders in the west. As a young man, Stephen attempted to attend Illinois College, but both he and his brother dropped out, quite possibly because Edward Beecher ran the school and was operating an Under Ground Railroad Station there! Later he schooled under yet another uncle in the lead mining district of Wisconsin Territory at his law office. His uncle was a very good friend of the man who later became one of Iowa’s first senators, George Wallace Jones, a man who counted Jefferson Davis and his wife as family friends. Wallace also owned slaves and he too sent sons to the Confederacy. He also was temporarily jailed during Lincoln’s suspension of Habeas Corpus and witch hunt for those disloyal for attempting to keep up correspondence with friends in the south. I look to be even more enlightened by your new site! Steve
David Connon
5 Apr 2015Hi, Steve.
Thanks for your gracious comments. You were right: Lots of different circumstances were involved with Iowans who became Confederates. You covered lots of ground in discussing Stephen Hempstead (Iowa’s second governor). Thanks for giving me an idea. I may devote a future blog post to discussing Hempstead’s son, Junius, who attended the Virginia Military Institute and entered the Confederate service.
Jeffry Burden
5 Apr 2015Speaking of Sen. George Wallace Jones: I’ve done some research recently on his son Charles Scott Dodge Jones, who served the C.S.A. in various capacities from his home in Richmond, was captured in 1864, and eventually returned to Iowa. I guess he fits in the purview of what you’re doing here!
David Connon
6 Apr 2015Hi, Jeffry.
Thanks for mentioning Iowa U.S. Senator George Wallace Jones and his son, Charles Scott Dodge Jones. The Joneses have a very interesting story.
Bob Ramay
7 Apr 2015David, It is very good to see that you are progressing in your studies of a mostly overlooked aspect of the War. Some folks certainly had links to the south. Others did not. My Grandfather, Miles Ramay, had no such linkages (to my knowledge). I am most interested in your findings. Thanx for your efforts, Bob Ramay
David Connon
7 Apr 2015Hi, Bob.
It’s good to hear from you. Thanks for your encouragement and for reading the blog.
Gretchen Jacobson
9 Apr 2015I am another descendant of a Confederate from Iowa. My great-great-grandfather, Rev. Joseph Stewart Howard was the son of Rev. Joseph Howard of Lucas, Iowa. JS Howard was baptized in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church as a baby when that church was organizing in Iowa. He is on the Iowa state census from 1850 as a resident of Lee, Iowa. Sometime between the ages of 22 and 25 he went to seminary in Randolph Co., Missouri-the heart of “Little Dixie”. He married a woman there and we surmise became very close to her family as they cared for his wife and children while he was in the CSA. JS Howard was a chaplin in the CSA. After the war he returned to Missouri as a teacher at McGee Seminary, later as president of women’s colleges in Tennessee, Mississippi and Texas.I assumed he never returned home, but recently found notes in my mother’s research that said his father originally told him to not to return, but at some point he did and was welcomed. However, he never again lived in Iowa after the Civil War. His parents are buried in the Lucas, Iowa cemetery.
David Connon
10 Apr 2015Hi, Gretchen. Thank you for sharing the excellent details about Rev. Joseph S. Howard! I was already familiar with Rev. Howard through the research of another descendant. Your ancestor had a very interesting life. Please let me know if you have any questions.
Gretchen Jacobson
11 Apr 2015I do have some questions. Rev. Howard raised my grandfather and his sisters after their mother died so we know quite a bit about him.. This was when he was at Texas Female Seminary. But I have little information about his service record so am curious is anyone has it documented.
David Connon
11 Apr 2015Hi, Gretchen.
I’ll e-mail you what I know.
David Connon
Felicia Wright
11 Jun 2015Hi David, My name is Felicia Wright. Just ran across some stuff on the civil war. I love studying about thst war in school. I dont know if you could help me but, i had a cousin that fought in the civil war for the union. His name was Orson Andrews he was with Company K 111 Illinois. He was wounded at Hogback ridge either in Tennessee or Kentucky. Would love any info. He died in 1937 and is buried in Emmettsburg IA. I know he was a doctor thats about it.
Thank you
Felicia Wright
David Connon
12 Jun 2015Hi, Felicia.
Thanks for reading my blog! I couldn’t find much on your ancestor, Orson Andrews. For example, he is not listed in the Roster and Record of Iowa Soldiers in the War of the Rebellion, but his name is listed in the Civil War Soldiers and Sailors Database (run by the National Park Service). Orson’s name is also mentioned briefly in the Palo Alto County, Iowa, iagenweb site. Good luck finding information!