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Ernest Hemingway said, “Any man’s life, told truly, is a novel.”  What is Memorial Day but a day to remember.  I’ll introduce three men from the greater Grinnell area who served in the Civil War.  Two of them have unfamiliar stories, and one is very familiar.  I give you the Professor, the Pacifist, and the Patriotic Farmer.

The Professor

School superintendent Leonard F. Parker stood with his face like flint toward those who would drive fugitive slaves from the Grinnell Public School.  In spite of a riot, Parker stood firm.  A year later, Confederates fired upon Fort Sumter, starting the great Civil War.

By this time, Parker was a professor at Iowa College (now called Grinnell College).  Parker fervently believed that the Confederacy must be defeated so slavery would end.  Most male students at Iowa College wanted to enlist, and Parker wanted to lead them into the army, but the college trustees said he would do more good at the college.

The war grew deadly serious, and Grinnell residents agonized over the casualty lists in the newspapers.  The unsettling specter of death visited Grinnell itself in a Spotted Fever Epidemic. As doctors struggled to treat residents with ghastly symptoms, the doctors themselves began to succumb to the disease.  Parker looked in on his wife, Sarah, to find her with Spotted Fever symptoms.  Using the only tools he had, research, logic, and prayer, he found a remedy that may have saved Sarah’s life.  The epidemic killed 13 people and afflicted others with lifelong medical problems, including Sarah who thereafter had a heart condition.

The war dragged on, and the need for fresh soldiers grew and grew.  The college trustees finally agreed to let Parker recruit Iowa College men — and others from Poweshiek County — to serve for 100 Days.  The recruiting tour took him to Montezuma and Brooklyn, where some complained about being “ruled by Grinnell.”  They raised enough men, and Parker was elected lieutenant.

When the “100 Day Men” arrived in Tennessee and Mississippi, the Rebels were always just one hill away.  Mosquitos drew more blood than did the Rebels.  After all their anticipation of giving it to the Rebels, the 100 days ended, and Parker and the students returned to fall classes.

The Pacifist

Devout Quaker Jesse Macy had left the family farm in Lynnville to attend the Iowa College Academy in Grinnell.  The Federal Government drafted Jesse during Iowa’s first draft in summer 1864.  Jesse’s father pleaded, “Let me pay $300 for a substitute so you don’t have to serve.”  But Jesse said he wanted to go South and serve former slaves, so he decided to enter the Army.  If Jesse couldn’t help freedmen, maybe he could “wait on the sick and wounded.”

Jesse reported for duty expecting to serve as a noncombatant.  As days turned into weeks, Jesse wanted to know his assignment, but his captain wouldn’t give Jesse permission to talk to anyone at headquarters.  Jesse said, “I resolved to obey orders as long as I could.”  He did so until they passed out rifles.  When the captain called Jesse’s name, he didn’t move.  Another soldier told the captain that Jesse claimed to be a noncombatant and wouldn’t bear arms. The captain swore that Jesse would.

What could be a very lonely place, standing against the entire weight of the U.S. Army changed, just a little bit, when a soldier from Tama County whispered to Jesse, “Don’t you draw your arms.”

This test of wills continued as the men moved into Tennessee.  One “long-whiskered soldier” told Jesse, “They can’t make you fight.”  Most other soldiers accepted that Jesse wouldn’t serve on military duty.  But the officers were another story.  Jesse said, “They have so many ways of coming at a person.”

He wanted to help teach some of the thousands of freedmen who were “thirsting for knowledge.”  But the Army required him to produce proof — from Grinnell — of his conscientious objection to fighting.

When they reached Cartersville, Georgia, a lieutenant said Jesse would carry an ax and cut paths for his company.  Jesse said he would labor for the relief of humanity, but he could not do any other army service.  The lieutenant said they “have a way in this army of making men do things.”  The officer finally relented and said Jesse might transfer to the ambulance train.

Jesse’s noncombatant orders finally came in, sending him to work in a hospital.  But his superiors kept him walking, unarmed, while Sherman’s men marched deeper into Georgia.  Jesse exulted when he transferred to an Army hospital near Savannah, Georgia. He worked for two months as a “special diet nurse.”  As Jesse labored to help suffering soldiers, a surgeon praised him for his “promptness, Kindness, and Judgment.”

The Patriotic Farmer

It wasn’t that Sylvester Alden forgot about the war.  After all, he was a Lincoln Republican.  And the newspapers made sure the war was on everybody’s mind.  But Sylvester was incredibly busy – and tired.

It all started a few years earlier when Sylvester bought farmland – virgin prairie – just over the county line near Montour.  Young buck that he was, Sylvester harnessed a team of oxen to a special plow and busted the sod.  After this impressive feat of sheer power, the real work began.

Every aspect of farm work was hard:  Walking behind a plow in a sweat-soaked shirt, planting seeds, cultivating weeds, feeding the horses, mucking out stalls.  The list never ended.

The unrelenting labor took all of the vitality of a 31-year-old man and every ounce of his strength.  And yet, he loved his help-meet, Louisa, as Adam loved Eve.  And regardless of the fatigue that dogged them every day but Sunday, Sylvester and Louisa loved their four children.

When Uncle Sam came calling with a draft notice, Sylvester was doing pretty well financially, all things considered.  He surely could have borrowed $300 to pay for a substitute to serve in his place.  He may have even thought about it.  But Sylvester obeyed the summons.  He answered the call.

He had eight days to make arrangements for Louisa and the children. Flying into action, they bought a house in town, and Sylvester asked his brother Ed to run the farm.

Sylvester soon joined Sherman’s March to the Sea.  Putting up a brave front in his letters, he insisted that he was fine, but he did ask Louisa to pray that he resist temptations.  He added, “Kiss all the babies for me.”

Sherman’s men marched deeper, deeper into Georgia.  Approaching the Atlantic coast, unrelenting rain wormed its way into his oilskin blanket. No matter what he did, he couldn’t stop feeling cold and clammy.  He entered the hospital.  Within days, he was dead, this man of vitality and love, felled by a fever that medicine couldn’t treat.  The Patriotic Farmer, like the Professor and the Pacifist, had answered the call.

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I gave the preceding remarks at the 2019 Memorial Day ceremony at the Newburg-Chester Church, north of Grinnell, Iowa.  

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