The Nation owes a debt to the veterans of the Civil war, who gave the best years of their young lives to the defense of the Union, and marched under the star-spangled banner under the leadership of such heroes as Grant, Sherman and Sheridan, which can never be fully repaid. The ranks of the grand army of brave and true men who have worn the blue are gradually thinning out, and where once they were numbered in hundreds and thousands throughout this broad land, there are now but few in each community. These veterans were of the salt of the earth, and no better type of manhood ever trod the earth or marched to the strains of martial music than the old guard, which saved the Union, at the call of Abraham Lincoln. Living on a farm, in the northwest part of Benton township, Atchison county, Kansas, is a survivor of General Sherman’s victorious “march to the sea.” Comrade Charles E. Barker gave three years of his life in the defense of the Union and flag, and has a war record which has been equalled or surpassed by but few men who shouldered a musket to save the Union from dissolution.
Charles E. Barker, well-to-do farmer, of Atchison county, Kansas, was born in Fulton county, Illinois, April 4, 1842, a son of John and Eleanor (Rutledge) Barker. The father of Charles was born in Virginia July 20, 1786, and learned the blacksmith’s trade when yet a boy. He migrated to Fulton county, Illinois, as early as 1826, and there operated a blacksmith shop. He was twice married, his second wife being Eleanor Rutledge, who bore him three children: George R., deceased; James Lee, deceased: Charles E. The four children by the first marriage were Joseph, John W., Sarah, and Elizabeth, deceased. The mother of Charles E. was born in Greenbrier county, Virginia, November 28, 1801, and died September 3, 1873. John Barker died in Fulton county, Illinois, in September of 1861.
Charles E. Barker grew up on his father’s farm, and helped in the shop and on the farm until his enlistment, at the age of twenty years. At the outbreak of the war he harkened to Lincoln’s call for volunteers to quell the rebellion of the Southern States, and went to Vermont, Ill., where he enlisted in Company F, One Hundred and third regiment, Illinois infantry, August 14, 1862, under the command of General Sherman, and Mr. Barker acted as commissary sergeant in Tennessee and the South. He participated in the following engagements: Vicksburg, Mission Ridge, Kenesaw Mountain, Resaca, Ga., Peachtree Creek, Ga., Dallas, Gristleville, November 26, 1864, and many others, his regiment being in twenty-seven battles in all. He marched under Sherman’s banner from Atlanta to the sea, and then marched in the Grand Review at Washington, D. C. He was honorably discharged at Chicago, Ill., July 7, 1865. He returned home after his discharge, and remained in Fulton county, Illinois, until 1883, when he disposed of his holdings there and went to Dade county, Missouri, where he bought a farm. He remained in Dade county for several years, living on various farms which he bought and sold. In August, 1887, he went to Furnace county, Nebraska, and purchased a half section of land, to which he added 160 acres later, which he sold in 1903 to his son, Harry. On March 1, 1891, he went to Brown county, Kansas, and lived there until his removal to Atchison county. In 1894 he came to Atchison county, Kansas, and bought 160 acres of land in the northwest corner of Benton township. He improved this farm and cultivated it with profit to himself. He maintains good graded live stock on his acreage and is considered one of the really successful agriculturists of the county. Nearly all of his land is sown to alfalfa and grasses.
On April 19, 1866, Mr. Barker was married to Mary E. Pontious, who has borne him six children, as follows: Leonard, a farmer, of Norton county, Kansas; Ira C., of Gooding, Idaho; Harry E., living in Brown county, Kansas; William L., a farmer, of Kapioma township, Atchison county, Kansas; Perry, residing in Stanford, Neb.; Nora, deceased. The mother of these children was born in Ohio, a daughter of Andrew and Ann (Bear) Pontious, natives of Germany.
Mr. Barker is a Democrat of the old school, and is a firm believer in Democratic principles. He belongs to the Grand Army of the Republic, Effingham Post, and numbers among the members of this organization many warm friends and comrades. He has taken his place in the community as a representative citizen, who enjoys the respect and esteem of all who know him. He can look back over his three score and thirteen years of life with satisfaction and realize with complacency that it has been well spent, and he has accomplished all that any good American could wish for on this earth.
JOHN E. SULLIVAN.
If a man has the inherent ability and energy in his makeup to enable him to succeed, he is going to do it. The life stories of all successful, self-made men bear out this contention, and there are numberless instances of success among the younger generation in the West which are well worth recounting. John E. Sullivan, real estate dealer, loan and insurance agent, of Effingham, Kansas, is a representative example of the class referred to in the foregoing statement. Mr. Sullivan was destined to succeed in his farming and business ventures, and, while a young man, he has already made his mark in the world, and is one of the substantial and influential citizens of Atchison county.
John E. Sullivan was born on a farm, near Rulo, Richardson county, Nebraska, January 20, 1873. He is a son of Murty and Mary (Rawley) Sullivan, substantial and well respected citizens of Effingham. The former was born in Ireland in 1847, and the latter is a native of Canada, born of Irish parents in 1852. Murty Sullivan left Ireland in 1865, immigrated to America and settled near Rulo, Neb. He made his own way in this country, and accumulated a large farm in Nebraska, on which he resided until 1910, when he removed to Effingham and purchased a farm adjoining the town on the south. Murty and Mary Sullivan are the parents of the following children: James and Murty, Jr., living at Hardin, Mont.; Daniel D., a farmer, of Benton township, Atchison county, Kan.; John E., the subject of this review; Mrs. John Vogel, of Falls City, Neb.; Sister M. Teresa, a sister of the Ursuline Convent, of York, Neb., and a teacher in St. Angela’s Academy there. The family are all members of the Catholic church.
John E. received his primary education in the common schools of his native county in Nebraska, and finished his education in St. Benedict’s College, Atchison, Kan., graduating from the commercial department of that institution in 1894. He then took a special teachers’ course at the Lincoln, Neb., Normal School. He taught school for seven years in Richardson county, Nebraska, and practically all of his teaching was done in two schools of his home county. Upon his marriage in 1897 he engaged in farming in Nebraska, and it is a matter of pride with Mr. Sullivan that he earned more money in two years of farming operations than he had in all of his seven years of teaching, another reason why the farm is the best place for a young and ambitious man to make money. His success as a farmer determined his future career, and he decided to stick to the agricultural country for all time, imbued with the belief that there is money to be earned in farming, or in handling farm lands. He left Nebraska in December of 1901, and came to Atchison county, Kansas, where he purchased a farm, one and one-half miles south of Effingham, his first farm being the northwest quarter of section 34–618. He is at present the owner of 400 acres of well improved land which is kept in a high state of cultivation by improved methods of farming. Mr. Sullivan raises considerable live stock on his acreage and aims to feed all the grain raised on the land to live stock. He specializes in Hereford cattle and Poland China hogs and aims to keep only good grade of stock of all kinds. At the time of his purchase of the farm land in Atchison county, the land itself was in poor condition, and the soil had become impoverished by continual cropping of a single staple. Through the modern method of crop rotation Mr. Sullivan is reviving the fertility of the soil, and at the present time the greater portion of his farm is planted to clover and grasses, for the purpose of renewing the strength of the soil, the process being assisted by the raising and feeding of live stock on the place. The Sullivan farm has splendid improvements, which were placed on it by Mr. Sullivan, who erected a modern eight-room house and a good barn. In 1907 Mr. Sullivan was induced to take up insurance work as a side line, in the interest of a Nebraska insurance company, and met with great success in his new line of work. He later took up the real estate business and the handling of loans, and has been likewise successful in establishing a permanent business which requires his attention and necessitates an office in Effingham. The Sullivan real estate and loan office is well located in the Farmers and Merchants State Bank, of which concern Mr. Sullivan served as cashier and a director for several years.
He was married February 16, 1897, to Mary Majerus, a native born resident of Richardson county, Nebraska, and a daughter of Jacob and Elizabeth (Wilker) Majerus, the former a native of Germany, and the latter of Ohio, of German parents. Seven children have blessed this union, namely: P. Justin, aged seventeen, and a student of St. Benedict’s College, class of 1916; Leo, aged thirteen years; Nellie, ten years old; Elizabeth, aged eight; Edward, six years old; Agnes, three years of age; and Mary, born January 28, 1915.