| The Moore page |
John Harvey, how could you?
If I had the opportunity to travel back in time to meet and talk with one of my ancestors, John Harvey would certainly be on the short list.
John Harvey was born in 1828, the third child of seven born to a farmer and shoe cobbler Andrew Harvey and his wife Elizabeth. The family lived in the Washington Township of Gibson County. In February of 1851 John married Mary “Polly” Jones, the daughter of Wiley and Margaret (Graves) Jones and to this union was born five children, with one daughter, Sarah, dying before reaching her first birthday.
No one could have predicted how two events in 1861 would change this family forever, and leave their ancestors wondering, “How could this happen?”
It was in 1861 that the Civil War erupted, and in August of that year Mary Harvey died, leaving her husband with four small children, Margaret, 9, Henry, 8, Elizabeth, 6, and Abraham, 2. Despite having just lost his wife and having his children to care for, two months after her death John Harvey made the inexplicable decision to leave his children and answer the call and enlist in the Union Army.
On October 30, 1861 John Harvey was mustered in as a private in the 42nd Indiana Volunteer Infantry, Company E. The 42nd was organized at Camp Vanderburgh near Evansville and pulled volunteers from Vanderburgh, Spencer, Gibson, Davies, Pike and Warrick counties.
The orders to march came quickly and in early November the 42nd was sent to put down a rebellion in Henderson, Kentucky. The troops boarded steamboats for the trip. The diaries of soldiers note that the weather was freezing and they feared rebels were waiting to attack around every bend. As it turns out, the only Confederate soldiers the 42nd saw were prisoners being held on a passing steamboat.
From Henderson the 42nd was ordered to march 27 miles into Kentucky to the town of Calhoun. It was a miserable trek. For four days John Harvey and the other soldiers carried more than 60 pounds of gear and supplies through a frigid, persistent rain. At one point, six inches of snow fell on the area making the march that much more difficult. Soldiers pitched their tents over piles of brush to keep from lying in snow and soggy ground.
When the troops finally reached the outskirts of Calhoun they were soaked, exhausted and discouraged. The men had yet to receive any pay, prompting one soldier to write in a letter home that the governor must have forgotten about them.
The terrible weather took its toll and fewer than twenty days after arriving in Calhoun one-third of the men were sick, including John Harvey. In March of 1862 Harvey succumbed to an unrecorded illness. He was buried in Calhoun, Kentucky. Harvey had left his children to serve his country. He never saw any action and was apparently never paid for his time in the service. He has a headstone at the Harvey family cemetery; however, it is just a memorial marker not his actual grave marker.
So why did he do it? How could he put serving his country before his children? These are the questions of which we will never know the answers. The grief over the loss of his wife and the call to duty by a nation that was plummeting into the grips of a terrible war must have been overwhelming. His sons and daughters must have been on his mind every minute of that long, miserable march. As a parent, I can imagine that the only thing that worried him more than his failing health was the well being of those kids.
As for the children, all that is known is that the oldest daughter, Margaret, stayed with the Isaac Carr family in neighboring Pike County where she helped with chores. How and where the other three children were raised, including my great great grandfather Abraham Harvey, is a mystery.
Bryce Moore