Twenty-Five Who Answered the Call

Mesick Area Civil War Soldiers

Introduction
Like many other northern Michigan communities, Wexford County had only one veteran, Dr. Edward Morgan, who signed up to fight in the Civil War. At the time few settlers had made it through the dense underbrush to make their way up to northern Michigan. However, after the war when the homestead properties were assigned to those brave men that had said “Yes!” when their country asked them to fight, many ended up in northern Michigan; a few from other states but mainly from New York. These are the men you will find that were laid to rest in the cemeteries of the little villages and towns surrounding Mesick.

These soldiers made our community what it is today by taking up positions in the villages they resided in becoming village officers and most all of them were family men. Some never knew a day without pain after the war was over, so we must give them credit for their patriotism—and our freedom. The following gives a glimpse into the lives of those veterans and their families and tells of the hardships they endured as they came to a land filled with trees and underbrush.

They were undaunted by the immensity of the job ahead of them. They cleared the land and made farms; at first burning the trees, but then, deciding there was a better way, began building mills and made lumber for homes, ship timbers, wooden bowls, broom handles, and other useful items to sell from those trees. You see, they were entrepreneurs at heart.

It is my hope you will enjoy the life stories of these warriors that helped run an “underground railroad”, become real estate investors, storekeepers, doctors, mill hands, lumber barons, orchard and vegetable farmers, and that they will be as interesting for you to read as it was for to research and write about…A big thanks goes to Peggy Johnson for helping me find the tombstones of these fine fighting men from the Civil War.

And so we begin, North against South, blue against gray, neighbor against neighbor…… The year 1861.

….Nancy Sanders