James W. Crawford, the present postmaster at Little River, Kan., and a well known and respected citizen of Rice county for over forty years, deserves mention in this work both for his useful career within the state and as a veteran of the Civil war. He was born on a farm in Coshocton county, Ohio, April 29, 1843, the son of Hance D. and Elizabeth (Scott) Crawford. Hance D. Crawford was born in County Down, Ireland, Dec. 25, 1818, and accompanied his parents to America at the age of sixteen years. Until 1855 he was associated with his father in the work of the home farm in Ohio, where the family had located. He then removed to Rock Island county, Illinois, where he was independently engaged in farming until 1863, removing thence to McLean county, where he was similarly engaged until 1870. In that year he brought his family to Kansas and located on a farm near Topeka, but the following year, or in 1871, he secured a homestead south of Little river in Rice county, which remained his home for some years. He died March 14, 1885, at Little River. The mother of the subject was a native of Catskill county, New York, where she was born Oct. 2, 1824. She died in Rice County, Kansas, Jan. 27, 1873. Hance D. Crawford and Elizabeth Scott were married Sept. 1, 1842; their only child was James W., of this review.

James W. Crawford acquired his education in the public schools of Ohio and Illinois. He was a youth of but eighteen years at the outbreak of the Civil war, but such was the fervor of his youthful patriotism that he enlisted April 25, 1861, at Port Byron, Ill., in Company D, Thirteenth Illinois infantry, for the first three months' call. Upon the conclusion of that service he enlisted in Captain Graham's Independent Cavalry company, of Moline, Ill., and was attached for service to the Fourteenth Missouri infantry. His regiment was captured by Gen. Sterling Price of the Confederacy at Lexington, Mo., during the siege of that town in 1861, and was mustered out when released. In June, 1862, Mr. Crawford reënlisted in Company D, Seventy-first Illinois infantry, with which he served four months with the rank of corporal. He then reënlisted in Company K, Second Illinois cavalry, with which he served until the close of the war. This regiment took the advance on March 30, 1863, in the Vicksburg campaign, with almost daily skirmishes until May 3, when the last of Grant's army crossed the Mississippi below Grand Gulf. After crossing the river it again led the advance until the army invested Vicksburg on May 18. After the fall of Vicksburg the Second Illinois cavalry took the advance toward Jackson, Miss., fighting all the way to that place. They were in active service from that time until the close of the war. Mr. Crawford participated in a number of different battles and engagements but was never wounded. At the three days' siege of Lexington, Mo., he was taken captive and, with others, was condemned to be executed, but the order was countermanded.

After the close of the war he returned to Illinois and worked on a farm near Lexington until 1866. On Nov. 7 of that year he married Miss Sarah M. Wilsey of Rapid City, Ill. She is the daughter of Daniel and Phoebe (Hurlburt) Wilsey, the former of whom was a native of New York and a carpenter by trade, and the latter was a native of Canada. The father died Dec. 17, 1879, and was survived by the mother until April 1, 1886. They were the parents of eleven children. To Mr. and Mrs. Crawford have been born five children, as follows: Phoebe, whose birth occurred Oct. 2, 1867, died Jan. 22, 1889; Hester, born Aug. 25, 1870, is now the wife of W. G. Greenback, editor and publisher of the "Monitor," at Little River, Kan., and is the mother of six children, four daughters and two sons—Mary M., Lester, Edith, Edna, James W. and Phoebe; Daniel H., the eldest son, was born March 29, 1875, and is now located at Little River, Kan.; served in the Spanish-American war in Company A, Twenty-first Kansas infantry; Etta May, born June 5, 1879, died Aug. 14, 1879; James W. Crawford, Jr., born Nov. 21, 1881, enlisted in Company G, Ninth United States infantry, in 1900 and served three years; was in foreign service two years and was in the Boxer uprising in China, participating in the battle and capture of Pekin. He now resides in Portland, Ore.

Mr. Crawford came to Kansas with his parents and his own family in 1870, and to Rice county in 1871, locating on government land near Little River. He lived here until 1881, when he removed to the town of Little River. He was appointed postmaster at Lodiana in 1876 and served in that capacity until 1880, when that office was abolished and the one at Little River was established in its place, whereupon Mr. Crawford was appointed postmaster and held the office until 1885, when the administration changed. On Dec. 8, 1897, he was again appointed postmaster at Little River and has held that office continuously to the present time (1911), making a total service of twenty-three years in that official position. He has also held other positions of trust and of public service, having been a township trustee two years, mayor of Little River one term, councilman two terms, police judge three years, a director and treasurer of the Little River school board, and a justice of the peace twelve years. He has also entered actively into the fraternal, social and church life of his community and has always lent his influence toward all that tends to greater moral as well as greater commercial and industrial development. He is a member of the Masonic order, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and the Knights of Pythias, and both he and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal church.