JOSHUA SHRIVER                          GRAVESTONE PHOTO                      

Pages 541-542, transcribed by Carolyn Ward from History of Butler County, Kansas by Vol. P. Mooney. Standard Publishing Company, Lawrence, Kan.: 1916. ill.; 894 pgs.

HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY

Joshua Shriver, of Towanda, Kans., is a veteran of the Civil war and a Kansas pioneer who has spent over forty-five years of his life in Butler county. He was born at Elkhart, Ind., in 1841, and is a son of Daniel and Lavina (Nuzum) Shriver, both natives of Virginia, who removed to Indiana at an early date. The following children were born to Daniel and Lavina (Nuzum) Shriver: Joshua, the subject of this sketch; William, Elkhart, Ind.; Rufus, Elkhart, Ind.; Frank, Peabody, Kans.; Anne (deceased); Mrs. Matilda Hoover, Peabody, Kans.; Mrs. Phoebe Lambert, Goshen, Ind.; John (deceased), and Noah (deceased).

Joshua Shriver spent his boyhood days in his native State and was educated in the public schools of Elkhart. About the time he reached his majority he enlisted at Elkhart, Ind., in Company E, Seventy-fourth Indiana infantry, serving from 1862 until June, 1865, when he was honorably discharged at Indianapolis on account of the close of the war, after having served about three years. His career as a soldier was an active one and he participated in many important battles of that great struggle, as well as a number of lesser engagements and minor skirmishes. He was at the battle of Chickamauga, Missionary Ridge and the Atlanta campaign. He was at the battle of Jonesboro, and the constant series of engagements on Sherman's march, beginning with the battle of Resaca, and when the war closed he was at Goldsborough, N. C. While Mr. Shriver's military career was an unusually hazardous one, he escaped without an injury and never spent a day in a hospital.

At the close of the war Mr. Shriver returned to Goshen, Ind., where he was engaged in farming for about six years, and in 1871 came to Kansas, locating in Towanda township, Butler county, about one and a half miles east of Towanda. Here he homesteaded 160 acres and engaged in farming. He broke the prairie and converted his place into one of the productive farms of Butler county, and was engaged in farming and stock raising until 1913, when he removed to Towanda, where he is now living in retirement. Mr. Shriver has well earned the title of pioneer and is one of the men who had faith in the future of Kansas during its days of uncertainty, and in recording the story of these men, a work of this character is fulfilling its most important function.

Mr. Shriver was married in 1868 to Miss Nannie McGuffin, of Goshen, Ind. She was a daughter of James McGuffin and Sarah (Stuart) McGuffin, natives of Indiana and of Scotch descent. To Mr. and Mrs. Shriver have been born the following children: Charles, Leon, Kans.; John, Pine Bluff, Ark.; E. A., hardware merchant, Towanda, Kans., a sketch of whom appears in this volume; Fred G., Towanda, Kans.; James, farming the home place in Towanda township; Mrs. Ella Oten, McPherson, Kans.; Mrs. Bertha Stewart, Benton, Kans., and Mrs. Nellie Bishop, Amarilla, Tex.

Mr. Shriver has been in poor health for the last few years, having been afflicted with partial paralysis since 1912. However, his mind is as clear as ever, and his recollection of the pioneer days in Butler county is most vivid, and he tells in an interesting and entertaining way the many adventures and experiences of the early day pioneers who laid the foundation of Butler county, as one of the foremost political subdivisions of the Kansas of today and the future.