Veteran Mustered Out

After a long and serious illness Comrade Philip W. Weaver did at his home at 1101 South Fourth St. this morning, at the age of Seventy-five years, one month and eleven days. In 1861 he enlisted in the 21st Indiana Volunteers, and later in the First Indiana Heavy Artillery and in the battle of Baton Rouge in 1862 was wounded. He was born in Park county, Indiana, in 1837, and in the early ‘80’s, with his family bought a farm in the old Harrsionville neighborhood, and for many years was a power in the neighborhood for good. He was converted in 1861 and united with the United Brethren church, and for thirty years was a quarterly conference minister with a permanent license, and remained in the church fellowship until the end. He is survived by his widow, one son, O. A. Weaver and one daughter, Mrs. Ella Roadruck, both of this city. The funeral will be held Friday. He was an active member of the Grand Army of the Republic, and greatly admired by a wide circle of friends.

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From History of Montgomery County, Kansas, By Its Own People, Published by L. Wallace Duncan, Iola, Kansas, 1903, Pg. 514-515:

Weaver, P. W. Bio

P. W. Weaver, retired farmer, now residing at 401 South Sixth street, Independence, has been a citizen of Montgomery county for the past twenty –two years. During this time, the citizens of the county have come to know him as a high-minded, sincere gentleman, whose evident purpose in life is to live and to serve.

Mr. Weaver is of “Hoosier State” nativity, born in Parke county, February 16, 1837. His father was John Weaver, his mother Margaret Crecelius, natives of Virginia and Tennessee, respectively. They belonged to the pioneer farmer class, whose genius mastered the primeval forest and caused it to bloom forth into cultivated field and pastured hillside. Both of the parents lived to a ripe age, the father dying at eighty-four, the mother at eighty-five years. The latter was a consistent member of the United Brethren church and a woman of superior mould of character. The former was of that stern quality, frequently found among the early pioneers, whose love of country amounted to a religious creed, and whose lives comported with the purity of the patriotic sentiment enshrined in their hearts. This, he particularly and forcibly manifested during the Civil war. Too old to enter the service, he sent his son, and then busied himself in making it uncomfortable for the Copperheads who infested his neighborhood and who had become member of that traitorous organization, known as the Knights of the Golden Circle. His family consisted of eleven children, five of whom are yet living.

P. W. Weaver received a fair education and passed his life in active labor on the farm until the great Civil war burst in all its fury---a fury destined to eclipse the most sanguine of history’s greatest conflicts. Patriotism having been a part of his daily sustenance, it was not strange that our subject should be one of the first, from his neighborhood, to enlist. He became a private, in Company “H,” Twenty-first Indiana Volunteer Infantry, his enlistment dating in June of 1861. His regiment became a part of the Army of the Potomac, but was soon changed to the First Indiana Artillery and sent to the extreme south, becoming a part of the Army of the Gulf. On the lower Mississippi and about New Orleans, he saw much service, during the winter of 1861-62, his first battle being at Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Here, he received a ball in the wrist and, with many other wounded soldiers, was sent to the hospital at New Orleans. On this trip, he was a witness to one of the most appalling catastrophes of the war, and one which, when the truth of it diabolism became known, caused the most intense feeling throughout the north. The vessel on which he was carried to New Orleans was The Morning Light. On the 5th of August 1862, she was run into by one of the Union gunboats, and, in eighteen minutes, sank with almost her entire cargo of wounded and helpless soldiers. Mr. Weaver, being on the hurricane deck and having one good arm, was able to save himself, but hundreds of his comrades were drowned, like rats in a trap. Investigation proved that the deed was consummated by Rebel engineers, who had taken advantage of the great demand for their craft in the Union navy, deserted, ostensibly, from the Confederates, took the oath of allegiance, and were at once placed in responsible positions.

His wound proving a serious one, Mr. Weaver was sent home, going by way of Cuba and New York, having been discharged at New Orleans, prior to his embarkation. He did not reenter the service.

Mr. Weaver engaged in agricultural pursuits, in Indiana, until 1881 when he came to Montgomery county and settled on a farm on Onion creek. Upon this he placed many valuable improvements and made it his home until 1899, when he moved to Bolton, and in 1902 became a resident of Independence. He still owns an improved farm of one hundred and twenty acres in the gas belt.

In October of 1864 our subject was married to Miss Virena Morgan, a native of Parke county, Indiana, and a daughter of Kenchen and Sarah (Johnson) Morgan. To this marriage have been born two children: Onda A., a resident of Bolton, who married Pearl Lynch and has one child, Wayne; Ollie B., married William H. Roadruck and resides in Independence.

Mr. Weaver and family are leading members of the United Brethren church, he being a trustee and quarterly conference minister. He is also a member of the Masonic order, having taken the Blue Lodge degrees in 1863, and is a prominent member of the Grand Army of the Republic.

Looking back on a life, honorable in all its activities and resting secure in the esteem of many friends, our subject is passing the eve of life in peace and contentment, “with charity for all, and malice toward none.”

Contributed by Mrs. Maryann Johnson a Civil war researcher and a volunteer in the Kansas Room of the Independence Public Library, Independence, Kansas.