William Welch
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William Welch never married and never had any descendants but his life story is a poignant one and deserves to be memorialized. He was born in 1835 on the family farm in Jackson Township, Wayne County, Indiana. He was the oldest child of Harvey and Rachel Woodward Welch and was a great grandson of Abraham and Hannah Thornbrough Woodward, the subject of this Web Site. He was a slight man, 5'6" tall, weighing about 135 pounds. This was probably an average size for a man of that time.
William Welch remained at home helping on the family farm, and also worked out to help with the family income. In the 1850 Wayne County census he is enumerated at home and as a servant in a nearby hotel at the age of 14. In 1847-1848 a three story hostelry was built on the newly opened Whitewater Canal to accomodate travelers there and on the National Road and this is the hotel where William worked. This hotel still stands and is known as the Vinton House. William's parents had made a good living in Wayne County supplying farm produce to a nearby station on the National Road. Drovers stopped overnight at these stations with their herds of cattle and hogs and huge quantities of corn were needed to feed the livestock. About 1856 the railroads came through and livestock was shipped by rail. Harvey and Rachel Woodward Welch and their family pulled up stakes and moved to Mercer County, Illinois, where there was a good market for produce on the Mississippi River.
In the 1860 census in Mercer County, William is enumerated both on the family farm and as a laborer working for William Carr, father of the William Carr who would later marry William Welch's sister, Lydia Ellen Welch. On August 20, 1861, William Welch enlisted in the Twenty-Seventh Illinois infantry. He was mustered into Company G on August 24, 1861. William's brother John Welch enlisted and was mustered in on the same day. The town of New Boston in Mercer County was very proud of this company and it was dubbed "The New Boston Sharpshooters." A send-off dinner, complete with patriotic speeches and a rendering of "The Star Spangled Banner" and a parody of the song "Dixie" to especially cheer the new soldiers on their way, was given by the citizens of New Boston. The story of the trip from New Boston to camp is told in a letter linked on a Mercer County Web Site Civil War page. A traveling photographer was set up on the streets of New Boston to memorialize the occasion and take pictures for families to remember their sons. William and brother John were photographed and are shown against a backdrop of sheeting set up for the photos - William a slight, prematurely balding man, next to his tall handsome brother John Welch. William would survive the rigors of the war but John would not.
In September 1862 on a forced march to Nashville, Tennessee, William Welch fell into a deep hole in the dark and was ruptured, an injury that would plague him the rest of his life. He would also suffer later in life from the effects of exposure and improper diet while in service.
The Twenty-Seventh Illinois took part in several Tennessee battles as a part of the Army of the Cumnberland, culminating in the Battle of Stones River at Murfreesboro. There the men were ordered to charge with bayonets when their ammunition ran out; their action saved the day for the Union Army. As a part of McCook's Division the Regiment fought at Shelbyville, Tullahoma and Stevenson, Tennessee, and made a forced march toward Rome, Georgia, where they suffered great loss under enemy fire.
At the Battle of Chattanooga, after storming Missionary Ridge, the Regiment was noticed for good conduct. Many of the Regiment were without shoes by the end of a forced march of 115 miles to Knoxville. Here, although he did not know it, William was very near the ancestral home of his grandparents, Abraham and Hannah Thornbrough Woodward.
The Twenty-Seventh moved as a part of the Army of the Cumberland on the Atlanta campaign, under fire for most of the time. They fought at Muddy Creek and Kenesaw Mountain, June 17, 1864. (For a letter about the Kenesaw Mountain battle that also mentions William Welch's reenlistment see the Mercer County Web Site.) The Twenty-seventh went into the assault with 17 officers, coming out with seven, and lost enlisted men in the same proportion.
The Regiment was ordered to Springfield, Illinois, to muster out on September 20, 1864, after three years and three months constant service at the front. One hundred two of the Regiment's original 1193 men were killed or died of wounds, 80 died of disease, 328 were wounded, 109 discharged for disability (among them William's brother John Welch), and 39 transferred.
William Welch chose to re-enlist as a veteran on January 1, 1865, and was mustered in on January 4, assigned to the Seventy-Ninth Illinois Volunteers as a part of Sheridan's Division of the 4th Army Corps, in Georgia. He was then temporarily assigned to the Illinois Ninth Consolidated Infantry, a mounted infantry battalion in the 20th Army that moved with Sherman to North Carolina, where the Confederate forces surrendered in April of 1865. The regiment was mustered out July 9, 1865, at Louisville, Kentucky, and William Welch was among those mustered out on that day. William's pension application papers state he joined the Ninth too late to see action with them. He had been in nearly continuous service for four years.
William Welch is found at home on the family farm in Mercer County in 1870. In 1880 he is found at the home of his brother-in-law, Stephen Carr, in Dennison, Grayson County, Texas.
The next record we have of William Welch is September 15, 1890, when he filed an application for a pension under the Act of June 27, 1890, for disabilities resulting from his Civil War Service. It is from this application that we know of his injury and his physical description. We know it is our William Welch because of the regiments, place of enlistment, and birthdate given in the application.
For nearly five years William Welch attempted to qualify for a pension. He had numerous difficulties, including an attorney he felt was dishonest. Part of the problem was that William was moving about, evidently following crop picking and his mail didn't always catch up with him. At various times he was at Sherman, Denison, Lehigh, and Dallas, Texas. At the time he was doing this hard labor William was sixty years old!
The last communication was a letter from William to the pension office explaining some of his difficulties:
"Denison, Texas May 10, 1895
Charles and William B. King
As you know I received an order to go before the medical board and have not complied with it. I now will tell you all about it in plain words I lost it on or about the 25th of December. I will tell you all about it. I was living with a man that has a large family of children and a good many cotton pickers was there at the time. I had taken the order out of my trunk and laid it and some pictures I had on the bed and stepped out and stayed longer than I intended and when I returned it was gone. This so vexed me that I thought I would quit trying to get a pension. I should not have been so careless but it was gone and no one could tell where some of the children might have got it and burnt it. Now I have been sick a good deal this winter and almost gave up but am better now. I went to town the other day and saw an old comrade and he urged me to try again his claim was filed not many months ago and had receive his papers for the money and he is a much better man than I am. And now mister Kings please wright and tell how to persue if you think it worth while trusting that I will hear from you soon I assure you that I will be carefull and prompt in all matters pertaining to my care.
Yours as ever
William Welsh"
William Welch did not receive a pension and there is no further record of him. He no doubt died somewhere there in the fields of cotton, a sixty-some year old man, living with strangers, and no longer having the comfort of his family photos.
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