Biography - James Reeder
James S. Reeder, postmaster at Garrett, to which position he was appointed in July, 1898, located in Bourbon in 1856. He is a son of John A. and Mary B. (Harter) Reeder. John A. Reeder was born in Ohio in 1815 and died in 1891. David Harter (maternal grandfather) was a native of Virginia. James S. was in the Civil war as a private, enlisting in Company G, Seventy-ninth Illinois Regiment Volunteer Infantry. Going in in August, 1862, he remained for two years and ten months.
Extracted by Linda Lang from the Historical and Biographical Record of Douglas County, Illinois, pages 276.
James S. Reeder was born in March 4, 1840, in Darke county, Ohio, and came with his parents in 1856 to this locality, where he engaged in farming. He enlisted in August, 1862, in Company G, Seventy-ninth Illinois Infantry, and served three years. At the battle of Stone River, December 31, 1862, he was wounded and taken prisoner; after being in the enemy's lines twenty-seven days he was exchanged, and participated in the battles of Liberty Gap and Chickamauga; at the latter, September 19, 1863, he was captured and taken to Richmond prison, then to Andersonville, Charleston, South Carolina, and Florence, making seventeen months in all spent in prison. At the close of the war he returned and engaged in farming. He was married December 2, 1865, to Mary M. Kelly, who was born in Winchester, Indiana. He resides in Arthur.
Extracted by Linda Lang from the Historical and Biographical Record of Douglas County, Illinois, pages 286.
