CAPTAIN WILLIAM H.
REYNOLDS OF ABINGDON
A Notable Military Record
Farmer, Lawyer,
and above all, a man of forthright independence, William H. Reynolds, like so
many others of his generation, began his life elsewhere. He was born on December 23rd,
1829, in Park County, Indiana. At the
age of seven he accompanied his father Samuel, and his mother, Ann Jane, to
Illinois, where his father purchased a farm of 160 acres near Berwick,
Illinois. Samuel applied himself
industriously to farming and to the acquisition of land, and at one time owned
2000 acres of land in Warren County. He
lived to the ripe old age of 88, and sired, 12 children, 9 of whom reached maturity.
Young William
grew up on the home farm, and received a solid education in the local schools
and then at Abingdon College, an educational institution that opened in
1853. He studied law and practiced the
legal profession for four to five years, but gave it up to concentrate on
farming. It was a struggle; he ran into
debt and eventually sold a farm of 360 acres in Warren County, but eventually
he prospered and soon was able to afford a farm of 1000 acres in Orange
Township, near Knoxville.
In 1855 he
married Martha Bundy in Orange Township.
Their family eventually included a son and 2 daughters.
William enlisted
as a private in Company D of the 7th Illinois Volunteer Cavalry in
August of 1861. His unit was mustered
into service in October of 1861. He soon
was made 1st Lieutenant, and soon took over the duties of the
Captain of the regiment due to the inefficiencies of his superior officer. He went on to see action in the Western
theatre of the war, serving with General Pope at Island No. 10 and New Madrid,
and fighting along the Tennessee River.
He led his command ably at the Battle of Corinth, and shortly afterwards
was promoted to the rank of Captain, the duties of which he had already taken
the responsibility for.
After the defeat
of Van Dorn and the rebels at Corinth, the 7th participated in the
pursuit of the retreating rebel army, and was the first Union regiment to march
into Tuscumbia, Alabama. Reynolds and
the 7th saw hard fighting again at the Battle of Iuka when they were
engaged for seven hours, and in September through November performed a series
of assignments during which they covered some 800 miles, destroying railroads
and bridges. On November 26th
the 7th routed 300 Confederates under the command of Colonel
Richardson. In early December Reynolds
and the 7th pursued General Price into Mississippi, but on the 5th
of December the rebels turned on their pursuers and defeated them in an
engagement near Coffeeville, Mississippi.
William Reynolds was among the Union troops who were unfortunate enough
to be taken prisoner, and he was held as such in Jackson, Mississippi and then
Vicksburg for about two months. He was
exchanged and sent to St. Louis, where he recuperated for a bit before he
returned to his command on the 5th of March in 1863.
William was back
in the regiment when it made a grueling campaign that culminated in the capture
of Baton Rouge. This campaign had taken
the men some 800 miles and had resulted in the capture of a thousand enemy
prisoners. The regiment and William
Reynolds went on to assist in the Capture of Fort Hudson, eventually making its
way back to Memphis in July of 1863. It
also was the 7th that pursued Confederate General Jeff Thompson, a
very able cavalry commander known as “the Swamp Fox of the Confederacy,” 16 miles though a quagmire pf swampland to the
safety of a rebel fort, and then were able to extricate themselves after
running up against superior numbers, only though after a firefight that lasted for 7 hours.
William Reynolds
had an independent streak that manifested itself in a couple of notable
instances. At one point Union General
Grant issued an order to General William Rosecrans to have all horses branded
and turned over to the United States government. Captain Reynolds protested, and succeeded in
preventing the breaking of the contract that allowed the men of 7th
to retain their horses as “unbranded” throughout the war. In another instance, while on detached duty
in Memphis due to illness, General Benjamin Grierson ordered him to take
command of the 9th Illinois Cavalry, a regiment that had the reputation
of being harder to discipline than any other regiment sent out of
Illinois. Captain Reynolds wanted
nothing to do with the regiment, whose reputation was well known to him as
well. He promptly refused the order to
take command of it. For this act of
insubordination he was placed under arrest.
General Grierson though, was no martinet. Approaching Reynolds as a friend rather than as
a commanding officer, he sat down with William Reynolds and eventually
convinced him that it would be in the best interests of both his career and the
cause to withdraw his objection, apologize for his stubborn refusal, and accept
the responsibility of handling the regiment.
He did so, but was soon laid low by illness and was sent to Memphis to
recuperate. Upon doing so, he served for
several months as a special detective in Memphis under the command of General C. C. Washburn. This was an assignment that required the
utmost nerve and courage, initiating and pursuing investigations regarding suspected
rebel spies, smuggling of contraband and rounding up deserters. Reynolds performed his duties in this
responsible position well enough to please his superiors.
Williams Reynolds
served until the close of the war, but due to some bureaucratic oversight,
never received his discharge papers.
Those in charge of processing them however, claimed that they were
issued properly to all of the men in the regiment when the regiment was
mustered out of service.
After the war
William returned to Knox County and resumed his life as a farmer. In addition to his holding in Orange
Township, he purchased 600 acres of land in Knox County and a 400 acre model
stock farm in Norton County, Kansas. His
wife Martha having died in 1873, he remarried later that year in Knoxville, a
Miss Margaret Wallace, a native of Scotland.
Two sons and two daughters resulted from their union.
Politically
William Reynolds considered himself an independent. He served as a County Supervisor, School
Director and Road Commissioner. In 1880
he was prevailed upon by the fledgling Greenback Party to run for
Congress. He gave it an honest attempt,
and although defeated, he gave 90 speeches and impressed his neighbors and
opponents both by his oratory and campaign efforts.
The old farmer
and Civil War Patriot died in April of 1919, and is interred with other member
s of his family in the mausoleum at the Abingdon, Illinois cemetery.
Bibliography
1899 Historical Encyclopedia of Knox County
Civil War Veterans of Knox County, Illinois website
Find A Grave
William H. Reynolds
Abingdon College, Wikipedia entry
Jeff Thompson, Wikipedia entry
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