My Genealogy Hound

John F. Bushmiaer, farmer, was born in Prussia in 1832, and is a son of Henry and Margaret (Schnuky) Bushmiaer, also natives of Prussia. The father served in the Prussian army when quite young, being present at the battle of Waterloo and the capture of Paris. Some years after he became a government official. In October, 1847, he started with his family for the United States, and in the spring of 1848 landed at Van Buren, Ark., and soon after settled two miles south of the present site of Alma, where he died in 1849 and the mother in 1884. Both were members of the German Lutheran Church. John F., was the third in a family of five children, and while in the old country attended a common and graded school between the ages of seven and fourteen. He accompanied his parents to Crawford County, and is one of its oldest German pioneer citizens, as at the time of his arrival Van Buren was but a hamlet. The county seat had just been moved from the mouth of the Mulberry to Van Buren, and Sebastian was still a part of Crawford County. There are but few living here now who remember those days, and among those few is Mr. Bushmiaer. He being the oldest son, at the time of his father’s death was left to care for the family. At the commencement of the war he joined Company C., of Col. Chas. A. Carroll’s regiment of cavalry, and operated throughout the entire war in Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, Indian Territory and Texas, being in nearly all the engagements, and never being captured or wounded. The company was disbanded on Trinity River, in Texas. In 1868 Mr. Bushmiaer married Mrs. Caroline Smith, widow, who maiden name was Winckly, a native of Virginia; she died, leaving three children. In 1883 he was married to Mrs. Catherine Ramsdan, a widow, and the sister of his first wife. Since 1849 Mr. Bushmiaer has lived upon the farm his father cleared, and he now has in all 340 acres of good land. He is an industrious farmer and stock raiser, and one of the well-to-do citizens of the township. He is an enterprising man, and has given his children all available educational opportunities. He is a Democrat, and cast his first presidential vote for Buchanan in 1856. He has been a member of the Alma Masonic Lodge since its organization, and is identified with the Lutheran Church. Mrs. Bushmiaer is a Baptist.