My Genealogy Hound

CALVARY CHAPMAN, section 20, post-office Avilla, is a native of West Virginia, born in Kanawha county, Oct. 30, 1825, and was there reared to manhood and learned the cooper’s trade in his father’s shop. He was married in his native county, July 12, 1848, to Miss Mary J. Payne, and the following year immigrated to Ohio, and carried on a cooper-shop at Proctorville, in that state, until 1855, when he moved to Des Moines county, Iowa, where he remained two years, when he became a citizen of Jasper county, Mo., locating where he now lives. At the breaking out of the civil war Mr. Chapman espoused the cause of the Union, and volunteered in the Seventy-sixth Regiment Enrolled Missouri Militia, going into active service. His family remaining at home, subject to all the dangers and indignities of these trying times, were repeatedly raided by bushwhackers and deprived of everything movable. Their horses being driven off early in the struggle, forced the family to remain, and the hardships endured by them would fill a volume. Their daughter, then a young girl of fifteen, was forced to take off her shoes and give them to a party of raiders. At one time Mr. Chapman came home and went with his wife and several neighbors to Fort Scott to purchase supplies, and on their return were met by a party and everything taken from them; the shawl taken from his wife and coat and hat from himself. In this condition they had to return to their home by a long night’s ride, with oxen—a cold night in October. After the cessation of hostilities Mr. Chapman, with the poor facilities left him, again commenced improving his land, and has been quite prosperous. His farm consists of 200 acres of improved land, also forty acres of timber. His wife died Dec. 17, 1876, leaving a family of six children: Elizabeth J., wife of J. L. Striker; Sarah F., wife of L. Van Tarter; Charles W., Morris D., Mary S., and Harriet. He married for his second wife, Mrs. Caledonia Wilson, daughter of John C. Batton, Oct. 28, 1880. Of this union there is one child, Abner D.