My Genealogy Hound

Xavier Kohler, farmer and stock-raiser, of Rock Township, was born in Baden, Germany, January 1, 1841, and is the eldest of three sons born to Sebastian and Mary Ann (Riebold) Kohler. [For further particulars of parents see sketch of Leo Kohler]. Xavier was reared principally by Judge Yerger, and received his education in the common schools by his own efforts. He remained at home until October 19, 1861, when he enlisted in Company B of Stewart’s Cavalry for three years, but in January, of the following year, was transferred to Company I, Forty-third Illinois Volunteer Infantry. In February he left for the South, and was initiated at Shiloh. He remained in West Tennessee, and North Mississippi, in the sixteenth corps, until the summer of 1863, when that corps was ordered South, and was at Haines Bluff at the fall of Vicksburg. Mr. Kohler was transferred to the seventh corps, under Gen. Steele, in the Trans-Mississippi department, was at Jenkin’s Ferry, and also participated in many minor skirmishes. He served about two months over the time of his enlistment, being discharged at Cairo, Ill., in December, 1864. He then returned home and remained on the farm until 1869, at which date he married Mrs. Mary Westerreck, widow of Henry Westerreck, and the daughter of William Freding, who was at the battle of Leipsic, where he met his death. Her mother, Minnie Freding, came to Missouri in 1847, and afterwards to Jefferson County, where she died in 1881, aged eighty-three. Mrs. Kohler is the mother of four children by her first marriage, and four by her last. The last children are: Apollonia, Anton, Anselm and Bertha. Since his marriage Mr. Kohler has lived on his present farm of 170 acres, situated three miles north of Antonia. He is a Mason, and in his political views is a Republican, casting his first presidential vote for Lincoln in 1864.