Rawson Ave. Neighborhood Sent 3 to Civil War

Editor's Note: This is the fourth of a five-part series on local men and their service in the Civil War. Click here for Parts 1-3.

When you are driving on S. Howell Avenue and turn onto E. Rawson Avenue, you quickly go over a small hill and see an assortment of houses on the passenger side of the vehicle.

On the driver's side of the car are abundant open spaces and the occasional business a little more than a mile from the north-south runway of Mitchell International Airport.

In 1863, people in this same area would have been driving their horses and wagons past Oak Creek Township farms that had sons in the Civil War – the Schumacher farm, the Schulte farm, the Verhaalen farm (which would be spelled Verhalen on the 1876 plat map) and most likely others.

George Verhaalen, whose family owned land on the south side of the road in what is now the 500 block of E. Rawson, was a private in the 24th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry, enlisting Aug. 21, 1862, a year and four months after the war started. A total of 38 Oak Creek men were in Company K of the regiment; the vast majority joining up during that month.

A little over a year after Verhaalen left for the war, two other men from the Rawson Avenue neighborhood, Henry Schumacher and Peter Schulte, enlisted in the 35th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment on Dec. 8, 1863, serving in Company B. Schumacher was a corporal and Schulte a private. On the alphabetical roster of their company, their names are only one spot from each other. For some reason the 35th's roster lists them as being from Milwaukee, but they were Oak Creek all the way – Schulte lived one farm east of Verhaalen, and Schumacher lived across the road in what is now the 1100 block of E. Rawson.

"George Verhaalen was born in Till-Moyland, Rhineland, in Prussia, on April 14, 1841," says Dean Collins of Brookfield, his great-grandson. "He came to America at age 13, arriving in New York and ending up in Oak Creek Township. His father, Peter, bought land on May 31, 1854."

Verhaalen was an apprentice for a local blacksmith and was 21 when he enlisted. He was not injured in the 24th Wisconsin's first battle, at bloody Stones River in Tennessee, which was . But Verhaalen was wounded and taken prisoner nine months later in the epic battle at Chickamauga, Ga., on Sept. 20, 1863.

He quickly was shipped to Richmond, Va., the Confederate capital, probably to a prison known as Belle Island, but was not a prisoner for long. "On Sept. 29, 1863, he dug a hole underneath a stockade with a frying pan and escaped," Collins says. "On the way out, he and another POW killed a Confederate picket. He returned to Union lines on June 10, 1864, in Knoxville, Ky."

Collins grew up hearing Verhaalen’s story frequently recounted by an aunt. "I don't know what kind of wound he sustained, but it must have been serious since he was detached from the 24th Wisconsin and assigned to the Ambulance Corps." Injured or ill soldiers who still were able to serve usually were put into such units.

Despite the aunt's love of telling the family history, Collins has no photo of the soldier at any stage of life, and did not know exactly where Verhaalen lived until being contacted for this story on Oak Creek Patch.

A similar story about wounding at Chickamauga, capture and escape could be told about Cpl. Bernard Stollenwert, who lived elsewhere in Oak Creek and served in Company K along with Verhaalen.

"Wisconsin Volunteers, War of the Rebellion, 1861-1865," a vintage research book that has been put online by the Wisconsin Historical Society, gives a glimpse at their stories. Stollenwert's line, with the abbreviations spelled out here, says: "Wounded and prisoner at Chickamauga. Wounded at Franklin," a later battle. Verhaalen's line says, "Wounded and prisoner at Chickamauga."

So one cannot help but wonder whether Stollenwert was with Verhaalen during some or all of the battle and time as a prisoner. One single company in an infantry regiment does not occupy a very wide area of space.

Stollenwert was discharged, termed "mustered out" in that era, on June 10, 1865, the same day as  Verhaalen. Stollenwert is buried at a site within one mile of the neighborhood of Verhaalen, Schumacher and Schulte: on S. Howell Avenue by The Gables apartments. Dozens and dozens of cars pass by this cemetery every hour, far more than go through the busy Rawson Avenue neighborhood. Stollenwert's tall white stone is clearly visible from the northbound lanes on Howell.

Stollenwert was born Nov. 18, 1837, in Bickerath, Prussia, according to a long family genealogy that is on the Internet. So he was nearly four years older than Verhaalen and age 24 when he enlisted in Company K in 1862. Stollenwert's gravestone has nothing about when he died, nor does the genealogy.

A second resident of the Rawson Avenue neighborhood, Henry Schumacher, was from Dunstekoven in Rhineland in what became Germany. He was 11 months old when his family emigrated via Amsterdam to America in early 1845, according to a family history assembled by Pete Schumacher of Oak Creek – Henry was his great-great uncle (brother of Pete's great-grandfather). This was three years before Wisconsin became a state. Henry's father, Johann (Joseph), was 38 and his mother, Anna Maria, was 35. There were four older siblings.

Joseph Schumacher bought 40 acres of land on the north side of E. Rawson from a land speculator, Martin Otis Walker. This was across the road and a little to the east of the Verhaalen and Schulte lands.

Henry Schumacher was 19 when he enlisted at the end of 1863.

Neighbor Peter Schulte went into the 35th the same day as Schumacher, but would be dead in 10 months – from disease on Sept. 21, 1864, in Chicago, according to the Roster of Volunteers. Dysentery, pneumonia, typhoid and malaria were ailments that soldiers commonly picked up in the South, and in many units those were a greater danger than fire from Confederates. Overall, the 35th Regiment lost only two enlisted men in battle but 274 – three officers and 271 enlisted like Schulte – to disease.

In the spring and summer of 1864, the 35th passed through or was stationed briefly at several spots in Louisiana and then at St. Charles, Ark., before returning to Louisiana in August. This is the period in which Schulte likely became ill.

In October, the 35th was part of a brigade that fought at Simsport, La., and other sites. In February 1865, it began its work in the drive against Mobile, Ala., the siege of Spanish Fort there, and the capture of Fort Blakely. In March, in the final weeks of the war, Schumacher was injured while building log defenses known as breastworks at Spanish Fort, which guarded Mobile Bay.

"Henry's pension papers name his disabilities as 'ruptures of both sides," Pete Schumacher says. "The circumstances of the injury are described as 'The first disability above named was incurred at or near Mobile in the state of Ala. on or about the 24th day of March year of 1865 under the following circumstances: by carrying material (logs) for the purpose of making breastworks.' The battle of Spanish Fort coincides with this date."

In March 1865, Union forces were moving toward Mobile from two directions. Spanish Fort and Spanish Bluffs controlled one of the main water approaches to Mobile, and the Confederates had built massive fortifications and deployed equally formidable artillery batteries there. Union forces of Maj. Gen. E.R.S. Canby laid siege to Spanish Fort for 12 days, outnumbering the Confederates by a ratio of 15 to 1, according to ExploreSouthernHistory.com.

"The battle began on March 27, 1865, and continued to escalate as Union troops  encircled the land approaches to the Confederate fortifications, digging siege works and placing artillery," it adds. That is the type of work in which Schumacher was injured. The siege was two weeks before Appomattox, and the Confederates eventually withdrew.

Less than 20 years ago, Spanish Fort became an incorporated city, and its website says, "Breastworks from the Civil War still remain throughout our area and the residential subdivisions."

Schumacher soon recovered from his injury and stayed with the regiment until it was mustered out on March 15, 1866, nearly a year after Appomattox.

When he returned home, he and his brother William already had purchased additional land beyond the family's original 40 acres. In 1873, Henry married Elisabeth Schulte, the sister of his Civil War colleague Peter who had died of disease, and built a home at 1108 E. Rawson Ave., very close to his family’s original home and using some of the original timbers. It still stands, but is slated to be torn down soon because of decades of neglect. In 1878, their father sold half his farm to Henry and half to William.

William Schumacher also stayed in the neighborhood to find his bride, Magdalena Bautz. He bought her family's farm and established the Schumacher Pickle Factory on land that now is occupied by Milwaukee County’s Runway Dog Exercise Area, 1214 E. Rawson, and Gastrau’s Golf Center, 1300 E. Rawson.

Verhaalen spent most of the rest of his life in Saukville. "George's house is still standing on the village square, at 283 E. Green Bay Ave.," Collins says. "He was the village blacksmith and also a carriage maker." When Verhaalen died on July 10, 1879, he had a daughter who was only 10 months old – she was Collins' grandmother.

Verhaalen is buried in Saukville. Schumacher died March 10, 1912, and is buried in St. Joseph’s Cemetery on S. Howell Avenue south of College Avenue, about a mile north of his farm and a mile or so from Stollenwert's cemetery.

While these families were some of the originals on Rawson Avenue, one of the earliest pioneer clans was that of Oliver Rawson; he and his son Luther bought 320 acres of land along a road that soon carried the family name.

Next: Two soldiers who died in the same week and hundreds of miles apart.