Goodspeed Sketch of Dr.
John S. Organ
submitted by Linda Lane Hedges and Shirley Webb
HISTORY OF GALLATIN, SALINE, HAMILTON, FRANKLIN AND WILLIAMSON COUNTIES, ILLINOIS, Goodspeed, 1887.(Found in the public library in Harrisburg, IL)
In the Hamilton County Biographical Appendix, p.733+
DR. JOHN S. ORGAN
Dr. John S. ORGAN, of Walpole, was born in Wilson County, Tenn.,
in 1844, the eldest of seven children of Col. Dr. James T. and
Amanda (CARTWRIGHT) ORGAN, natives of Wilson County, born in 1822
and 1826 respectively. They were married October 24, 1843, and
about 1848 removed to Wayne Co., Ill., where the father resumed
blacksmithing. In 1857 he went to Marion, in 1859 to Arkansas,
and in 1862 joined a Missouri regiment of volunteers. He first
took his family back to Wayne County, Ill., and in the meantime
being cut off from his company, Gen. Blair, in command at St.
Louis, commissioned him first lieutenant to raise a company of
which he was made captain. He then joined the Thirtieth Missouri,
and was in active service until the close, operating in Missouri,
Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, etc. He was made captain of a
company in the Sixth Mississippi Heavy Artillery, and afterward
lieutenant-colonel of the Seventieth Mississippi (colored) and
afterward colonel. After three years of distinguished service he
returned home, and in a few years moved to Harrisburg and resumed
the study of medicine, began before the war. From 1869 he
practiced there and in neighboring counties until his health
forbid it, about three years before his death, which occurred
October 7, 1879. The mother died in September, 1874, a member of
the Christian Church. Our subject had an ordinary education, and
when seventeen, in June, 1862, enlisted in his father's company,
served about eighteen months, and was discharged in 1864. In 1867 he began medical study under Dr.
Cheany, of Harrisburg, and two years later, in 1871-72, he attended lectures at the Medical College of Louisville, and graduated in 1879 from
the Medical College of Evansville. He entered upon his practice at Broughton in 1872, and since 1874 has made Walpole and vicinity his home,
where he has become one of the leading practitioners in the county, and has an extensive practice. He has acquired ninety acres of choice land, well
cultivated and with excellent buildings, all this from a beginning of no means. He is a Republican, first voting for Lincoln. He is a Mason.
January 18, 1877, he married Nancy, daughter of David and Patsey Smith, natives of Wilson County Tenn. Their only surviving child is John
R.
Transcribed by Linda (Lane) Hedges and Shirley Webb
For non-commercial use only.