CIVIL WAR VETERAN - OTTAWA CO, KS PIONEER

Henry-7 Gilbert Baldwin was the son of Ezra-6 and Lydia (Eaton) Baldwin. His Baldwin line is: Henry-7, Ezra-6, Elijah-5, Daniel-4, Daniel-3, Benjamin-2, Henry-1, the Puritan immigrant from England to Woburn, Mass in the late 1630's.

He married Eleanor/Ellen Serepta Fisher on Dec 20, 1861 in Vermont. They had 10 children, eight survived to adulthood:

Harriet Adelia - md Frank Arthur Sanders
Martha "Mattie" Adeline - md Jabez Brewster
Erminnie Josephine - md Federick Buck
Bertha Ellen - md Fred Rehling
Gilbert Henry - died 5 mos old
Florence Estella - never married
Arthur Willis - md Inez Evangeline Hallock (only boy with 7 sisters to survive to adulthood)
Lydia Abbie Mabel - md Willard Wheeler
Effie Inez (twin)- died 1 month old
Elfie Iris (twin) - md Ellis Martin Hallock

CIVIL WAR

Born in Vermont, he joined a Vermont unit that served in the Union during the New Orleans campaign. He kept a diary that was published in "Heritage" by Doug Geist, 1986.

The first entry in the diary is dated December 17, 1861: "Enlisted for war, root hog or die, and may the Eternal Preserver guide and protect my loved one E." (referring to his wife Eleanor/Ellen).

KANSAS PIONEER

Soon after his service in the Civil War, Henry and Eleanor settled near Sand Springs, Iowa. They had their first two children there. They left Sand Springs, Iowa in the spring of 1868, bound for Kansas. Eleanor was pregnant during that trip and had Erminnie Josephine in Pottawatomie, KS, where they were staying with a relative.

On January 13, 1870, Henry settled upon his 160 acre homestead, the southeast quarter of section 6 of Fountain Township. (approximately 4 miles north and one mile west of Ada, KS) His final Homestead Certificate was filed May 26, 1876 giving him ownership for living, improving, and cultivating the land for five years. The affidavit provided by two neighbors (his brother Rufus Ebenezer Baldwin and a neighbor S. P. Beucler) said that he had built a house of "hewn logs 1 1/2 stories high with shingle roof, plank floor, one door, and 3 windows and that said house is a suitable & comfortable dwelling". The witnesses further stated that he had cultivated 35 acres of the land over the past five years. To improve the land, he "Dug and walled a well which furnished an abundance of good drinking water; built a stable, granary, hen house, smokehouse, corn crib, pig pen, and done other improvements thereon." This 160 acres was deeded to him under the Homestead Act of 1862.

The homestead paperwork is available to you from the US Government Land Office web site with references: Application 5155, Final Certificate 3583, Land Office: Concordia, KS, 05/26/1876.

He died in 1894 at only 57 years of age, when their youngest child was 11 years old. Eleanor survived him another 30 years, passing away in 1924.