Gary L. Knepp
It was late summer of 1862. The Confederacy was on the march. Tens of thousands of gray clad soldiers poured into Kentucky, starting what was later known as the Heartland Offensive. The goal of the campaign was to take Kentucky and “return” it to the Confederacy.
It began well for the Rebels. They crushed the Yanks at The Battle of Richmond, Kentucky and easily swept through central Kentucky on their way to the Ohio River and Cincinnati. The news of the advances of General Henry Heth’s army in Kentucky threw Ohio into a panic.
General Lew Wallace, who would later write the novel Ben Hur, assumed control of Cincinnati’s defenses. He ordered three forts-Fort Thomas, Fort Wright and Fort Mitchell-, linked together by eleven miles of fighting trenches, be built. He filled the positions with 80,000 men and awaited the enemy’s first move.
Caleb Walker was an unlikely soldier. In his late sixties, he was decades beyond the ideal age for military service. However, his country was in danger. He had to do something.
Walker arrived in New Richmond when he was twenty-three years old. He set his life’s course when he married Ann Ashburn, the daughter of the founder of the Village of Susanna. He became a successful businessman- owning a general store, a carding (wool cleaning) factory and a Catawba grape growing operation, and was elected mayor of New Richmond and Ohio Township trustee.
He became a Methodist circuit rider, earning a reputation as an able opponent of slavery who condemned the peculiar institution at every opportunity. Reverend Walker attended a convention of Methodists held in Cincinnati in 1836. The conclave became heated when debating a resolution condemning slavery. The resolution failed. Walker was disappointed that his southern brethren could not see the immorality and injustice of slavery, One year later he was elected president of the New Richmond Anti-slavery Society. Soon after the Civil War began, Walker joined with the other older men of the community to form a home guard known as the “Gray Hairs.”
Revernd Walker learned that his son- in-law’s unit, the 89th Ohio Volunteer Infantry Regiment, had been deployed to the front near Covington, Kentucky. He decided to meet up with him. Walker arrived at the Covington waterfront afterdark. With only a vague notion of where he was to go, Walker meandered through the chaos, asking about the location of his son-in-law’s unit. After finding it, the “Gray Hair” collapsed, totally exhausted. The 89th was called to the line several times in the next few days. Although they did not fight, standing in line at attention under a scorching, unrelenting sun was tiring. Walker did not accompany his comrades on these trips to the field. Instead, he remained behind in camp doing chores and recuperating. He left the Army after the Confederates withdrew.
Walker’s short time in the Army convinced him that soldiering was a young man’s pursuit. Even so, he still wanted to defend the Union, contribute to the cause. He decided to volunteer at the Camp Dennison Hospital. The 2300 bed facility, located in eastern Hamilton County, was established in April of 1862 following The Battle of Shiloh.
Walker told the post chaplain that he came to the hospital to “administer to the spiritual wants of the sick and dying…as well as their temporal comforts”, noting, “I soon found abundant opportunity to do so.” Walker spent as much time as he could just talking to patients, finding the experience “most precious”. Writing letters for his sick patients was one of his favorite activities. He recalled that one young soldier’s “pale contenance lighted up” when he read the letter to “the poor sufferer.”
Working in a 19th century hospital challenged a caregiver’s health, especially one of Walker’s age. Inevitably, he became ill. For one unnamed malady he was given a “heroic” or large dosage of calomel. Also known as “blue mass”, the compound contained mercury which was harmful to the nervous system. Two weeks later he contracted “a cutaneous disorder, a kind of camp itch, a most loathsome disorder.” For this he was given a sulfur-based ointment that gave off a strong odor which embarrassed him. “And last but not least”, he wrote, there was “the enfeebling and dangerous influence of constant exposure to the inevitable impurities that load the atmosphere from forty sick beds”.
These conditions took their toll upon Revernd Walker. He was declared “not fit for duty” on Christmas Eve 1862. He returned to his home in New Richmond. He regretted that his age had prohibited him from making “…a greater sacrifice in his country’s cause,” He took some comfort that he may have eased his patients’ ordeal by talking with them, writing their letters and “especially in recommending the religion of Jesus that can assuredly happify the soul when the diseased body is languishing”
Reverend Walker’s personal pilgrimage ended in 1874, He is buried in Watkins Hill Cemetery in New Richmond.
Gary Knepp is Clermont County’s honorary historian and is the author of eight books about Clermont’s history. Knepp’s website is www.garyknepp.com.