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Publish date 1924.
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John N. Runyan
Birth: 1846.
Death: Dec. 25, 1924.
Wife: Minnie J. Forkner Runyan, ( 1849-1930?)
Married January 15, 1880.
Children: James Runyan.
Burial: Oakwood Cemetery. Warsaw, Kosciusko County, Indiana.
Note. The following came from The History of Kosciusko County Indiana, Volume 1.
This book can be found and read on line. There is a lot more on him in this Volume.
John N. Runyan, a native of Warsaw, and identified with both
the Twelfth and the Seventy-fourth regiments, was one of the young-
est officers ever called to the performance of important duties in the
Union army. When in his sixteenth year he could hold himself in
leash no longer, he found that he was too short in stature to reach
military requirements, but thick soles and well stuffed boots overcame
that drawback, and in December, 1861, he was finally accepted as a
recruit for Company E, Twelfth Indiana Infantry. His was one of
the short-term regiments and he was mustered out without seeing
active service, in May, 1862.
But Private Runyan had been baptized and now his overpowering
ambition was to be a real soldier; so upon his return to Warsaw he
took an active part in recruiting Company A of the Seventy-fourth
Indiana Volunteer Infantry, and in July, 1862, then only in his
seventeenth year, -was mustered in as sergeant. The regiment became
part of the Fourteenth Army Corps, under Thomas. He was promoted second lieutenant in April, 1863, and at the battle of Chattanooga in the following November, the captain and first lieutenant
of Company A having been badly wounded early in the action, the
command devolved upon Lieutenant Runyan. From every authentic
account he was fully equal to the occasion. Twenty-five of his forty four men were pierced by enemy bullets, and he was also struck by
a spent ball, but remained at his post. The result of this remarkable
and steady bravery in one who was still a mere youth was promotion to the grade of first lieutenant, in December following the battle
of Chattanooga.
Lieutenant Runyan was also in the front line at Mission Ridge,
but during the winter of 1863-64 was sent home as a recruiting officer.
His record and his enthusiastic personality were both calculated to
further that work, and in April he returned to his regiment with
strengthened reputation, in time to participate in the Atlanta cam-
paign. His prominence in carrying the outposts of the Confederate
troops at the base of Kenesaw Mountain has already been described.
The wound there received which terminated his militarj' career healed
superficially and, under the tender ministrations of a tender and
admiring father, he was able to return to his home within thirty
days of his misfortune. When able to do so, he proceeded to Cincinnati to obtain his honorable discharge.
Lieutenant Runyan entered the Fort "Wayne College for a short
course of study, but his wound commenced to assert itself to such a
degree that he abandoned, for the time, his legal ambitions, and
through the influence and exertions of his father, Peter L. Runyan,
secured the appointment of the Warsaw postmastership. The father,
so prominent in county and state affairs and one of the most able
and popular of the pioneers, had held that office through the entire
period of the Civil war, and the son continued in the office for many years thereafter.
But the wound received at Kenesaw Mountain persistently pained
him, and it became evident that the amputation had been improperly
performed, or that the hospital treatment had been faulty. After
careful consultation, it was decided that a re-amputation was neces-
sary. This was performed and undoubtedly saved him long years
of suffering, if not prolonged his life. He afterward resumed the
study of the law ; practiced his profession for some time ; and was
also interested in the Warsaw Woolen mills, the Opera House and
other local enterprises.
PERSONAL MEMOIRS
By CAPTAIN RUNYAN
"When the Regiment was camped at Lavergne, Tenn., I
visited Nashville fifteen miles away” quite often and on each
occasion stopped with Captain Driver, a Union resident of the
city whose home was the headquarters of Union officers and
soldiers in the city temporarily. I became quite well acquaint-
ed with the family, the Captain and his wife and two grown
daughters.
After being wounded in front of Kenesaw, I was first taken
to Field Hospital, thence to Athens, thence to Chattanooga,
where an order came to send the officers up to Lookout Mountain
and the men back to Nashville. This was done by two men
gathering up the cot and carrying it down to the train — but a
.short distance or if an officer he was carried to the ambulance
and sent up the mountain. I overheard the order to the men
so when they took up my cot, my uniform had been neatly
hidden under the covers and I told them "I go to the train" so in due time I reached Nashville and was taken to the Officers' Hospital where I got the surgeon to telegraph my father
who soon arrived. Upon his arrival he failed to fall in love
with the surroundings and I suggested that he go over to Captain Driver's and see if he would not take me in. He did so
and upon asking the surgeon's permission he granted it and I
was soon located in a nice room with many comforts about me
and with one of Captain Driver's daughters reading to or conversing with me.
One day while thus seated the ligature sluffed off the artery
and the blood spurted all over bed and wall. The lady gave a
war whoop, I gave a yell and soon the room was full of people.
Quick action with a tourniquet stopped the flow of blood and
my life was saved. A few days after my father arranged to
take me home which was done, by placing me on a cot, hiring
men to carry same to and from trains and transporting me in
an express car.
In 1905 I visited Nashville and I hunted up Captain Driv-
er's daughter, finding the Captain and his wife had both died.
I visited his old homestead, which stood exactly as it had during
the war. I stood in the same room where my life had so nearly
ebbed away forty years before. I saw with my mind's eye
the past go by. I called to mind the suffering I had gone
through, the weary couch that supported me. I felt the sutuers
tearing in my wound and the laps lying open as they did while
going over the corduroy road from Field Hospital to Athens.
1 saw the ghastly face of a comrade who died at my side in the
ambulance while going over that terrible road. I heard the
spade digging his grave but a few feet from the road side and
knew some mother's darling was being laid in a grave that no
loving hand could ever bedeck with sweet flowers. I remem-
bered how in the hospital at Chattanooga a lady unknown to
me came to my cot and kneeling pleaded in prayer with "Our
Father in Heaven" to spare my young life and permit me to
return to loved ones at home. God bless that lady wherever she
be for I often think that her prayer with those of my mother
and father and sisters must have reached the Throne.
