| Notes |
- 1860 Census, worth $80. Enumerated with parents.
1870 Census, also in household Joseph White, 19, b. OH, farm laborer
Council Bluffs NonPareil, 27 Aug 1927: Harlan Man, 89, Is Reminiscing
--Hugh Winders interests his friends with story of war experiences
--Made Doctor of Him
--Has Smallpox in Gov't Hospital Where He Remained to Become Nurse and General Medical Advisor
--Special to the Nonpareil
HARLAN, Ia., Aug. 26. A party in honor of Hugh Winder's eighty-nineth birthday was held Thursday afternoon at the home of Mrs. Frank Salters, whose birthday also occurs in August. Among the guests were Mr. Winder's eldest daughter, who also celebrates her birthday during this month, and his old friend and neighbor, H. B. Kees, who had his ninety-second birthday Aug. 19.
Mr. Winder was born in North Lewisburg, O., and came with his father's family to Iowa in 1860.
They settled first at New Sharon, then mostly open prairie, and Hugh and his father hauled lumber twelve miles to build the first blacksmith shop in that town. Mr Winder's father worked at his trade, but he went out on a farm, assisting his father only during the slack season.
The war which was threatening broke soon after the Winder family came to Iowa, and in 1862 Hugh enlisted in Company (illegible) 33rd regiment, volunteer infantry, and the story he tells of his war experiences is full of interest.
His company was sent to St. Louis, where it was set to guarding prisoners, and Mr. Winder was [lines omitted in copying] taking it was sent to the government detention hospital on an island in the Mississippi river a short distance from the city. When he began to recover from the disease, his natural aptitude for nursing was shown, as he waited on other patients, and after he recovered he was retained as a nurse in that hospital. He received promotions until he had charge of the hospital under the direction of the surgeon general.
Patients from prison camps and all government hospitals who had smallpox were received at this hospital, northern and southern soldiers, red, yellow, black or white men. At times there were as high as 180 patients and the physicians estimated that they lost only one in seven, which was a low death rate from smallpox then. St. Louis also had its detention hospital on this island and Mr. Winder says he saw every form of smallpox from the variatoid to the malignatet black type, and every age of patients from the babe of a few weeks to the men and women of eighty and over and coming in such close contact with the disease he made a study of it until he could diagnose it in the earliest stage and could prescribe for it.
In fact, the doctor advised him on his discharge to go home and put out his shingle, but said he, "I had the experience, but neither the book or medical education a physician should have, so I went back to the farm and I wouldn't trade places yet today."
LITTLE PESTS / BIGGEST WORRY
The greatest problem was not smallpox, although one patient in his delirium did stab a nurse when the physician was away, and he had to bandage it and give him attention, but the pests they had the most trouble with were the gray backs and bedbugs and only by constant fighting could they keep them down so they could stay in the buildings. Orders were that every new patient should be stripped in the center of the room, their clothing immediately burned, and then they were bathed and given clean clothes. [lines omitted in copying] In spite of all their care, he says more than once when he undressed and turned his trousers wrong side out, along the seams of the leg there was a stripe of gray just like an officer's stripe, but it was alive.
One of his duties was caring for the mail and he said as he went over to the city one morning he met five of his comrades and they were in such high spirits he stopped to inquire, and they said, "Don't you know our company is mustered out and I'm going home." The company arrived in Davenport Aug. 8, 1865. While the two years and nine months he spent in the detention hospital were not pleasant ones, he does not regret them, he says, and to the fact that he learned how to take care of his body. He attributes his long life and good health and the knowledge he gained often enabled him to aid in sickness during the pioneer days in Iowa when a physician could not be gotten.
The family moved to Powsheik county, where he married Mary E. Sheridan and about 1879 they came to Shelby county where with other pioneers they helped in the building of the new country. Mrs. Winder died in Harlan about nine years ago and the children, Mrs. Leech and Carrie Winder Gregerson, live in Harlan. the only son, Oscar, lives in Kansas, and Mrs. Florence Nellson at Alhambra, California. From early manhood he has been a devoted member of the M. E. Church. He expects to return to California shortly to spend the winter.
See webpage at «a href="http://www.tianma.com/demidov/genealogy/Page_2x.html"»Winder-Demidov Website«/a».
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1838 - 1930 (91 years)
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