Sunday, February 17, 2008

William H. Campion

William H. Campion, also known as “Compion”, was born 1837 in Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Ohio.

(In 1850 there was a William “Camp”, age 11 and born in Ohio, living with his mother, New Jersey native Rebecca and his siblings in Division 10, Berrien County, Michigan.) In any case, by 1860 William had left Ohio and settled in Michigan where he was working as a clerk living with the Dwight Dutcher family in Saugatuck, Allegan County.

William stood 5’5” with blue eyes, brown hair and a dark complexion, and was 24 years old and still living in Allegan County, probably working as a clerk when he enlisted in Company I on May 13, 1861. William was a Corporal when he was wounded by a gunshot to the left arm on May 31, 1862, at Fair Oaks, Virginia. He was subsequently hospitalized, and by late July he was reported to be in Chesapeake hospital near Fortress Monroe, “wounded in the neck, doing well.”

By early August, he had been transferred to New York and was hospitalized at Brooklyn College Hospital in Brooklyn, New York, and was discharged on November 25, 1862 at Brooklyn College Hospital “for partial paralysis of the left arm, the result of a gunshot wound near the lower part of the cervical spine.”

In June of 1863 he applied for and received a pension (no. 53,684).

At some point William returned to Michigan, probably to Allegan County where he was living when he reentered the service as Quartermaster Sergeant on March 8, 1864, in Unassigned, Third Michigan cavalry. He was promoted to Second Lieutenant of Company I on October 17, 1864 (effective December 15) and then to First Lieutenant of Company G on November 17, 1864, effective February 21, 1865. By early April of 1865 William was serving with the regiment in New Orleans, Louisiana. He was mustered out of Unassigned, Third Michigan cavalry on February 12, 1866, at San Antonio, Texas.

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