Calvin A. Wilsey

Calvin A. Wilsey was born in 1823 in Cattaraugus County, New York.

Calvin married New York native Sarah Ann (b. 1825) and they had at least three children: John Allen (b. 1847), Mary (b. 1850) and George (b. 1856). Calvin eventually left New York and he and his wife eventually settled in Michigan by 1847.

By 1850 they were living on a farm in Lyndon, Washtenaw County; also living with them was a 10-year-old girl named Eliza Jane Whitehorse or White House. By 1860 Calvin was working as a farmer (and owned some $1100 worth of real estate) and living with his wife and two children in Boston, Ionia County. Next door lived the family of Urias Storey; Urias, too, would join the Third Michigan.

He stood 6’3’ with gray eyes, light hair and a dark complexion, and was a 39-year-old farmer probably living in Boston when he enlisted in Company D on February 3, 1862, at Saranac, Ionia County for 3 years, and was mustered the same day. (Company D was composed in large part of men who came from western Ionia County and Eaton County.) He was dropped from the company rolls in compliance with G.O. no. 92 (War Department) regarding deserters.

In fact he died of typhoid fever on June 3, 1862, in the hospital at Yorktown, Virginia, and initially buried on June 3 in the hospital graveyard. He was interred in Yorktown National Cemetery: grave no. 1364.

In 1863 Sarah applied for and received a widow’s pension (no. 32479). Sarah eventually remarried one Mr. Devault and applied for and received a minor child’s pension (no. 151264).