Truman J. Wisner was born in 1828 in New York, the son of John (b. 1800) and Betsey (Jones, b. 1801).
Truman’s family left New York and moved west, eventually settling in Michigan. By 1850 Truman was working as a farmer and living with his family in Butler, Branch County.
Truman married 17-year-old New York native Caroline Burroughs on July 20, 1850, in Butler, Branch County; the wedding was performed by his father who was the justice of the peace, and they had at least four children: Emery or Enos (b. 1851), James (b. 1854), Laurette Ann (b. 1857) and John (b. 1859).
By 1860 Truman was working as a master carpenter and living with his wife and four children in Rutland, Barry County. Several houses away lived John Webster who would also join the 3rd Michigan Infantry.
He stood 5’8” with blue eyes, brown hair and a light complexion and was a 35-year-old blacksmith and/or master carpenter possibly living in Maple Grove, Barry County when he enlisted in Company E on February 8, 1864, at Grand Rapids for 3 years, crediting Maple Grove, and was mustered the same day.
Truman joined the Regiment on March 27, was possibly taken sick on April 8 and subsequently hospitalized, and may have been absent sick when he was was transferred to Company E, 5th Michigan Infantry upon consolidation of the 3rd and 5th Michigan Regiments on June 10, 1864. He may have been returned to duty and was possibly wounded on June 12 near White House Landing, Virginia. He was reportedly mustered out on July 5, 1865, at Jeffersonville, Indiana.
In fact, Truman was taken prisoner (possibly on June 12) and eventually confined in the prison camp at Florence, South Carolina.
Truman died of dropsy and dysentery while a prisoner of war on September 30, 1864, at Florence, South Carolina, and is presumably buried among the unknown soldiers in Florence.
In March of 1865 his wife applied for and received a pension (no. 74876). She remarried in November of 1869 and in 1870 a minor child pension application was granted for the three children James, Laurette and George Wisner (no. 161107).
Curiously there is one E. Wisner, who had served in Company B, 13th Michigan Infantry, and who died in South Carolina in December of 1864, buried in Beaufort National Cemetery. However, there is no soldier by that name listed in the official state history of 13th Michigan.
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