Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
During the Battle of Shiloh, W.H. Mershon, a Union Army drummer, captured a Rebel colonel. When he got the opportunity, he commemorated the event by having a photograph taken with the Navy pistol responsible for subduing the enemy.
Later Mershon, a Warsaw native, set the story down in his memoirs.
The photograph, an Ambertype in its original case, a set of drumsticks, Mershon's 241-page journal and much more resurfaced earlier this year, opening a long-hidden page of local and national history.
"It's really an interesting piece of history," said appraiser and auctioneer Glenn Williams of Beaumont, Calif., who is offering the Mershon collection for sale on the Internet Sept. 18.
Williams said a young couple entered his office with the material about eight months ago.
"When his mother moved into this house, which the couple now own, she found several boxes of things in a closet. She contacted the former owner, who did not want anything. She held onto them for 50 years. When her son moved into the house, he rediscovered the items. He heard about me and my background as a professional accredited appraiser."
Williams was astonished at the discovery.
"I had two Civil War experts look at these items. They both said they had never seen so much paper and provenance on one person. They think this is a very valuable historical collection," he said.
Mershon filled four scrapbooks of clippings, ribbons, programs fliers and much more covering his entire life.
He founded the Mershon School of Music in the Warner Building on Washington Street in Warsaw in 1894.
Mershon, son of Aaron J. and Lydia Duryea Mershon, entered the Union Army at age 16 Sept. 13, 1861. He enrolled as a musiorian of Co. I, 30th Regiment of Indiana Volunteers in Fort Wayne. He served until Nov. 11, 1865.
Mershon may be the original Drummer Boy of Shiloh, a distinction long held by John Clem. In his memoirs he refers to a drum he had bearing the inscription, "Presented to W.H. Mershon, The Drummer Boy of SHILOH, by his Colonel, James C. Strong."
Drum corpsmen sounded reveille, meal times, drills, assembly, to battle calls, battlefield maneuvers and taps.
The battle at Shiloh, Tenn., was the first major engagement of the Civil War. More than 24,000 men died there. Mershon wrote this passage about the carnage:
"Twice they charged our lines with desperate and reckless furry and with their rebel yell, did their utmost to break our line and drive us back; but with as desperate bravery, they were met, and hurled back with fearful slaughter. Shells burst in the ranks, grape and cannister and bullets were whistling through the air until it seems none of us would get out alive."
Mershon did survive and went on to capture a Rebel colonel.
He was the military band leader in Chicago when the train bearing the body of President Abraham Lincoln stopped in the Windy City. He traveled with the funeral procession to the Oak Ridge Cemetery in Springfield, Lincoln's final resting place.
The Lincoln funeral program, the train ticket and the steamboat ticket used to arrive in southern Illinois are also at auction.
In 1903, Mershon was asked by Gov. Winfield T. Durbin to help dedicate the Indiana monuments in Shiloh National Military Park. The Indiana contingent numbered more than 500 people.
The dedication program lists a drum solo on two drums by "Capt. W.H. Mershon, the original Drummer Boy of Shiloh, member of the 30th Indiana Volunteer Infantry."
On the Net:
ebay.com (Click on the link to liveauctioneers.com with the link to the catalogue.)
liveauctioneers.com (On the search page type "Mershon" and items 191 through 212 should appear)
wmsauctions.net
