Page 521-522, transcribed by Carolyn Ward from History of Butler County, Kansas by Vol. P. Mooney. Standard Publishing Company, Lawrence, Kan.: 1916. ill.; 894 pgs.


  HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY 521 cont'd

George William Ohmart, a Civil war veteran who has been identified with industrial Augusta for the past sixteen years, is a native of Illinois, born in Montgomery county in 1846. His parents were natives of Pennsylvania, and his mother died when he was three years of age, leaving the following children: Rachael Catherine, married a man named Miller, and died in Oklahoma; Samuel died at the age of five; Charles E., Augusta; and George W., of this review.

George W. Ohmart received his education in the public schools of Logan county, Illinois, and at the age of sixteen enlisted in Company B, Seventy-third Illinois infantry. His regiment was attached to the Army of the Cumberland, and he saw severe service for a period of about three years. He was at the battles of Perryville, Stone River, Chickamauga, Missionary Ridge, Atlanta, Franklin and Nashville, and during the Atlanta campaign, he was under fire almost continuously for four months. At the battle of Franklin, which history records as one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil war, he received a wound which nearly ended his military career. A musket ball penetrated his hat inflicting a flesh wound on his right temple and glanced from his skull, and passed through twenty-four thicknesses of his blanket which he was carrying on his shoulder. Mr. Ohmart was unconscious for an hour or more, from the effect of the wound. He was "clipped" by bullets, as he calls it, on two other occasions, and at another time received a cut on the lip from a sword in a hand to hand conflict.

At the close of the war he returned to Illinois, and learned the blacksmith's trade. In 1880, he went to Nebraska, and settled in Otoe county where he remained twelve years; and then to Valley county, Nebraska, remaining two years. In 1894 he came to Kansas, and after spending one year at Andover went to Benton, remaining there until


522 HISTORY OF BUTLER COUNTY  

1900. He then came to Augusta where he engaged in farming about two years, when he opened a blacksmith shop which he has since conducted.

Mr. Ohmart was united in marriage at Jacksonville, Ill., in 1873, to Miss Oella Robbins, a daughter of Randolph Robbins, an early settler of Mason county, Illinois, who located there in 1854, and later removed to Jacksonville. To Mr. and Mrs. Ohmart have been born eight children, five of whom are living, as follows: George R., Enid, Okla.; Mrs. Ida May Runion, El Dorado, Kans.; Albert R., Wichita; Charles E., Great Bend, Kans., and Myrtie E., at home. Mr. Ohmart is a member of the Grand Army of the Republic, L. E. King Post, No. 105. He is one of the progressive business men of Augusta, and has built up an extensive business in his line.

Christian E. Ohmart, brother of George W., whose sketch appears on a preceding page of this volume, was born in Montgomery county, Illinois, in 1842. He received a common school education in the district schools of Logan county and spent his early life on the home farm. On November 21, 1861, he enlisted in Company H, Fourth Illinois cavalry, when he was nineteen years old. He participated in many important battles, and skirmishes without number, as was the common lot of the average cavalryman in the Civil war. He was in the battles of Fort Donelson, Corinth, Shiloh and many others.

Mr. Ohmart was mustered out of service at Natchez, Miss., in 1864, and returned to Logan county, Illinois, where he remained until 1879. He then went to Camden county, Missouri, remaining there until 1909 when he came to Butler county. Mr. Ohmart learned the blacksmith's trade while in the army, and has made that his life work. He came to Butler county in 1909 and since that time has been associated with his brother, George W., a sketch of whom precedes this article.

Christian E. Ohmart was united in marriage in 1884, to Miss Frances Wooley, a native of Missouri, and they had four children, as follows: John, Augusta; Sarah, died at the age of two; Stephen, Augusta, and Frederick, died at the age of four.


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