An extract from:
Soldiers’ and Citizens’ Album of Biographical Record. 1890, Chicago, Grand Army Publishing Company. P. 391-394.
General John Benton Callis, resident of Lancaster, Wis., a charter member of G.A.R. Post 132, was born at Fayetteville, North Carolina, Jan. 3, 1828. His paternal ancestry was of Huguenot origin and French nativity; his mother Christina Benton before marriage, was of Scotch extraction. His father, Henry Callis, was a farmer and removed from North Carolina to Tennessee in 1834 and thence to Grant County, Wisconsin, in 1840. The parents were pioneer settlers in Lancaster and there passed the remainder of their lives. The General and two sisters - Mrs. James Barnett and Mrs. Jeremiah Garner of Lancaster - were their only children and all are living.
The son obtained such education as was possible for the son of a pioneer, subjected to all the hardships and privations which are the earliest resources of an unsettled locality, but they only served to stimulate his intellect, inspire his ambition and impress his understanding with the responsibilities of a boy who shall, in time, take his position as a laborer in the world’s work; of which such boys probably have the best possible opportunity to know what the world demands of them. Wisconsin ranks many such on her roll of honor. Young Callis cherished a hope of a profession and studied medicine with Dr. J.H. Higgins of Lancaster, but he was of too active a temperament to be satisfied with the routine of a course of study in an office and, lacking the financial requisites for broad gauge preparation, he preferred work and went to St. Paul, Minn., in 1848, where he obtained a contract, associated with John R. Irvin to build Fort Gaines (now Fort Ripley) at the confluence of the Crow Wing River with the Mississippi, 300 miles north of St. Paul. (In this he was associated also with Captain Todd, a brother of Mrs. Lincoln.) In 1851, he crossed the plains to California, where he engaged in various operations, mining at various points and selling goods. In 1853 he went to Central America, sailing from Greytown for New York, whence he returned to Lancaster in the autumn of the same year.
He was occupied in mercantile pursuits until the outbreak of Southern hostilities, when his impetuous nature instigated him to lay aside all personal considerations and he was instrumental in raising a company which was assigned to the 7th Wisconsin as Company F, of which he was made Captain. It will suffice to state that until after Gettysburg the history of the 7th Wisconsin, in all its brilliant and effective bravery, is that of General Callis, as he was identified with every successive movement. The entire brigade, known to history and to appreciative generations since, as the "Iron Brigade," was occupied in every specie of military duty common to the opening of one of the greatest conflicts ever know in the history of the world, and the marvel of that period is that more serious blunders that occurred did not happen to defer and prolong, which proved the latent strength of a class of people who had never considered the possibility of being called to fight for their inheritance of Union and Liberty.
In the fight at Gainesville (claimed by some as the field where the "Iron Brigade" was christened in blood) all the field officers and captains ranking Captain Callis were killed or disabled and the command of the regiment devolved on him. (Aug. 28, 1862.) He retained that relation in the succeeding movements, conducting the operations of the 7th at South Mountain and Antietam and on the Rappahannock, fighting at Fredericksburg. Early in 1863 he was promoted to the rank of Major, and accompanied the 7th in the expeditions into Virginia. Before the month of March he was promoted Lieutenant-Colonel and took part in the disasters of the spring campaign, culminating in the battle of Chancellorsville.
At Gettysburg he received his crowning honors as a soldier who had risen from the ranks, so to speak; while at the head of his command on the 1st day of July, 1863, he was slightly wounded about nine o’clock in the morning, but he did not abandon his post; and he continued to fight in the charge on the ridge, which resulted in the capture of the entire brigade of General Archer and in which Colonel Fairchild was injured. In the afternoon General Callis received a bullet in his chest which injured the liver and passed into the lung, where it still remains. He lay on the field 43 hours, the rebels, in their succeeding movements, passing over him, and General Early provided a guard for him as prisoner of war, but he was finally taken to the house of a Mrs. Buehler, in Gettysburg, where, three weeks after, he was joined by Mrs. Callis, and the careful nursing he received resulted in such improvement that he was able at the end of three months to be placed on a rubber bed on a stretcher and brought to Wisconsin.
He received muster out Dec. 24, 1863, being wholly incapacitated for the service on the field for the remainder of the war. As soon as sufficiently recovered to resume his interest in civil life, he purchased a flouring mill in Anaton, and he managed its relations through an agent a few months. His fiery temperament was illy satisfied with his inactivity, while there was good fighting opportunities in the service he found agreeable to his disposition, and, in 1864, he connected himself with the Veteran Corps, and was appointed by President Lincoln Military Superintendent of the War Department at Washington with the rank of Major. During the raid of Early he was carried in an ambulance to Fort Sumner, where he was in the fighting made effective by timely aid from the 6th Corps of the Army of the Potomac.
Soon after the close of hostilities, when the Department was conferring its testimonials of appreciation of special gallantry, General Callis was made Lieutenant-Colonel and Colonel, and, later, Brigadier-General, for meritorious conduct during the war and especially at Gainesville, South Mountain and Antietam and Gettysburg. He was made a Captain in the regular army, assigned to the 45th U.S. Infantry, and stationed at Huntsville, Ala., where he assisted in the reconstruction of affairs in his military district, for which service he received the commendation of the authorities at Washington.
During his connection with the Freedmen’s Bureau, he interfered with the punishment of a colored girl at the whipping post by her Legree, self-styled master, the brute having never recognized the Emancipation Act, and conducting his relations with his former slaves precisely as if nothing had taken place. General Callis, by virtue of his authority as an officer of the Government, ordered him to desist, and on his refusing he thrust his through on the spot with his saber. The chivalry of Huntsville appreciated the daring exhibited by "the d__d Yankee" and presented him a gold watch, the scenes of the whipping and "sword feat" being engraved on the back and front of the fine hunting case. In the course of the day on which the presentation by a colored man took place, a drunken fire-eater took it into his head he had been insulted by General Callis and called on him with his friends for an apology or to challenge to a duel. General Callis tried expostulation until his temper gave way, when, as the challenged party, with the right to choose conditions, he ordered assistants to bring bowie knives and some "horses" formerly used in repairs and a plank on which himself and his Southern friend, after having donned cavalry breeches with buckskin seats were to be nailed face to face; and "then," said Callis, between his teeth, "I will cut your heart out, sir." This not suiting the high-toned ideas of followers of the code, they demurred and were ordered from the office with more force than elegance. The discomfited Southerner afterwards apologized for his conduct and became the staunch supporter of his former foe.
Feb. 4, 1868, General Callis resigned his commission and devoted his attention to civil pursuits. Soon after, he was elected to the 40th Congress from the Fifth District of Alabama, receiving a majority which demonstrated his popularity with former enemies, arising from their admiration of his dauntless courage and fearlessness of danger in the defense of his country and his principles of patriotism. His seat was contested by General Burke, but his claim was sustained and he transacted business as a legislator in the best interests of his southern constituency and in manner perfectly in keeping with his character.
July 21, 1868, he was made member of Committee on Enrolled Bills, and he was the father of the original "Ku-Klux Bill," which passed the House to be killed in the Senate of the 40th Congress, but which was passed by the 42nd Congress. He introduced three bills providing for the establishment of mail routes in Alabama and five bills for the removal of political disabilities from Southern citizens; he also introduced a bill granting a loan of $5,000,000 of the five per cent. Bonds of the United States to the New Orleans & Selma R. R. and Immigrant Association, and a bill granting lands in the state of Alabama to the Tennessee & Coosa R. R. Co. At the termination of the 40th Congress, he resigned his seat and returned to Lancaster.
He established a real-estate and insurance business which he conducted until 1874, when he was elected to the Legislature of Wisconsin as a reformer in politics. (In his earliest political connection, general Callis was an old-line Whig; he was then a member of the Republican party and since 1872 has ranked as a "Reformer." Among his treasured possessions are a complete file of the "Annals of Congress" since 1799, and there is no better posted man in the legislative history of this country.) As a member of the Assembly of this State he served as Chairman of Committee on Incorporations and on State Lands, and he was a member of the Joint Committee to settle the Excise Law – a formulated bill passing both Houses.
From the foregoing the character of General Callis may be inferred. His temperament is impetuous, but his discretion is of a type to preclude hasty and ill-advised action, although in emergencies he is not a man to pause to counsel with tardy caution. He is still a sufferer from his wounds, the bullet in his lungs causing great pain and danger to life. But he has, nevertheless, continued to take unabated interest in the affairs of active existence and especially in matters relating to soldiers. He was a member of the 2d Provisional Post of Nashville, Tenn., and afterward a charter member of the Post at Lancaster. Since coming of age he has been a Mason and belongs to the Chapter. He was for many years actively involved in matters pertaining to the Order of Odd Fellows, but in late years has not been identified with that fraternity.
He was married in 1855 to Mattie Barnett of Lancaster. She was born near Pittsburgh, Pa., and is the daughter of Andrew and Elizabeth Barnett. Five children are recorded as follows: Frank B., John B., Mrs. Jeanette E. Meyer, Mrs. Jessie B. McCoy and Mrs. Bessie E. McCoy.
Note: Several pieces of information included in the piece are inaccurate. Mattie Barnett was born in Port Barnett, which is not "near" Pittsburgh, even today. It seems that it was another officer, not General Early, who provided a guard for the wounded Callis at Gettysburg. The stories are wonderful and the author must have been paid by the word.
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