John Witherspoon

CAPTAIN JOHN WITHERSPOON was one of those who left the Detroit Free Press composing room to become a soldier. He was twenty-two years old when he enlisted in 1861 in the 1st Michigan. At Gettysburg, he was one of the four officers of the 24th who came through the battle unhurt. He was made second lieutenant in Company C on December 13, 1862, first lieutenant on September 1, 1863, and captain the following November 22. He was wounded in the Wilderness, May 5, 1864. After the war he homesteaded at St. Edward's, Nebraska, and was killed there during a cyclone. His family returned to Detroit, where his grandson and namesake, John Homer Wither-spoon, became a popular civic figure, occupying the various public offices of assistant corporation counsel, police commissioner, and city controller.

Some of the information on this Pages comes from Father Abraham's Children, (p. 271).