HERE’S
A VINTAGE 1910 GRAND ARMY OF THE
REPUBLIC [GAR] CELLULOID CAMPAIGN PINBACK FOR
COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF
JOHN McELROY
(1846 – 1929)
John
McElroy (1846–1929) was an American printer, soldier, journalist
and author, known mainly for writing the novel "The Red Acorn" and
the four-volume "Andersonville: A Story of Rebel Military Prisons," based upon his lengthy confinement in the Confederate Andersonville prison camp during
the American Civil War.
Biography
McElroy
was born to Robert and Mary Henderson McElroy in Greenup County, Kentucky. When his father
died, he traveled to St. Louis to become an apprentice in
the printing business.
As a
sixteen-year-old in 1863, McElroy enlisted with the Union Army as
a private in Company L of the 16th Illinois Cavalry regiment,
having earlier served with local Union troops in operations near St. Louis. In
January 1864, he was among dozens of men captured in a skirmish near Jonesville,
Virginia, by Confederate cavalrymen commanded by William E. Jones. According to his book, Andersonville:
A Story of Rebel Military Prisons, McElroy was first sent to Richmond, then
to Andersonville in February 1864. In October 1864 he was moved to Savannah and
within about six weeks was sent to the new prison in Millen, Georgia (Camp
Lawton); thence to several other camps before the war ended.
After
the war ended, McElroy was released from captivity and transported back to the
North. He settled in Chicago and
resumed the printer's trade. He became a local reporter and newspaperman before
relocating to Toledo, Ohio, to
become an editor of the Toledo Blade. He
married Elsie Pomeroy of Ottawa, Ohio,
and raised a family. In 1879, he wrote Andersonville: A Story of Rebel
Military Prisons, a non-fiction work based on his experiences during his
fifteen-month incarceration. It quickly became a bestseller and
remained popular for the next twenty years.
In
1884, he relocated from Toledo to Washington, D.C. to
become editor and co-owner of the newspaper National Tribune, where
Elsie Pomeroy McElroy wrote "The Better Half" column. He was active
in the local Grand Army of the Republic, serving as commander
of the Department of the Potomac during 1896. In 1908, McElroy published The
Economic Functions of Vice. The next year, he published The
Struggle for Missouri, a history of the controversy concerning slavery that
resulted in armed conflict in Missouri. In 1910, he published a Civil War novel
entitled Si Klegg: His Transformation from a Raw Recruit to a Veteran.
The pinback measures 1 ¾” in diameter, and shows some light foxing and cracks in the celluloid.
I am a proud member of the Universal Autograph Collectors Club
(UACC), The Ephemera Society of America, the Manuscript Society and the
American Political Items Collectors (APIC) (member name: John Lissandrello). I
subscribe to each organizations' code of ethics and authenticity is guaranteed.
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