Brigadier General John W. Sprague (USV)

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Corporal
Joined
Aug 27, 2016
Location
Hangzhou, China (Wisconsin, USA)
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Brigadier General John Wilson Sprague (USV)


John Wilson Sprague was born in White Creek, New York, on 4 April 1817. At the age of thirteen, he entered Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute at Troy, New York. He left school before graduation to engage in the grocery business, and in 1845 removed to Milan, Ohio, where he continued the business of a merchant in the shipping and commission sales businesses. He served one term (1851-1852) as the treasurer of Erie County, Ohio. In the late 1850s, he organized and equipped a line of sailboats and steamers for traffic on Lake Erie and was engaged in that business when war erupted.

With the outbreak of the Civil War and President Abraham Lincoln’s call for 100,000 volunteers to put down the rebellion, Sprague raised a company of infantry and was sent to Camp Dennison near Cincinnati. He became the captain of Company E of the 7th Ohio Infantry. While returning home on furlough in August 1861, he and a small party of fellow Buckeyes were captured in western Virginia and held as prisoners of war. Sprague was exchanged in January 1862.

He was appointed colonel of the newly designated 63rd Ohio Infantry and joined Maj. Gen. John Pope in Missouri. Sprague led the regiment at the Siege of Corinth, Mississippi, and then was in charge of the Ohio Brigade during the Battle of Iuka in 1862. For the next several months, Sprague took part in the army’s general operations in northern Alabama and Mississippi, extending sometimes into Tennessee. He participated in the Vicksburg Campaign in early and mid-1863. In the fall of 1863, under Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman, he moved with his regiment eastward toward Chattanooga, Tennessee. His regiment was part of the force under Grenville M. Dodge detached to secure the railroad to Decatur, Alabama.

During the 1864 Atlanta Campaign, Sprague was in command of the 2nd Brigade, 4th Division, XVI Corps. During the Battle of Atlanta on 22 July 1864, near Decatur, Georgia, he masterfully conducted a delaying action under heavy enemy fire and received praise from his superiors. With only a small command, he defeated an overwhelming Confederate force and saved the entire ordnance and supply trains of the XV, XVI, XVII, and XX Corps.

He was promoted to brigadier general on 30 July 1864. He moved with Sherman on the March to the Sea and then northward during the Carolinas Campaign. He commanded the brigade on its march from Raleigh, North Carolina, through Richmond to Washington, D.C., and participated in the Grand Review of the Armies in May. He received the brevet rank of major general at the end of the war.

From April 1865 until September 1866, Sprague was the assistant commissioner of the Freedmen’s Bureau for the district of Arkansas, serving under Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard. He was in charge of operations in Missouri, Kansas, and the Indian Territory. In September 1865, he declined a lieutenant-colonelcy in the Regular Army and mustered out of service.

He managed the Winona & St. Paul Railway. In 1870, he became the general manager of the Western Division of the Northern Pacific Railway and co-established the city of Tacoma, Washington. He was instrumental in selecting the route for the railroad’s Pacific Division, and in 1883 had the honor of driving the golden spike on completion of his division.

He served as Tacoma’s first mayor and was president of the board of trade and of various banks and corporations. The town of Spraque, Washington, founded in 1880, was named for him. After suffering for several years from heart disease and chronic cystitis, Sprague died in Tacoma on 27 December 1893. In 1894, the United States Congress awarded the Medal of Honor to Brig. Gen. John W. Sprague for his distinguished gallantry during the Battle of Decatur.

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