Jackson County IA Archives Biographies.....Allen, Amasa 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Ken Wright wright@prestontel.com January 18, 2011, 2:47 am

Source: Jackson Sentinel
Author: Jackson Sentinel

Jackson Sentinel, March 3, 1944 

AMASA O. ALLEN 

During the summer of 1862 Amasa O. Allen volunteered for service in Company I, 
of the 24th Iowa Volunteer Infantry Regiment. Although Allen was a busy farmer 
with a wife and two small children, the desperate need of his country caused 
him to forsake the peaceful pursuit of agriculture. He left Maquoketa with the 
Jackson County volunteers on August 31, boarded the steamer “Denmark” at 
Davenport, and proceeded to Camp Strong, located on a large island below 
Muscatine. 

The spiritual needs of these soldiers were not neglected. Amasa Allen wrote 
his young wife, “Today, we were all escorted into a hollow square, and 
listened to some of the best addresses that I ever heard, by Rev. Truesdale, 
and I never saw a congregation keep as good order in a church, as did that 
1500 men, seated on the ground-and many were the wet faces, as we listened to 
the advice that was given. Since writing the above we had a prayer meeting in 
our tent and we had a good one before we closed.” Allen found most of his 
comrades steady, and noted that they had “prayer meetings in their barracks 
every night and preaching twice on Sunday.” The story of this Christian 
soldier is told by Bessie L. Lyon in “The Palimpsest” for February. 

On October 20, Allen and his comrades departed for St. Louis aboard 
the “Hawkeye State.” Then they proceeded to Helena, Arkansas, where they 
remained until April of 1863 before joining Grant’s Army in the operations 
around Vicksburg. Although he met many hardened men and engaged in the 
bloodiest of battles Amasa Allen always remembered his pledge to his wife 
to “return no worse than when we parted and just as much better as I can.” 
Sometime in May or June during the hard fighting around Vicksburg, Allen was 
taken sick. From a Memphis hospital an Army chaplin wrote to Agnes Allen that 
her husband was dying. It was his last wish that she would take care of their 
children. Today two great-grandsons of Amasa Allen-Allen Baird and Alfred 
Baird, of Webster City, serve in the United States Army, Christian soldiers 
like their great-grandfather. 



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