*****Copying of the files within by non-commercial individuals and libraries is encouraged. This message must appear on all copied files. Commercial copying must have permission. ***** Submitted by Cindy Bryant CHARLES R. DICKINSON MRS. HANNAH (TURRILL) DICKINSON (1st wife) MRS. MARY (TURRELL) DICKINSON (2nd wife) MRS. KATE (SULLIVAN) DICKINSON (3rd wife) There are none who better deserve to be written up in history than the citizen-soldiery of our country, who left home and families when the Slaveholders' Rebellion broke upon the startled people of the North to go forth and, if need be, give their lives in the vindication and preservation of our republican form of government. Such a one was Charles R. Dickinson, who enlisted as a private in Company K, Twenty-first Michigan Infantry, Aug. 12, 1862. He was ever with his company, and participated in all its skirmishes and battles, the principal ones being Perryville, Ky., Stone River, Chickamauga, and the "March to the Sea." At Savannah he was severely wounded in the leg by a shell. Mr. Dickinson, for good conduct, was promoted to corporal and sergeant, and was discharged with his regiment at Detroit, June 8, 1865. He was born in New Haven, Addison Co., Vt., May 24, 1825. His family was of old New England stock, his ancestors on both sides emigrated from Connecticut to Vermont prior to the war for independence. His grandfather on his mother's side (Simon Smith) was a soldier in that war. The father of Charles R., Julius C. Dickinson, was also born in Vermont, where he grew to manhood. He married Miss Betsey Smith. He worked at blacksmithing until 1832, when he moved to Genesee Co., N. Y., where he remained until 1838, when he, with his family, came West and settled in the town of Hanover, Jackson Co., Mich., where he bought two hundred acres of wild land, which he improved and owned until 1852, when he sold out and moved into the city of Jackson where he still resides. Charles being a lad of thirteen when the family went into the new farm, was at once, with the rest, put to work clearing and improving the farm, and was thus early taught that work was one of God's ordinances, and that he was no exception to the rule. Arrived at his majority, he started out in life on his own account with no wealth but health and strength. For a time he took jobs, thus getting a small start, with which he, in 1850, joined a party and made the overland trip to California, where for two years he worked in the mines, meeting with fair success. He then returned to Michigan, and in 1853 came to the town of Bloomer, where he bought of a Mr. Giddings the east half of southeast quarter of section 28, and the wet half of southwest quarter of section 27; also eighty acres in section 34, which he soon sold. There was only a slashing of four acres on his farm, and no roads to it. But, nothing daunted, he at once went to work, and soon cleared fields took the place of the forests, buildings went up, and to-day his toil is rewarded by a fine farm, ninety acres of which is cleared, and mostly by his own hands, with buildings, orchard, etc., a view of which is given on another page of this work. In politics he is a stalwart Republican, and among his townsmen very popular, having been elected supervisor thirteen years in succession; also for four years treasurer, and two years a highway commissioner. Mr. Dickinson was married, Jan. 27, 1855, to Hannah Turrill, daughter of Truman J. and Cornelia (Covill) Turrill. She was born in Canada in May, 1835. Their children were Charles F., born March 2, 1857; Ettie V., July 18, 1859; and Harmon R., March 4, 1863. Mr. Dickinson died March 10, 1866. On the 1st day of September, 1868, he was again married, his bride being Miss Mary Turrell, born Sept. 1, 1848, who died soon after. For his third wife Mr. Dickinson married on the 18th day of March, 1869, Miss Kate Sullivan, who was born Dec. 25, 1827, daughter of Cornelius Sullivan. This biography is taken from "HISTORY OF IONIA AND MONTCALM COUNTIES, MICHIGAN" by John S. Schenck. Philadelphia: D. W. Ensign & Co., 1881. Page 422. Bloomer.