Born in Copenhagen, Lewis County, New York, in 1829. He was reared on a farm, attending the common schools winters and assisting in the work of the farm during summers. He taught several terms and then studied law. He was admitted to the bar in 1855 and the following spring removed to Iowa, locating at De Witt, then the county-seat of Clinton. He soon acquired a good practice but when the Civil War began he raised a company and entered the service as captain of Company D, Twenty-sixth Regiment of Infantry. He was severely wounded at the Battle of Arkansas Post. Mr. Merrell was a commissioner of the Soldiers’ Orphans’ Home and president of the First National Bank of De Witt for several years. He was mayor of De Witt two years. He was a member of the Senate of the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, Seventeenth and Eighteenth General Assemblies. He took a prominent part in the revision of the Code of 1873. He was a Democratic member of the House of the Fourteenth, Twentieth, and Twenty-sixth General Assemblies. Mr. Merrell died on December 31, 1896, before he could serve in the extra session of the Twenty-sixth General Assembly. At the extra session, he was replaced by Walter I. Hayes.
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