Senator Alvin Manley Whaley View All Years

Seantor Hagemann, from a special committee, submitted the following report and moved its adoption:

ALVIN MANLEY WHALEY.

Alvin Manley Whaley was born in Wyoming County, New York, May 14, 1838. He was a pupil in the common schools until the age of fifteen, when he entered Middlebury Academy in Wyoming County, continuing there, except during the winters when he taught, until 1861, when the breaking out of the rebellion put an end to peaceful pursuits.

Patriotic and loyal, he quickly enlisted for service and, although without experience, was elected by his companions second lieutenant of Company K, Seventeenth New York Volunteers, one of the first companies to enlist. Going to the front he was with the army of the Potomac, where, on account of bravery and merit, he was successively advance to the rank of first lieutenant and then captain.

At Fredericksburg, while leading his men in an assault on the rebel works he was struck on the head by a musket ball, and it was supposed by all that this was the end of his brilliant career. Although the skull was fractured, prompt surgical skill saved his life, but so remarkable was his recovery that the case was reported at length in “The Medical and Surgical History of the Rebellion,” and pieces of his skull are still preserved in the museum at Washington. Since that accident he had always worn a silver plate over his brain.

After being discharged from the hospital at Georgetown, he was mustered out, but almost immediately re-entered the service, receiving a commission as quartermaster and serving as assistant quartermaster general. Being ordered to Alabama, he went to Vicksburg, and was with Sherman on his raid and later in his famous march to the sea. Soon afterward the war ended and he returned to engage in farming in his native county in New York.

In 1869 he came to Iowa where he settled at Aplington, Butler County, where he rapidly became one of the wealthy men of the community through his extensive grain, lumber and stock operations, and later because of his banking interests as president of the Exchange Bank for many years.

Captain Whaley was a leading Republican all his life and for many years was well known and honored in the councils of his party. In 1877 he was elected to represent Butler County in the Iowa Legislature, and was returned to the same office in 1879. On the death of Senator W. B. Gaylord he was chosen to represent the Forty-sixth Senatorial District, which included Butler, Floyd and Mitchell Counties, for the unexpired term, being also re-elected for the second term.

He was chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs of the Senate, and also chairman of the Senate Committee which selected Marshalltown, Iowa, as the location for the Iowa Soldiers’ Home.

He again re-entered politics when on the election of President McKinley he was made postmaster at Aplington, an office which he held until a few years ago.

He was a member of the Presbyterian Church of Aplington, and for over twenty years was an elder in the church, being sent to represent the church in the Presbytery, and being sent in 1898 to the General Assembly as representative of the Waterloo Presbytery.

He was a member of the Masonic Lodge of Parkersburg, having been honored as a Knight Templar and as a member of the Mystic Shrine. He was also a member of the John Bradley G. A. R. post at Parkersburg.

Mr. Whaley was married on October 17, 1871, to Jane Hull Smith, daughter of George B. Smith, one of the oldest leading residents of Aplington. She passed away a year ago last July. Four sons are left to mourn their father’s death.

Resolved, That in the death of this noble man the state has lost a worthy citizen, soldier and statesman, and the Senate a loved and honored member; and be it further

Resolved, That these sentiments be entered upon the Senate Journal and a copy be sent to the bereaved family of the deceased.

F. P. HAGEMANN,

JOHN L. WILSON,

D. C. CHASE,

Committee.

The resolutions were adopted unanimously by a rising vote.