Information Sheet
R Mack, John Armenius, 1807-1869.
742 Correspondence, 1850-1869.
One folder, photocopies.
This is the correspondence of John A. Mack, an attorney and county official of Greene County, Missouri. Most of the collection consists of letters to his sons, who were serving in the Union army in Missouri and Arkansas. There are also postwar letters to Mack from Jefferson City, containing political news.
John A. Mack was a native of Pittsylvania County, Virginia, and trained as an attorney. He married Sarah Sophia (Mack) Mack in Virginia on 5 February 1829. They moved to Wayne County, Tennessee in 1834, and back to Virginia in 1845. In 1852, they came to Missouri, settling on a farm in Greene County. John and Sarah Mack had at least six sons. Four of them, John A. “Jack,” Moreau, Robert B., and Rowan E. M., and possibly W. L. “Lundy” Mack, also came to Missouri. Another son, Marshall H. Mack, became a resident of Indianola, Iowa.
Mack and his family were Unionists during the Civil War. In the fall of 1861, he and his sons enlisted at Rolla in the 6th Missouri Cavalry. The senior Mack did not fare well in the service and seems to have been sick much of the time. He was discharged in March 1862 due to disability. He joined his wife in Indianola, where he recuperated before they returned to Greene County. Mack became active in Radical Republican politics. He was defeated in the election for state senator in 1862, but Gov. Hamilton Gamble appointed him circuit attorney of Greene County. Later, he was elected probate clerk and probate judge of Greene County. He was also a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1865, where he acquired the nickname “Honest John.” Mack died at his farm in Greene County on 10 December 1869.
There are a few
antebellum letters in the Mack collection, but the majority of the items consist
of letters from John A. Mack, his sons at home, relatives, and friends to the
sons in federal service. They contain
family news, concerns for their well-being, and comments on military and
political matters in Missouri. Included
are replies, 16 April and 18 April 1862, in response to the news of Moreau
Mack’s death from disease at Houston, Missouri.
John A. Mack, Jr. remained in the 6th Missouri Cavalry, but
in June 1862 Robert B. and Rowan E. M. Mack enlisted in and became officers of
Company G, 1st Arkansas Cavalry (US) serving at
John A. Mack’s letters became increasingly Radical in tone after the death of Moreau Mack. His letters of 4 February 1863 and 4 March 1864 indicate his disgust at the policies of Gov. Hamilton Gamble and Gen. John M. Schofield, and his fear that the conservative influence of John S. Phelps, Colley B. Holland, and others would foster even more instability in southwest Missouri. Mack and several Unionist neighbors were robbed of horses and other livestock in February 1864, thefts that he believed arose from legal proceedings against “Copperheads” in the courts of Greene County. Also in connection with Missouri politics are six letters to John A. Mack from Jared E. Smith, written from Jefferson City 5 December 1866—23 January 1869. Smith queried Mack about the position of state printer in 1866, advised him of events concerning the 1868 elections, and discussed Republican Party matters in 1869. Among the political personages mentioned were Havens, S. H. Headlee, Washington F. Geiger, Sempronious “Pony” Boyd, Joseph J. Gravelly, Francis Rodman, and Benjamin F. Loan.
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