Rodney McClave was born around 1834 in New York. He grew up and attended school in Orange, New York, and by 1850, he was working as a farmer. He moved to Jackson, Indiana, in the late 1850s, and by 1860, he was working on the farm of Joseph and Elizabeth Grey.

 

He enlisted in the Union army on September 5, 1861, and mustered in as a private in Company G of the 8^th Indiana Infantry later that day. A month later, he later claimed, a Confederate soldier poisoned their water supply while they were camped near Georgetown, Missouri, and he fell severely ill. He eventually recovered, but he relapsed in December 1861 and was reportedly “crazy as a loon and did not know anything or any body for 3 days.” He was discharged for disability on January 26, 1863.

 

He enlisted again on December 19, 1863, and mustered in as a private in Company A of the 124^th Indiana Infantry. The regiment took part in the Atlanta campaign and the Carolinas campaign, and he mustered out in Greensboro, North Carolina, on August 31, 1865. He settled in Cambridge, Indiana, after the war and worked as a laborer.

 

McClave applied for a federal pension in April 1880 and eventually secured one. By the early 1890s, he was working as a teacher. He was admitted to the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers in Marion, Indiana, on June 13, 1894, suffering from rheumatism and eye disease. According to his records, he was 5 feet, 5 inches tall, with gray hair and black eyes. He was transferred to the National Home in Danville, Illinois, in 1900, and he died there on October 4, 1902.

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