Joseph Rusling Talley
Joseph Rusling Talley was born on July 15, 1842, in Indiana to Joseph and Anna Talley. His father was a farmer who owned $500 of real estate by 1850. The family lived in Wayne, Indiana, until the 1850s, when they moved to Macoupin County, Illinois. By 1860, Talley was an apprentice carpenter.
He enlisted in the Union army on August 9, 1861, and he mustered in as a private in Company F of the 27th Illinois Infantry on August 17. According to his service records, he was 5 feet, 7 inches tall, with brown hair and gray eyes. The regiment took part in the siege of Corinth, the Battle of Stones River, and the Atlanta campaign. In November 1862, he declared General George B. McClellan “one of the best Generals we have” and insisted that “you cannot find one that the soldiers has more confidence in than they have in him.” He mustered out on September 20, 1864.
He returned to Macoupin County after leaving the army. He married Louisa Allen on September 27, 1866, and they had at least four children: Mina, born around 1868; Bertie, born around 1872; Mary, born around 1874; and Oliver, born around 1877. They moved to McDonald, Missouri, in the late 1860s, and he worked as a carpenter there. By 1870, he owned $1,200 of real estate and $400 of personal property.
They returned to Shipman, Illinois, in the 1870s. He received a patent in 1878 for a “new and useful Improvement in Gates.” They moved to Lakeland, Florida, in November 1891. His wife died in July 1917. Talley suffered a “stroke of paralysis” in March 1922, and he died in Lakeland on March 15, 1922.
DATABASE CONTENT
| (3845) | Talley, Joseph Rusling | 1842-07-15 | 1922-03-15 |
- Conflict Side: Union
- Role: Soldier
- Rank in: Private
- Rank out: Private
- Rank highest: Private
- Gender: Male
- Race: White
Documents - Records: 5
- (4011) [writer] ~ Joseph R. Talley Diary, 1863
- (10781) [writer] ~ Joseph R. Talley to Joseph Talley, 17 November 1862
- (11474) [recipient] ~ John D. Talley to Joseph R. Talley, 4 February 1867
- (11475) [recipient] ~ William H. Talley to Joseph R. Talley, 27 September 1864
- (15278) [writer] ~ Joseph R. Talley Diary, 1864
People - Records: 3
- (3845) Talley, Joseph Rusling is the [cousin of] (4108) Talley, William Henry
Places - Records: 2
Regiments - Records: 1
- (48) [enlisted] [F] ~ 27th Illinois Infantry
SOURCES
1850, 1860, 1870, 1880, 1900, 1910, and 1920 United States Federal Censuses, available from Ancestry.com; Databases of Illinois Veterans Index, 1775-1995, available from Ancestry.com; Illinois Marriage Index, 1860-1920, available from Ancestry.com; Specifications and Drawings of Patents Issued from the U.S. Patent Office for July 1878 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1878); Joseph R. Talley to Joseph Talley, 17 November 1862, DL1688, Nau Collection
