Former California State Senator Phillip D. Wyman was back in Genoa last week to resurrect interest in the historical building that bears his surname.
 
Wyman donated $2,000 to the Preserve Our Post committee, the organization attempting to restore the Elliot Wyman Post 39, believed to be the only Grand Army of the Republic building left in Northwest Ohio.
 
Wyman hopes his donation will rekindle restoration efforts stalled by The Great Recession. For him, the mission is a personal one. The post was named after his great grandfather’s brother.
 
Ellen Bergman, chairperson of the Preserve Our Post committee, said the committee had a goal of raising $70,000 when it formed in 2004, but grants and donations have been hard to secure. 
Bergman said Wyman’s donation will help fund a brick facade for the foundation and entrance steps. Work completed to date includes moving the building onto a new foundation and replacing the roof. The building is located at Veterans Memorial Park on land that once belonged to the Wyman family.

The group formed shortly after Wyman visited Genoa in 2004 to research his family’s Civil War legacy. A search of village records revealed that the building, which was used for storage, is an authentic GAR building, one of only five remaining in the state.  At one time, there were 705.
 
Wyman’s most recent trip to Northwest Ohio has a two-fold purpose. He wants to assure the building will be open to the public on August 6, 2014, the 150th anniversary of Elliot Wyman’s death in a battle near Atlanta. He is also seeking support in his effort to include his great grandfather Frank Wyman’s letters in the public school curriculum in Ohio and California. To that end, he met with Tom Culbertson, executive director of the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Museum.
 
Entitled Forward March: Civil War Letters of Sergeant Frank Wyman, the letters depict history from the viewpoint of an enlisted man. Sgt. Wyman served with Company A of the 14th Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He fought at Chickamauga and Shiloh and travelled more than 6,000 miles in four years.
 
While Civil War letters are not unique, Culbertson said Sgt. Wyman’s letters are “more literate than a lot of letters you find. They tell a pretty compelling story of one man’s experience in the Civil War.”
 
The letters recount how officers instilled discipline in the troops with constant drilling, marching and maintaining a clean, organized camp. Sunday church attendance was mandatory and card playing and vulgar language barred. But, despite the officers’ best efforts, soldiers gambled on horse races and cock fights and Sgt. Wyman penned a vague reference about a bus which brought 40 women into camp.
 
The diversions were welcome for men who faced years of physical hardship, loneliness and the diseases that accompany living in camps and marching in rain, snow and heat. Sgt. Wyman wrote about these hardships, as well as the gruesome sight of battle.
 
Sgt. Wyman also wrote about how General Ulysses S. Grant saved his life. In September of 1863, Sgt. Wyman contacted typhoid fever and dropped out of a march to rest on a log. General Grant rode by and noticed the sick soldier. He ordered a horse for him to ride back to camp and sent an inquiry later to see how he was. “He was a wonderful officer always caring and looking after his men,” Sgt. Wyman wrote.
 
Shortly after his brother was killed, Sgt. Wyman pledged he wouldn’t take any more chances in battle. But, a week later, after his captain fell mortally wounded at Jonesboro, Georgia, he found himself in charge of his unit. Wyman led his men on a successful charge of the Confederate position and held it.
 
Throughout the hardships of war—the disease, the death, the assaults on one’s moral code and the loneliness--Sgt. Wyman projected a positive face to his loved ones in Genoa. Once, he wrote to his sister, ‘It is a good thing to be a soldier. Nothing troubles one but the want of something better to eat…You will see but few long faces in the Army. The greater the hardship, the jollier they take it. On a night March for instance, they all get to singing, and then time passes off as quickly as if we were at a party or ball. Who would not be a soldier for Uncle Sam? Everybody, unless a coward or a traitor. What is home without a country? If everyone thought as I do, there would never be any drafting.”
 
After General Robert E. Lee surrendered to General Grant, Sgt. Wyman returned to Genoa. He later wrote of the day he arrived at home, “It was near evening when I came home. Mother was in the kitchen getting ready for the evening meal. I went around to the back where she was, said `Hello,’ and hung up my hat. I asked her if the milking had been done. She said, `No,’ so I took the pail off the hook where it hung as always behind the door and went out to milk the cows. And, the war was over for me.”
 
Frank Wyman was just 22 when the war started. In later life, he pioneered the lime business in Genoa and California. He served as a member of Genoa City Council, the Genoa School Board and the Los Angeles Police Commission.
 
Phillip Wyman faces two daunting tasks. The recession has made competition for grants and private donations more intense. His $2,000 will help, but $70,000 is still needed. Adding to a school curriculum is no easy chore either. However, Wyman served 18 years in the California Senate so he’s proven he can work with others to get things done. The question is can he rally enough financial support during these economic times.

 Comment at zoz@presspublications. To donate to the renovation contact Ellen Bergman at 419-855-3166.

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