R/RFHA Newsletter, March 2001                                P.3

From Charlotte Kunold, sent to her from Everett Washington, 1374 Crissinger Rd., Marion, OH 43302

He is a descendant of relatives of Gen. JOHN AARON RAWLINS, aide to U.S. Grant during the War Between the States, later named by Pres. Grant as Secretary of War. Charlotte's address is 1188 So. Orange Ave., Apt. #5, El Cajon, CA 92020.

From Gettysburgh Records Bldg., Pennsylvania

“JOHN AARON RAWLINS was born Feb. 13, 1831, at Galena, Illinois. His family had originated in Virginia and had come to Illinois by way of Kentucky. When his father, JAMES DAWSON RAWLINS, went to California for the gold rush of 1849, young RAWLINS maintained the family at the same time he was obtaining a law education, and admitted to the state Bar in 1854. He served as City Attorney of Galena in 1857 and like thousands of his midwestern contemporaries was a Douglas Democrat in 1860. With outbreak of war, RAWLINS teamed up with the unassuming ex-captain of the army who he had met while he was clerking in his brother's leather store. This was Ulysses S. Grant. Grant, at the suggestion of others after President Lincoln had chosen him to head the Union Armies, appointed RAWLINS to become his aide-de-camp, later Chief of Staff. In August 30, 1861, RAWLINS was commissioned Captain and assistant Adjutant General on Grant's staff. From that time until the end of his brief life, RAWLINS was Grant's alter ego, discharging with objectivity the duties and responsibilities of an intimate friend, a military and political adviser, editor, and on perhaps a few occasions, those of apostle of sobriety, he being a teatotalling Methodist. Grant referred to him on many occasions as ""the most indispensable" man he had around him.

During this time RAWLINS made appropriate advances in grade until he was a Brigadier General as Chief of Staff of the General Grant's Army.

RAWLINS first wife had died of tuberculosis in 1861, and it was 'determined that he himself was suffering from the disease. At one time travel on the high plains was recommended to him and he went with companions over the proposed route of the Union Pacific Railroad, but it failed to improve his health. When Grant became President in 1868 he named RAWLINS his Secretary of War, but he only lived 5 more months, dying in Washington DC in March of 1869. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.”

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Everett was born in 1919, and he included a few notes on his immediate family when he sent the above to Charlotte. His grandfather was JOHN D. RAWLINS, b. June 27, 1881, in Lucasville, Ohio, Scioto County. His father was JOHN RAWLINS, born in Jackson Co., Ohio. Their ancestry was Scotch, Welsh and English. JOHN D. RAWLINS had a brother BENTON LEWIS with whom he worked until 1910 when BENTON went to California. BENTON md Catherine Burns in 1914 at Oregon City, Oregon. He had 4 children, one died when a baby; one was named GEORGE ROBERT, a daughter named NAOMI ETTA, and another named RUTH IRENE. Both girls lived in Independence, Oregon. RUTH married a man named Chambers. BENTON had at least one son, GEORGE, who taught school in Modesto.

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