This cache is located along the Galena River Trail. Please read the cache listing for GC12W8G Galena River Trail for information on the trail.
Brevet Major General of U.S. Volunteers, Augustus Louis Chetlain, was born in St. Louis, Mo. on Dec. 26, 1824. He moved to Galena with his family when he was two years old. His father became a miner, and later, a farmer. Chetlain traveled to Elyria, Ohio, to marry Emily Tenney in 1847. They had a son, and Emily passed away eighteen months later. Chetlain established a glassware and crockery business on Galena’s Main Street in 1852. By 1859 he had accumulated a small fortune. He sold his interest in his store to his chief clerk, and spent the summer traveling in Europe for “rest and relaxation,” as Chetlain put it.
With the breakout of the Civil War in 1861, Chetlain aided in organizing the “Jo Daviess Guards”– the first company of volunteers from the Galena area. Chetlain was the first man enlisted in Northern Illinois, according to a Galena Daily Advertiser article from 1864. Ulysses S. Grant was also instrumental in the forming of this group. Grant declined the position of Captain, and with his recommendation, Chetlain became Captain of the Jo Daviess Guards. The Jo Daviess Guards was formed, drilled, equipped and on its way to Springfield 13 days after the first shot at Fort Sumter. Once there it was incorporated into the 12th Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment, where Chetlain was elected Lt. Colonel of the regiment on May 3, 1861. Chetlain participated in the battles at Fort Henry, Fort Donelson, Shiloh and both the Siege of Corinth and the Battle of Corinth. It was for his leadership in the battle of Fort Donelson that he was promoted to Colonel of the regiment on April 1, 1862. Chetlain was injured on April 6, 1862 at Shiloh.
Chetlain and the 12th Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment became part of Sherman’s Army and took part in the Battle of Chattanooga on Missionary Ridge. He was commissioned Brigadier General of Volunteers on December 19, 1863 and was involved in organizing the 55th regiment of Colored Volunteers. Chetlain was then appointed Superintendent of recruiting services in Kentucky and later, Tennessee. It was for this he was brevetted Major General on June 18, 1865.
Chetlain mustered out of the army in 1866. He was then appointed the Internal Revenue Collector for Utah and Wyoming, serving from 1867 to 1869. Grant, then president, appointed Chetlain U.S. Counsel General to Brussels, Belgium from 1869 until 1872. Chetlain moved to Chicago in 1872 where he established himself in the banking business and as a stockbroker. He was president of the Home National Bank, organizer of the Industrial Bank of Chicago, director of the Chicago Stock Exchange, and member of the Board of Education. Later, Chetlain wrote his memoirs, Recollections of Seventy Years, which was published by The Gazette Publishing Company in Galena in 1899. Chetlain died on March 15, 1914 and is buried in Greenwood Cemetery.