Gazwell Kline was Grocery and Saloon Keeper

New Madrid Record

March 24, 1886

Funeral Notice:

                               Died in this city at one o'clock p.m. Wednesday, March 24, 1886.

Mr. Gazwell Klein

Aged 42 years, 11 months, and 15 days.  Friends of the deceased are respectfully notified that the funeral will take place from the residence of Mrs. Mosier in this city at 2 o'clock Thursday, March 25, 1886, to the Klein graveyard.  Services will be conducted by Rev. Webster Full.

(The Kline/Cline graveyard is now in the middle of the Mississippi River.  Gazwell Kline was the husband of Anna Eliza Blount Kline, and the above newspaper clipping was pasted in her Bible.)        ___  ___  ___ ___ ___ ___ ____ 

                                       

The funeral was held at Elizabeth "Tickell" Jones-Moore-Blount-Mosier.

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Elizabeth Mosier, who died February 20, 1892, was a sister of Madison Tickell and Gazwell Kline's mother-in-law.  Elizabeth Tickell, the wife of Daniel Mosier, is buried in the Sikeston City Cemetery along with her daughter, Eliza Anna Blount Kline, her son-in-law, W. Henry Cline (his wife and Elizabeth's granddaughter Nancy Lena Kline), a grandson Webster, and a great-granddaughter Vera Cline Johnson.  Elizabeth has her maiden name on her headstone, which shows her date of birth as March 9, 1811.

NOTE:  William "Wilheim" Cline was born in  Darmstadt, Hesse, Germany, and his American family originally spelled their name Cline.  However, after the marriage of his granddaughter Nancy Lena Cline to her first cousin Henry Cline, Anna Eliza Blount Cline changed the spelling of her and her daughter's name to Kline.

William's only son, Gazwell, was born in or near New Madrid, Missouri, on April 8, 1843.  Some seventy-four years and fifteen days later, his great-great-granddaughter Tina Louise Harmon Havard was born on his birthday on April 8, 1960.  Even odder, six years later, on April 8, 1966, a second great-great-granddaughter Jeanelle Renee' Cline Shaw, was born.  Both these baby girls were the granddaughters of Curtis Henry Cline and Marie Ruth Price Cline.  Unfortunately, family tradition says that Gazwell died from either gallstones or appendicitis.

I found the 1863 Tax Assessment Report for New Madrid County, Missouri, listing non-serving men of eligible age who were not fighting in the War Between the States.  I then found Missouri taxed a $30 fee for non-service in 1863 on Gazwell Cline for not serving in the War.   I was surprised by this as Gazwell's father was a German-born immigrant to the USA.  In general, German-born immigrants firmly backed the Union cause.  It is also odd that this family had three or more slaves.  But, again, most German-born citizens were staunch abolitionists.  From these documents, he apparently declined to take sides in the American Civil War and continued to run the family grocery store.

We have little information on Gazwell Cline; however, I have a videotape of granddaughter Vera Cline Johnson telling the camera about her memories of hearing her Grandma Kline talk about her husband.  My Aunt Vera recalled her Grandma saying, "My husband Gazwell was a kind man and a gentleman.  He was good to me.  I could go into the store and take money out of the cash register, tell him how much I took, and he would just say, 'fine dear, have a pleasant day.' That was the way he was, even-tempered." Unfortunately, family traditions state he died of appendicitis.  Today, a simple operation would take care of that issue; however, in 1886, doctors had little knowledge of the surgery needed to remove his appendix.  He did just fifteen days short of his 43rd birthday.

Gazwell Cline (later changed to Kline) and Anna Eliza Blount married on January 23, 1868, in the Methodist Episcopal Church, South in New Madrid.  He was educated in private schooling in New Madrid and worked in his Father's Grocery and Dram store in downtown New Madrid.  His wife, Anna, was educated at the Nashville Ladies College in Nashville, Tennessee.  Gazwell and his wife had two children, Nancy Lena Cline and Robert Edward Cline.  Both were well-educated in private educational institutes in New Madrid.  Lena was fluent in English, German, and French and was an accomplished musician.  She played the pianist for the local Methodist Church.  Their son, Edward, graduated from the Kentucky University and Business College in Lexington, Kentucky, and was employed with N. W. Marshall and Company as a bookkeeper.  He died in 1894, just one year after graduating from college.  

Gazwell's daughter Lena married his wife's cousin, Henry Cline.  Family tradition says that it was at this time they changed the spelling of the last name from Cline to Kline.  So Anna Eliza Blount Kline's mother (Elizabeth Tickell Jones-Moore-Blount-Mosier) and her new son-in-law Henry Cline's mother (Sophronia Tickell Cline) were sisters.  This made my grandparents William Henry Cline and his wife, Lena Kline Cline, second cousins.  It also makes my family tree interesting.

Civil War Era New Madrid, Missouri

In 1862, New Madrid, Missouri, had 85
businesses and two hospitals.

When 1st Lt. Louis Boedicker, 2nd MO. Art., Army Engineer, drew this map in March 1862. The Confederates still controlled New Madrid and Island Number Ten. The town was the county seat of government, it had 85 active businesses, two hospitals, and a thriving Port of New Madrid, and its citizens enjoyed freedom from the Union troops. Few people understand that Missouri saw more than 1,200 engagements within its boundaries when you count minor actions and skirmishes. Only Virginia and Tennessee exceeded this total. The movie "Gone With the Wind" implies that the Civil War was only fought in the Deep South. Missouri, Kentucky, and Tennessee citizens suffered much throughout the war. In my opinion, the high action in these three states was primarily because of the intense loyalty of its people to both sides. Even those citizens who supported remaining in the Union resented the invasion of Union Troops into Missouri and other border states.

Missouri was essential to the Union and Confederacy because of its strategic location on the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers, natural resources, and manpower.

Missouri experienced some of the most violent conflicts of the Civil War, and its people came to symbolize the tragedy of the nation's divisive struggle. The fighting in Missouri was unique in the American Civil War. They experienced arson, murder, robbery, torture, and more from Bloomfield to Commerce, Cape Girardeau, and Jackson to Fredericktown, Benton, Bertrand, New Hamburg, and Sikeston. Citizens in Southern Missouri received more violence than other sections of the state, but the Kansas City area also suffered heavily. Often, local deaths were not among the numbers tallied as war deaths. All Missouri citizens experienced events from destructive guerrilla fighting, murders of neighbors, raids, and the pursuit of outlaws through their property, to the hunting down of Southern sympathizers. This was topped by citizens fearing Federal scouting parties across the state. Growing up in Southeast Missouri, I felt the recurring hatred of one generation to the next but failed to understand what I witnessed. Anger was prevalent toward the Germans in northern Scott County, above Benton Hill, who turned in Southern sympathizers, and Blacks just because of the color of their skin. Rebuilding and recovery were slow following the Civil War. After one hundred years, flames of passion still flared up from time to time. The divisiveness appears to be softening, but much healing is still needed.

This map shows a few of the battles
 fought around New Madrid, MO.

One minor battle in Southeast Missouri was near Belmont, across the Mississippi River from a Confederate stronghold at Columbus, Kentucky. November 6, 1961, Gen. Grant moved by riverboat from his base in Cairo, Illinois, to attack the small outpost near Belmont in Mississippi County, Missouri. (As information, Belmont is only 37 miles from Sikeston and 36 miles from New Madrid.)  Grant landed his men north of the camp and marched to Belmont. Grant's troops overran the surprised Confederate camp and destroyed it. However, the scattered Confederate forces quickly reorganized and were reinforced from Columbus, Kentucky. They were counterattacked, supported by heavy artillery fire from across the river. Grant retreated to his riverboats and took his men back to Paducah, Kentucky. Both sides declared victory. The battle was relatively unimportant, but with little happening elsewhere at the time, it received considerable attention in the press, and a Union General engaged the Confederates was well received in the North.

In mid-February 1862, some seventy miles south of Cario, Gen. Grant's Union troops captured Fort Henry on the Tennessee River. A week after winning Fort Henry, Grant marched his troupes twelve miles cross-country to Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River. After five days of fighting, the Confederates asked for terms of surrender. Grant demanded "Unconditional Surrender" from the commanding officer, and he got it. Both these forts were near the Kentucky-Tennessee border, only 135 miles overland to New Madrid, and about 45 miles less using a ferry to cross the Mississippi  River. The solid wins for Union forces led to the promotion of Big. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant went from an obscure officer to the rank of Major General.

Once these forts fell to the Union, the town of New Madrid and Island Number Ten, which stood about ten feet above the Mississippi River water line and just north of New Madrid, became the confederate solid point for defending the Mississippi River. It was a long battle turned siege, lasting from February 28 to April 8, 1862. Unfortunately, there is not enough space on this Blog to address the critical role Island Number Ten and New Madrid played in the war. However, many books are available on Island Number Ten and New Madrid during the Civil War. I encourage you to read one or two to better understand their pivotal role in the American Civil War.  

After the Confederates surrendered New Madrid, its citizens left the town for anywhere they could find a family to house them or work to support their families. Businesses were forced to close their doors until the war was over. I read in a statement from the General who took New Madrid that the only people found in the town were old men, women, and a few public officials running the County Courthouse.

To conclude this segment, we look at what happened to William Cline's children, starting with the marriage of Elizabeth to Theopholis Verlaque in 1856.