Page:Autobiographies and portraits of the President, cabinet, Supreme court, and Fifty-fifth Congress (IA autobiographiesp02neal).pdf/181

 JOHN LENDRUM MITCHELL

, of Milwaukee, was born in Milwaukee, Wis., October 19, 1842; acquired the rudiments of an education in the Milwaukee public schools, followed by a course in a military school in Hampton, Conn.; he was then sent abroad and studied in Dresden, Munich, and Geneva; upon the breaking out of the Rebellion he returned home, and at the age of nineteen entered the military service as second lieutenant of Company I, Twenty-Fourth Wisconsin Volunteers; promoted to be first lieutenant January 17, 1863, and transferred to Company E, same regiment; in June, 1863, was detailed for service on brigade staff of General Rousseau; participated in the battles and engagements of his regiment, including Perryville, Murfreesboro, Hoovers Gap, and the campaigns about Chattanooga; threatened with loss of eyesight, and on surgeon's certificate of disability he resigned his commission, which was accepted; was a member of the State senate of Wisconsin in 1872–73 and 1875–76; president of the Milwaukee school board 1884–85; president of the Wisconsin State Agricultural Society, and president of the Northwestern Trotting-Horse Breeders' Association; in 1886, by joint resolution of Congress, he was appointed a member of the board of managers of the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers; reappointed in 1892, and elected vice-president of the board in 1895; was a member of the national Democratic committee four years, and in 1892 was chairman of the Democratic congressional committee; is vice-president of the Wisconsin Marine and Fire Insurance Company Bank, and of the Northwestern National Insurance Company; was elected to the Fifty-Second and Fifty-Third Congresses as a Democrat was elected to the United States Senate, and took his seat March 4, 1893. His term of service will expire March 3, 1899.