Civil War: Company G, 7th California Infantry

Adam Ernst was born in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, February 6, 1828, the son of Jacob Ernst (1790-bef. 1860) and Elizabeth Hummel (1793-1872, Phila., PA). He left Pennsylvania and headed west to seek his fortune in California's gold-fields sometime after 1850. During the Civil War he was commissioned a 1st Lieutenant at Placerville, California, October 24, 1864, and mustered into Company G, 7th California Infantry, October 30. Lieutenant Ernst, along with the other soldiers of his Company, reported to the Presidio of San Francisco in November and remained there until May 1865. He sailed with his company from San Francisco to San Pedro, where he arrived at Drum Barracks in June. He accompanied the regiment on its long march across the Mojave and Sonoran Deserts to Arizona Territory arriving at Tubac in late July. Ernst's regiment relocated to Calabazas August 21 to establish Fort Mason at the confluence of Potrero Creek and Santa Cruz River. Lieutenant Ernst fell ill to the deadly epidemic that struck the post in the Fall of 1865 and his health left him unfit for service. His request for resignation was approved in November 1865 and Lieutenant Ernst resigned his commission at Fort Mason on December 14, 1865. After being mustered out Adam Ernst eventually relocated to Wells County, Indiana, where he married Priscilla Ann Worster October 1, 1868. Priscilla was born in Wells County in October 1851. Ernst became a farmer in Wells County and the couple had two children born there. Sometime in 1876 he moved his family to Loda Township, Reno County, Kansas. The 1880 U.S. Census shows him there with his family, the same year he filed for a Civil War veteran's disability pension, April 1, 1880. He received application No. 356,264 and certificate No. 475,638. Following a crop failure in 1887 that left him deep in debt, Adam Ernst took a job as a teamster with a firm in Hutchinson, also in Reno County. He made occasional visits to his home in Loda Township until he was taken seriously ill in Hutchinson. His family and friends joined him there and were at his side when he died of blood poisoning Saturday, June 2, 1888; he was 60 years old. His body was escorted on the train from Hutchinson to Arlington by members of Hutchinson's Joseph Hooker Post, No. 17, Grand Army of the Republic. He was buried with full military honors by his post, Perryville, No. 242, G.A.R., in Arlington Cemetery on Sunday, June 10, 1888. His headstone in Arlington Cemetery incorrectly identifies him as Adam Ernest. Soon after his death Priscilla filed for a widow's pension June 20, 1888, and received application No. 374,833 certificate No. 267,463. Priscilla eventually returned to her hometown of Liberty, Wells County, Indiana, where she remained until about 1920. After the death of her son Frank's first wife Louisa in 1902, Frank left his two daughters in Priscilla's care and moved moved to Gary, Indiana. The 1910 U.S. Census indicates Priscilla was living there with her grand-daughters Mona L. Ernst, age 16, and Freda Artive Ernst, age 12. According to the 1920 U.S. Census, Priscilla was living in Harrison, Blackford County, Indiana, with her unmarried granddaughter, Mona L. Ernst, who was then 25. Priscilla died in 1922 while visiting her daughter Ida and son-in-law Robert Thrasher at their home in Iowa.
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Children:
(born Wells County, IN)
- Ida Mae (June 20, 1869-Apr. 25, 1941; married Robert Thrasher)
- Frank Orville (Dec. 29, 1870-Mar. 7, 1937, IN; married [1] Louisa Laudema Huffman in 1893; [2] Viola Lyons in 1908)
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Biography by Steve