During the Civil War years, Rev. James Griffing served appointments in Auburn and Burlingame,
Tecumseh and Clinton, and Seneca. During this last appointment, James and Augusta
rented their homestead in Shawnee County to Jesse Hannum and took up temporary quarters in the
small -- and now extinct-- town of Lincoln, in Nemaha County.
Although Missouri did not
secede from the Union, many Kansans feared traveling across the State of
Missouri due to the armed guerilla bands who held the State hostage. By the
summer of 1864, however, a Cheyenne uprising on the plains of central Kansas
gave settlers in Washington and Nemaha Counties reason to overcome their travel
fears. While Augusta and her three children traveled East to visit her relatives
in late 1864, James wrote of his experiences while serving with the Nemaha Home Guards
in defending their homes against Indians and Rebels.
Patriotic envelope mailed by Mary Ann Goodrich in 1861
An 1861 letter from Owego, New York addressed to Mrs. James S. Griffing
Deed for purchase of Lots 419 & 421 on Tyler Street in Topeka by
James S. Griffing. The lots were purchased from Nathan & Esther Taylor.
