Barger, John S.

Born: 1802-12-05 Culpeper County, Virginia

Died: 1877-01-04 Bloomington, Illinois

John S. Barger, Methodist Episcopal minister, moved to Kentucky in his youth, and at an early age decided to enter the ministry and ultimately spent fifty-five years as a minister. He was accepted as a circuit rider in the Kentucky Conference, and filled this role until 1831 when he was transferred first to the Missouri Conference, and then to the Illinois Conference the following year. Barger settled in Illinois, where he was a presiding elder in the church districts of Kaskaskia, Wabash, Quincy, Lewistown, Bloomington, and Jacksonville. He was directly involved in the establishment of McKendree College and Illinois Wesleyan University. Between 1848 and 1850, Barger purchased 400 acres of land in DeWitt County on which he farmed. In 1853 and 1854, Barger was involved in lawsuits against the Illinois Central Railroad in DeWitt County over damages to his land and crops. In the first year, Barger retained Abraham Lincoln to represent him, and in the following, Lincoln represented the railroad. In 1860, Barger was living with his family in Chatham and owned $20,000 in real property, with a personal estate valued at $2,600. Barger was a “violent opponent” of slavery, and during the Civil War he served as a chaplain in the Seventy-Third Regiment of the Illinois Volunteer Infantry from August 1862 to April 1863. Barger married Sarah A. L. Baker in 1827 and the pair had nine children.

Elmo Scott Watson, The Illinois Wesleyan Story, 1850-1950 (Bloomington: Illinois Wesleyan University Press, 1950), esp. 17, 50, 193 (illustration following page 4); Kentucky, U.S., County Marriage Records, 1783-1965, 28 March 1827, Logan County (Lehi, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, 2016); Barger v. Illinois Central RR, Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, 2d edition (Springfield: Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, 2009), http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=135426; Barger v. Illinois Central RR, Martha L. Benner and Cullom Davis et al., eds., The Law Practice of Abraham Lincoln: Complete Documentary Edition, http://www.lawpracticeofabrahamlincoln.org/Details.aspx?case=135428; The Illinois Central Rail-Road Company Offer for Sale Over 2,400,000 Acres Selected Prairie, Farm and Wood Lands (New York: John W. Amerman, 1855), 13-16; U.S. Census Office, Eighth Census of the United States (1860), Chatham, Sangamon County, IL, 47; J. N. Reece, ed., Report of the Adjutant General of the State of Illinois (Springfield: Phillips Bros., 1901), 4:556; Illinois Weekly Journal (Springfield), 10 January 1877, 4:3; Gravestone, Evergreen Memorial Cemetery, Bloomington, IL.