General Daniel Warren Ketcham, US Army

Have you ever wondered about how life must have been for our ancestors at any given point in history? I have often looked at historical events, mainly in U.S. History, and wondered about how different those people's lives would have been in comparison to mine. I'm old enough to have seen a few changes in our standards of living and lifestyles, but not near old enough to appreciate the more dramatic changes witnessed by my grandparents and great grandparents.

My love of history initiated a Sims Family genealogy study several years ago. It emphasized to me just how different the common day lifestyles were just 100 years ago, in comparison to the life that I have lead. I am disappointed that I never spent any time discussing this with my grandparents when I was younger. Now, as I have matured to a relative degree and have become quite a bumbling old fool, I realize that I would have really enjoyed the opportunity to interrogate my elders.

Several years ago, I ventured through the Burns City Cemetery, just looking for the tombstones of distant relatives. My great grandparents, Noah and Barbara Sims, are interred at Burns City, as are several other great aunts and uncles. Like many older cemeteries, you cannot help but notice the extremely high number of markers that just say Infant or Infant Son or Infant Daughter. This was just another harsh realization about how life was so much more different without the technology that we are blessed with now.

One of the tombstones that I came across intrigued me greatly and invited me to do some more research. General D. W. Ketcham, born in 1867 and died in 1935, graduated from West Point in 1890. That caught my eye quickly and really started me to thinking about the life of General D.W. Ketcham. In the summer of 1886, Daniel Warren Ketcham, 19 years of age, left Burns City for West Point. What a trip that must have been for the young man.

I left Jasonville for West Point back in the summer of 1971. Just sat in the back seat of the car and my folks drove me on the fine highways of this country from Jasonville, Indiana to West Point, New York. I really don't recall any hardships along the way and I guess it was a pretty uneventful trip. For some reason, I don't recall much about that trip at all. Probably because I lapsed into a state of shock shortly after I arrived and it lasted for about 4 years. I often wonder how the trip was for Daniel Ketcham some 85 years earlier.

Prior to June of 1886, there were still problems with the railroad industry because different companies operated on different gauge of rail (the distance between the two rails). There was no way for a train built for one gauge to run on tracks of another one, so wherever lines of different gauges met, the freight and passengers had to be unloaded from one and loaded onto the other. This created lengthy trips of weeks and weeks to travel but a few hundred miles. However, in June of 1886, the nation's railroads had solved this problem and presumably this would have been when young Daniel Ketcham would have been traveling to West Point. My best estimate, based on looking at the rail lines in service at the time, is that the trip would have taken 6-7 days from Burns City to West Point and he would have had to change trains at least 4 times. This was not due to gauge problems, but due to the fact that one line didn't run directly from Burns City to West Point.

New Cadet Ketcham also entered an Academy very unlike the one New Cadet Sims saw on his first day. His class numbered slightly more than 100 and the Class of 1975 had over 1600. Many of the facilities that were present on my arrival, i.e. classroom buildings, library, gymnasium, etc., were not even built in the 19th Century. However, Cadet Ketcham did attend mandatory classes in equestrian training, because of the necessity to train cavalry officers. This was discontinued in 1947, so I was saved the embarrassment of falling off of my trusted steed.

Colonel Ketcham was listed in an October 3rd, 1914 New York Times article, as being part of the new Army General Staff under Chief of Staff, General Peyton March. An Army Major on that Staff was the future 5-Star General George C. Marshall. An article in the Times, just two months prior, listed Major Ketcham as a member of a relief force sailing to France on the Navy's Cruiser, USS Tennessee, with $5,000,000 in gold for the relief of American citizens caught up in the war in Europe. During the war, General Ketcham spent time in the War Plans Division and was later appointed Commander of all Field Artillery units in France. I am still spending some time looking for more information on the life of Daniel Warren Ketcham, but it is evident that many aspects of his life are totally foreign to anything that I have ever experienced in mine. I can't even begin to imagine how much more difficult it must have been compared to the spoiled existence we live through today.

There's another interesting note to this story about General Ketcham, which I'd like to address. He and I are related. Well sort of related, by marriage. It is pretty simple, if you just try and stay with me on this.

The General's sister, Laura, was married to Alfred Sims. Alfred was the son of Starlin Sims, my great grandfather Noah's older brother. So, I guess Alfred is my umpteenth cousin, somewhat removed.

Also, my grandfather Curt's sister, Alice, married John McCarter, who was the grandson of Moses McCarter and Sarah Ketcham. Sarah was the sister of General Ketcham's grandfather, Daniel.

So, as you can readily see, General Ketcham and I were pretty close.

If you ever get a hankering to investigate your family tree, let me know and maybe I can steer you in the right direction. However, you might want to remember what former President Jimmy Carter said about his ancestors, "We've uncovered some embarrassing ancestors in the not-to-distant past. Some horse thieves and some people killed on Saturday nights. One of my relatives, unfortunately, was even in the newspaper business."