Joseph Cameron Lockhart, a veteran Union soldier and a resident of Kansas for nearly forty-five years, had had a successful business career as a farmer and rancher and is now enjoying the fruits of his well spent lifetime at Eskridge in Wabaunsee County.
Mr. Lockhart was born in Salem Township of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, February 12, 1838, and is now in his eightieth year, still active and vigorous for all his experiences. The Lockhart ancestors were Scotch and settled in Pennsylvania in colonial times. His father, George Lockhart, was born in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, in 1807, spent his life there as a merchant and died in 1845. Politically he was identified with the whig party. George Lockhart married Maria Bidlack, who was born in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, in 1819 and died there in 1893, at the age of seventy-four. Joseph C. was the oldest of their four children, John became a Union soldier and died while in the war. Isabelle, who died at Kingston, Pennsylvania, married L. C. Dart, an insurance man, also deceased. George died when a young man in New York City.
Joseph C. Lockhart acquired his early education in the district schools of Luzerne County and also for three years attended the Wyoming Seminary at Kingston, Pennsylvania. At the age of eighteen, having completed his education, he moved west to Illinois and for a time was a merchant at Polo. The Civil war soon came on and broke up his business with that of many others and in 1862 he volunteered in Company B of the Seventh Illinois Cavalry. He was in the service a little more than three years until mustered out in 1865. From his enlistment until the close he was practically in every battle and skirmish in which his regiment was engaged and made a most creditable record as a soldier.
Mr. Lockhart came to Kansas in 1874, locating on a farm near Auburn in Shawnee County. From there he removed to Burlingame and since 1904 had been retired at Eskridge. Mr. Lockhart owned farms in Wabaunsee and Lyon counties, and also in various parts of Western Kansas, having a total of 12,000 acres as an evidence of his hard work and good judgment. He is a stockholder in the National Bank of Commerce of Hominy, Oklahoma. Mr. Lockhart is a republican and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
His Eskridge home is at the corner of Fourth and Locust streets. He had been twice married. The name of his first wife was Sarah Woodruff, who died at Topeka, Kansas. She was the mother of four children: Carolinc, who is an author and lives unmarried at Philadelphia; George, who lives at Eskridge and assists his father in the management of the ranch; Grace, wife of L. D. Edgington, a banker at Hominy, Oklahoma; and Robert, on his father’s ranch at Eskridge.
In 1890, at Sterling, Illinois, Mr. Lockhart married Miss Kate M. Reed. She was born in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, of colonial English ancestry. Her father, Benjamin Reed, was born in Pennsylvania in 1823 and died at Sterling, Illinois, in 1909. Her mother, Harriet Clark, was born at Waynesboro, Pennsylvania, in 1825 and died at Sterling, Illinois, in 1907. Benjamin Reed was a cabinet maker by trade, but after moving to Illinois in 1854 followed farming. Politically he was a democrat and a member of the Lutheran Church. He and his wife had eight children: Eleanor, who lives at Sterling, Illinois, widow of James McDowell, a farmer; Emily, whose home is at Cedar Rapids, Iowa, widow of J. F. Bednar, who was a merchant; Mrs. Lockhart, third in the family; John, a retired farmer at Sterling, Illinois; Reuben, a carpenter at Casper, Wyoming; Frank, a retired farmer at Sterling; Clara, twin sister of Frank, wife of F. R. Taylor, a plumber at Sterling; and Edna, who is living unmarried at Sterling. Mrs. Lockhart was educated in the public schools at Sterling, Illinois. She is very active socially in Eskridge, being a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church and its Ladies Aid Society and also belongs to the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, and the local Study Club.