My Genealogy Hound

ERNEST SHRIER is one of the self-made men of Center View, Johnson County, as he started out in life without capital and with his mother dependent upon him for support. In spite of all difficulties he was persevering in his determination to win success, and was a man of that stock which is not easily discouraged. Immediately after his marriage he leased a piece of land for seven years and then invested in forty acres lying in Macoupin County, Ill. This he sold out in 1881, and, coming to this locality, purchased one hundred and five acres of the farm which he now owns and manages. The place was then entirely without improvements and the first building erected thereon stood in the center of a cornfield.

The parents of our subject were John and Catherine Shrier, natives of Germany, who crossed the Atlantic in the ‘50s and settled near Bunker Hill, Ill. The father, who was a gardener in his native land, after locating in the Prairie State rented a farm, but was preparing to buy a place when his career was cut short by death, while still a comparatively young man. His widow continued to live at Bunker Hill until she departed this life in 1879, being then seventy-five years of age. She was for years a member of the German Methodist Church. Her children are as follows: William, a farmer of Macoupin County, Ill.; Hannah, widow of John Hoetker and a resident of Bunker Hill; Lena, whose home is in Carroll County, Mo.; Dora, widow of Rudolph Fisher, and now manager of the Bunker Hill Hotel; Henry, a farmer near that village; Sophia, of the same place, and widow of Fred Frederickson; August, a farmer of Macoupin County, Ill.; Ernest, our subject; Otto, who lives in Bunker Hill; and John, a farmer of Grant County, Ore. The latter served during the last year and a-half of the war in the Ninety-seventh Regiment of Illinois Volunteers.

The birth of Ernest Shrier occurred May 9, 1845, in Germany, and he was a mere child when his parents removed to Illinois. He attended school to some extent prior to his eleventh year, after which, in order to help support his mother, he engaged in working for farmers by the month, and for four years was employed by Thomas Hilton, of Madison County, Ill. In August, 1862, he joined the Ninety-seventh Illinois Regiment, being assigned to Company A. His service led him into many of the most important battles of the war, among which we mention the following: Chickasaw Bayou, Champion Hills, siege of Vicksburg, Port Gibson, Black River Bridge, siege of Fts. Jackson and Blakely, and Atchafalaya. At Ft. Blakely he received a slight wound from a musket-ball. The only battle in which his regiment was engaged and in which he did not participate was at Arkansas Post, he being sick in the hospital with the measles. He was discharged at Galveston, Tex., July 29, 1865, and was mustered out at Springfield, Ill.

Returning home, Mr. Shrier was again engaged to work for Mr. Hilton, his former employer, and subsequently was hired by John Goodwin for nearly four years, and then by Thomas Wood for a year. October 27, 1870, Mr. Shrier married Henrietta Goodwin, who died November 25, 1892, being then forty years of age, as she was born July 18, 1852. She was the mother of six children, namely: Charles W., born September 15, 1871; Ida May, March 19, 1875; Albert Marion, September 26, 1886; John, who was born July 10, 1873, and died March 23, 1879; George A., born February 26, 1878, and who died January 8, 1880; and a child born May 4, 1880, who died before receiving a name. The mother was a noble Christian woman, who was beloved by all who knew her.

On first becoming a voter Mr. Shrier was an ally of the Democracy, but of late years he has been a stanch Republican. He is a Past Master Workman in the local lodge of the Ancient Order of United Workmen of Center View, and has represented the same in the Grand Lodge of the state.