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J.K. Kerr
(1824 - 1876)
Home State: Pennsylvania
Command Billet: Regimental Lt Colonel
Branch of Service: Cavalry
Unit: 4th Pennsylvania Cavalry
Before Antietam
In 1860 he was a 37 year old lawyer in Franklin, Venango County, PA. He was appointed Major at the organization of the 4th Pennsylvania Cavalry in October 1861 and was promoted to Lieutenant Colonel on 12 March 1862.1
On the Campaign
He succeeded to command of the Regiment when Colonel Childs was killed at Antietam on 17 September 1862.
The rest of the War
He was promoted to Colonel on 18 September 1862 but resigned his commission on 17 May 1863, for health reasons.
After the War
By 1870 he was a prosperous lawyer in Pittsburgh, PA.
References & notes
Death and other details from History of Venango County,2 and Colonels in Blue.3 Personal details from family genealogists and the US Census of 1860 & 1870. His gravesite is on Findagrave. The photo above is a detail from one at the USAMHI/AHEC online photograph collection4, pointed out to us by Alfonso R. Laporte.
He married Eliza Jane McCormick (1825-1889) and they had 3 children between 1852 and 1856.
Birth
1824; Titusville, PA
Death
02/25/1876; Pittsburgh, PA; burial in Allegheny Cemetery, Pittsburg, PA
1 Bates, Samuel Penniman, History of the Pennsylvania Volunteers, 1861-65, Harrisburg: State of Pennsylvania, 1868-1871 [AotW citation 838]
2 Caldwell, J. A., History of Venango County Pennsylvania, and Incidentally of Petroleum, Columbus (OH): J.A. Caldwell, 1879 [AotW citation 839]
3 Hunt, Roger D., Colonels in Blue: Union Army Colonels of the Civil War - Mid Atlantic States, Mechanicsburg (PA): Stackpole Books, 2007 [AotW citation 840]
4 US Army, Military History Institute (USAMHI), American Civil War (ACW) photographs, Military History Institute Photograph Database, Published c. 1998, first accessed 01 January 2005, <http://cdm16635.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/search/collection/p16635coll20/> [AotW citation 1094]