My Genealogy Hound

D. W. Lutman is a practical mechanic who for nearly a third of a century has been a contractor and builder of Union county. He makes his home in Afton, where he is most widely and favorably known, having taken up his abode in this county in 1876. He is, moreover, entitled to mention by reason of the fact that he is one of the veterans of the Civil war, the ranks of which are fast being decimated. His birth occurred in Perry county, Pennsylvania, July 9, 1838. His father was John Lutman, a native of Pennsylvania, and his grandfather, Everhard Lutman, who was a soldier of the Revolutionary war and one of the early settlers of the Keystone state. John Lutman was there reared and after attaining his majority married Sarah Ricedorff, who was born in Pennsylvania. He followed farming in Perry county, where he reared his family, and later removed westward to Morgan county, Ohio, where he took up his abode in 1866. His remaining days were there passed and he died at the venerable age of eighty-eight years. His family numbered five sons and three daughters who reached adult age. The sons were all well educated and became teachers, while one served as county surveyor and also as county superintendent of schools.

D. W. Lutman is now the only survivor. Upon the home farm he was reared to manhood but desiring to follow other occupation he learned the trade of a carpenter and joiner when a young man of eighteen years, serving a three years’ apprenticeship. He afterward worked as a journeyman in Pennsylvania until the outbreak of the Civil war, when he offered his services to his country. The smoke from Fort Sumter’s guns had scarcely cleared away when he joined the army, responding to President Lincoln’s first call for troops. It was in April, 1861, that he joined the Second Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry, which was assigned to the army of the Potomac. Later he became ill in the hospital at Hagerstown, suffering with typhoid fever, and upon the expiration of his term of service was honorably discharged. In 1864, however, he again joined the army, being assigned to duty with Company E, of the Two Hundred and Eighth Pennsylvania regiment of Infantry Volunteers. He was first corporal of his company. For three months he was on picket duty and later was under fire in front of Petersburg for six months. He participated in the battle of Steadman and was with his command until the close of the war. He now holds two papers granting his honorable discharge, the last being received at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, in July, 1865.

When the preservation of the Union was an assured fact and the country was once more at peace Mr. Lutman returned home and resumed work at his trade, which he followed in Missouri until the spring of 1866, when he removed to the vicinity of Versailles, in Morgan county, Missouri. He there engaged in carpentering for ten years and in 1876 came to Iowa, settling on a farm. For a long time he rented farm land but continued to work at his trade for four years. In 1880 he bought a farm in Grant township, his first purchase bringing him eighty acres, which he at once began to cultivate and improve, erecting thereon a substantial residence and barns and outbuildings, which, furnished ample shelter for grain and stock. He has also divided the place into fields of convenient size by well kept fences and has put out considerable small fruit, as well as apples. As the years have passed he has prospered and as his financial resources have increased he has added to his holdings from time to time until he is now the owner of two hundred acres, constituting one of the best improved farms in Grant township. He continued to reside upon the farm until 1893, when he removed to Afton and erected a good residence, which he has since occupied. While living upon the farm and giving general supervision to its development and improvement he hired others to do the actual work of the fields while he continued in business as a contractor and builder. The last fourteen years have been given to that department of industrial activity and in all parts of the county are seen houses and barns of his construction. Many of these are substantial and attractive structures which add materially to the appearance in which they are located.

Mr. Lutman was married in Pennsylvania on Christmas day of 1862, when Miss Sarah Bupp, a native of that state, became his wife. Unto them were born nine children: Charles E., now a prominent contractor of Des Moines; Jesse E., a contractor and builder of Colorado Springs, Colorado; J. Harvey, who is a contractor of South Omaha; Walter, also living in South Omaha; Florence, the wife of William Nichols, a resident farmer of Grant township; Ellen, the wife of Samuel Snyder, also a farmer of Grant township; Myrtle, the wife of Wallace Harris, a business man of Sioux City, Iowa; Hattie, the wife of Frank Anderson, a dentist now practicing in Sioux City; and Minnie, who became the wife of L. H. Nichols, died in Denver, Colorado, and left two children, both of whom are now grown.

In his political views Mr. Lutman has always been an earnest democrat, ever supporting the party save when he cast his ballot for General U. S. Grant. His first vote was in support of Stephen A. Douglas in 1860 and in 1864 he voted for George B. McClellan but after voting for Grant he again gave his allegiance to the democracy. While living in New Hope township he served as president of the school board and also as justice of the peace, while in Grant township he was township trustee for several years and was secretary of the school board for a long period. He is a valued member of the Grand Army post at Afton and both he and his wife are members of the United Evangelical church. His life has ever been honorable and upright and in his business he has not only been diligent and persevering but also thoroughly reliable. The success which he has gained is richly merited, as it has come to him through his earnest efforts, and he is, moreover, entitled to the respect of his fellowmen by reason of his loyalty and citizenship at the time of the Civil war and also in days of peace.