Leander Swope died of advanced age October 6, 1923. He was born 23 April 1833 in Broom County, NY and came to Big Bull Falls, (Wausau) in 1857 from Pennsylvania. He worked here and at Jenny (Merrill). He was a river raftsman, licensed on both the Wisconsin and Mississippi Rivers. He was a civil engineer but was mostly in the logging industry.

He enlisted in 1861 in Company G, Fifth Wisconsin Infantry and served in many major engagements. He came back to Marathon County at the end of the war. He was the oldest Mason in the county, having been made a Mason on Sept. 1868. He was a charter member of Cutler Post N. 55, organized Dec. 5, 1882. He was commander for the last 30 years of his life.

He was married Miss Mary Armstrong and had five children. Oral tradition has it that the first Swope of Dutch ancestry came to New Amsterdam with Peter Minuit and was present when the Dutch purchased Manhattan Island from the Indians in 1623. Leander Swope's own great grandfather was allegedly tomahawked and scalped in a massacre in the Mohawk Valley of New York.

Marathon County Historical Society - Shelley D. Green
1890 Federal Veterans Schedule
Roster of Wisconsin Volunteers - War of the Rebellion
Various data bases - Ancestry.com

Research by Vince Barker

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