Excerpted From 1884 History of Cumberland, Jasper, and Richland Counties, Illinois p.493-4 (Village of Newton and Wade Township)

   " J. M. CATT was born in 1838, in Jasper County, Ill.; was reared a farmer, and educated in the common schools. He enlisted, August 2, 1861, in Company K, Thirty-Eighth Illinois Infantry, commanded by William T. Carlin, and served in the Department of Cumberland in the Atlanta campaign, and fought in the battles of Fredericktown, Mo., Shiloh, Perryville, Ky., Stone River, Murfreesboro, Nolensville, Chickamauga, Mission Ridge, Lookout Mountain, Buzzard's Roost, Resaca, Pine Mountain, where Rebel General Polk was killed; Peach Tree Creek, siege of Atlanta, Bald Knob, Marietta, Jonesboro, Lovejoy Station, Nashville and Franklin (where ten rebels Generals were killed). After a service of four years and seven months he returned home, and in 1868 was joined in marriage with Miss Margaret E. Chambers, daughter of Rev. George and Mary (Perey) Chambers. The result of the union was five children, viz: Milton C., Flora, Jobe W., Martha E., and Jacob M. He is father of two other children by a former marriage -- George J. and Joseph A.  His father Job Catt, was of German descent, born in Pennsylvania, and removed to Ohio in an early day, where he married Mary Stout, daughter of Joseph Stout. They reared a family of nine children, as follows: Margaret, Mary, John, Charles, Rachel, Catharine, Josiah, Elizabeth, J.M.; four others, not named, died in infancy. He was one of the early pioneers of Jasper County and was here when the Indians were yet numerous."

-Submitted by Minga (Buckle) Stivers