The Life and Military Times of James Riley Jordan

Article Sidebar

A drawing of a carronade with a ruler showing its real-life length of 4 feet.
PDF
Published: Dec 22, 2024
Keywords:
James Riley Jordan, Confection Manufactory, Erie army, Erie military

Main Article Content

Dr. Verel R. Salmon

Abstract

James Riley Jordan was born on the Jordan family farm on Jordan Road in Harborcreek Township in Erie County on April 24, 1832 to Riley and Elizabeth Elderkin Jordan. His mother was regarded as a beautiful and well educated woman. His father was a descendant of an adventurous Church of England priest who immigrated to Maine in 1639. Harborcreek was still a wilderness in 1832, and young Jordan often played with Seneca Indian children as their parents hunted for game in the surrounding area. Young Jim had gray eyes, a light complexion and brown hair. He was a little shorter than the average boy his age. Young Jordan had heard his elders relate as he grew up that his great grandfathers had served in the Continental Army during the Revolutionary War.

Article Details

Issue
The Journal of Erie Studies, Spring 1998, Vol. 27, No. 1
Section
Articles

The Copyright for all issues of The Journal of Erie Studies between 1972-2019 are held by the Hagen History Center and the Jefferson Educational Society, and all rights are reserved. These issues are made freely available online through a partnership with the Penn State Libraries Open Publishing program. Please contact the Hagen History Center for permissions and reuse requests.

Author Biography

Dr. Verel R. Salmon

Dr. Verel R. Salmon is Assistant Superintendent of Millcreek Schools. His Erie County ancestor, First Sergeant George Washington Salmon, was a member of Company C of the 145th Regiment of Pennsylvania Volunteer Infantry during the Amencan Civil War. The regiment was formed in September 1862 and was comprised of ten companies of which seven were principally from Erie County and the other three from Crawford, Warren, and Mercer. Dr. Salmon has a longstanding interest in the 145th and has been compiling for many years a soon to be published regimental history of this local unit in which over 2,000 area men served. James Jordan’s story has been selected by the author because of the profound change the Civil War imposed on Jordan. Jordan is the direct ancestor of William F. Fowler, Florence G. Deutsch, George Deutsch, and Susan Leingang, among others living in Erie in the 1990s.