By Pat Hammert/Staff Writer

Local historian Carolyn Barker knew there was more information to be had on the only Congressional Medal of Honor winner buried in El Reno Cemetery.

“I just wanted to find out about what he was like as a man,” she said.

The Medal of Honor Association had come up cold on details of John Alexander Sutherland, other than he earned the high award for outstanding courage while fighting in the Indian Wars in Arizona in 1868.

Still that group sought to honor Sutherland, one of 26 Medal of Honor winners buried in Oklahoma. On Memorial Day, the association’s representative, Dan Younger, recognized Sutherland with a bronze plaque and a ceremony featuring an honor guard and a 21-gun salute. No living descendants of Sutherland have been found.

Sutherland died on Dec. 2, 1891, in El Reno, at age 42. He was only 20 when he earned the medal, a corporal in Company L, 8th U.S. Cavalry, presumably stationed at Fort Reno.

Barker and fellow historical researcher Jean Kyle set about finding out more about the man. They started with Army pension records, finding out Sutherland was the eighth child of Alexander and Patsy (Martha Koontz) Sutherland, born Feb. 19, 1848, at Harrods-burgh, Monroe County, Ind.

He went to the Civil War with his father when he was only 16 years old. Soon after the war he enlisted in the regular Army and served for 10 years on the frontier, braving the hardships of Indian warfare in several of the western territories.

Sutherland enlisted as a private of Company C 43rd Regiment Indiana Volunteers on Oct. 10, 1864, at Indianapolis and was mustered out with the company on June 14, 1865. He re-enlisted in 1866 and was assigned to Troop L 8th Regiment of the U.S. Cavalry.

Muster roll for March and April 1868 reports him present for duty at Seneca Creek, Arizona Territory. The roll for November and December 1868 reports Sutherland sick at Fort Whipple. Nature of illness was not stated.

He was given the Medal of Honor for outstanding bravery in Arizona between August and October of 1868. The date of issue was July 24, 1869. The citation: “Bravery in scouts and actions against Indians.”

From 1865 through 1878, his Army records noted numerous illnesses, from bronchitis to rheumatism.

In 1870 or 1871, his first sergeant reported “that while the troop was stationed at Fort Union, New Mexico, Sutherland was detailed to go to Santa Fe with an escort in charge of treasury funds and on his return complained of his suffering with rheumatism and was sent on sick report. On his return at another time, from Kit Carson, Colorado, to Fort Union, he was also suffering with rheumatism.

The first sergeant reported: “Nothing but an iron constitution could stand the hardship and exposure endured by the members of said troop during their four years as scouts in Arizona and New Mexico from 1867 to 1871.”

He was affected at different times from 1878 through 1880 with severe colds and throat troubles and was very frequently unable to attend to business and was confined to his room and bed.

In 1888 at age 38, Sutherland applied for an Army pension. On the application his personal description was 5 feet 7 1/2 inches tall, light complexion, light hair, gray eyes. He weighed 129 pounds.

Upon leaving the service he had lived mainly at Caldwell, Kan. He freighted from there to Indian Territory, but employed hands to drive the team and do the work.

He married Gertrude M. Hays on June 12, 1872, in Bloomington, Monroe County, Ind.

They had two children, Flowrette, born in 1873, and Karl Alexander, born June 18, 1879, at Bloomington, Ind. But Sutherland left his family in Bloomington about October 1878 for Wichita, Kan., living there until 1881 when he moved to Caldwell and then to Joplin, Mo., in 1887.

His occupation was merchant and teamster. Records show he and Gertrude were divorced in 1888 in Labette County, Kan.

He enrolled at the Topeka Kansas Pension Agency for $12 per month disability because of bronchitis and rheumatism which was “incurred in the military service of the United States while serving as a private in Company C of the 43rd Regiment Indiana Volunteers.”

He stated he was unable to perform any manual labor because of his disabilities and he asked for an examination by the board to re-evaluate his condition.

He moved to El Reno about 1890 where he operated an express and delivery business. Sutherland was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic, Odd Fellows and Knights of Pythias orders.

His wife’s sister, Jennie Millen, told the Army the cause of the separation between “my sister and Sutherland seemed to be that he was not domestic…”

Millen’s son, a Kansas resident, gave written testimony that “Sutherland never had good health in Blooming-ton, Ind., so he wanted to live out here on that account, but his wife, Gertrude, would not live out here. That was apparently the cause of the separation between them.”

His son, Karl, wrote, “I remember my father. I saw him only about twice when I was small. I understand that my father was a soldier in the regular Army. He married my mother and went off again and came back and was on the police force here and he shot a man and then he left and went west and out there he was a freighter from St. Louis to Indian Territory.

“When I saw my father the last time, he came here and stayed just two or three days when I was 8 or 9 years old. No, he did not live with my mother when he came, but he talked to her I know. It seems to me that my father had been here on a short visit a short time before he came when I was 8 or 9 years old.”

A census record shows Karl and his wife had no children and there is no record that his sister ever married.