Eli McCarty
Captain, Indiana Volunteers

Eli McCarty was born on 28 November 1827 in Daviess County, IN, to James and Elizabeth McCarty. He married Louisa Allen on 18 February 1857 in Daviess County. Louisa was the daughter of Charles and Sarah V. Lundy Allen and was born on 1 January 1840 in Alfordsville, Daviess County. They had four daughters, all born in Daviess County, Emma R. (1858), Clara Ellen (1859), Delila (1861), and Hatty B. (1863).

McCarty volunteered for and helped to organize Company G 42nd Regiment Indiana Infantry Volunteers on Friday, 27 September 1861, and reported for duty at Evansville. The company was known as McCarty's Company and he was elected Captain. His cousin, David A. McCarty, among other relatives and friends, joined this company.

In October 1862, Eli was wounded by a bullet striking the top of his shoulder just behind the clavicle and coming out near the inferior angle of the scapula during the Battle of Perryville, KY. He was discharged for medical reasons on 16 May 1863 and returned to Daviess County where he was appointed Draft Officer when the 1864 Draft Laws were passed. Eli's job was to notify the men to be drafted in the 1864 draft.

On 3 October 1864, while notifying a number of men that they had been drafted, he was ambushed. McCarty was hit by a rifle ball that passed obliquely down through the lungs and severed the main artery near the heart. McCarty, a very strong man, rode on about 50 yards or more and then fell from his black horse, mortally wounded. Other shots were also fired by the men hidden in ambush.

The assassins kept the horse tied up in the woods until dark. When it was safe, the killers either put the body across the saddle or drug the body on a sled through a cornfield to the river bank where one of the deepest holes in the White River was located. The area used was on the East Fork of the White River at a place called Green's Bend on the Ballow farm. The body had apparently been dragged over the uneven ground to the river bank a distance of about two miles from where the murder had occurred. The body was then weighted down with a 100 pound stone tied with ropes that even fastened to a big palmetto hat used to hold the stone and then thrown into the river. The horse was then set free.

The following day, the body of Captain McCarty was recovered from the White River.

Five men were apprehended and taken to Indianapolis where they were found guilty by the Military Commission for Draft Resistance. The convicted were sentenced to the penitentiary. Two died before beginning their terms; the others served their six years of sentence and were released.

Death and Burial

Captain Eli McCarty was murdered on 3 October 1864 in Daviess County, IN. He is buried at Ebenezer Cemetery in Washington, IN.