Rensselaer Republican, Volume 25, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 July 1893 — A HOOSIER HERO. [ARTICLE]

A HOOSIER HERO.

Col. Lawton, of Fort Wayne, Presented With a Medal. Secretary Lamont,on last Saturday, presented a medal of honor to H. W. Lawton, of Ft. Wayne, late Captain and Lieuten-ant-Colonel of the Thirtieth Indiana Volunteers, and now Lieutenant-Colonel and Inspector-General United States Army, “for distinguished gallantry in the battle at Atlanta, Ga., August 3, 1864.” • The circumstances for which he is thus publicly commended occurred during the Atlanta campaign and in front of Atlanta, Ga., when Captain Lawton, ot the Thirtieth Indiana Volunteers, commanded by Col. O. D. Hurd, greatly distinguished himself by the exhibition of unusual courage and good judgment. During this* campaign the Thirtieth Indiana served in the Third brigade, First division. Fourth army corps, and on the 3rd of August,lß6-1, Captain Lawton was brigade officer of the day. On the afternoon of that day the skirmish line was reinforced and an advance was ordered along the whole Tint* nearly three-foufths of a mile, for the purpose of dislodging the enemy from their rifle pits. The] movement was concerted with the other two brigades of the division, the third being in the center. Capt. Lawton was in command of this line of the brigade and conducted and led its advance. In the language of Colonel Hurd, “the success eff this assault was due mainly to the intelligent dispositions made by Captain Lawton and to his personal courage and stubborn resistance made to the enemy’s repeated charges.” Col. Lawton was born In Ohio, but entered the army from Indiana, first as a surgeon in the Ninth Regiment, afterwards serving as a lieutenant in the Thirtieth and gradually rising to the rank of colonel. He entered the*regular army in 1860 as a lieutenant and has been gradually promoted, being made a lieutenant-colo-nel in 1889, and subsequently being made a colonel and detailed for duty at the War Department as Inspector-General.