Milo Smith Hascall

Milo Smith Hascall was born August 5, 1829, in LeRoy, Genesee County, New York. He clerked in a store and taught school in Indiana until he was appointed to West Point in 1848. In 1852, he graduated a second lieutenant in the 2nd Artillery and was stationed in New England doing garrison duty in Newport Harbor, Rhode Island. Because he saw no promise for promotion in peacetime, he resigned a year later. From the time of his resignation until the onset of the Civil War, he was successful in Goshen and Elkhart County as a lawyer, railroad contractor, district attorney, and clerk of the county courts. He offered his services when the Civil War broke out and was appointed aide-de-camp to General T. A. Morris, brigadier of Indiana volunteers in western Virginia. There he directed a regiment at Phillipi. He was given charge of a brigade of Thomas J. Wood’s division of Don Carlos Buell’s forces in the Army of the Cumberland in December 1861. His troops arrived at Shiloh the day after fighting ended, but did take part in the siege of Cornith. He was promoted to brigadier general, United States Volunteers, April 25, 1862. At Murfreesboro, Hascall took charge of his brigade, and then the division, when Wood was wounded. He then served under Ambrose E. Burnside in the Army of the Ohio rounding up deserters. Hascall took part in the defense of Knoxville and commanded the 2nd Division, XXIII Corps, in the Atlanta campaign. He was recommended for promotion by John M. Schofield on September 12, 1864, but resigned October 27, 1864, when no action on the promotion had been taken. Following his Civil War service, Milo Hascall was involved in banking at Goshen and Galena, Indiana. In 1890, he moved to Chicago and became involved in real estate. He died August 30, 1904, at his home in Oak Park, Illinois and was buried in Forest Home Cemetery in Forest Park, Illinois.