John P. Decker
John P. Decker, the able and efficient superintendent of the Cincinnati infirmary at Hartwell, was born in Mt. Auburn, July 18, 1841. His parents were of Germanic birth, the father being born near Strasburgh and his mother near Mentz. When nineteen years of age the father came to America and in 1853 died in Cincinnati. John was raised a farmer near Hartwell, and experienced the usual hardships common to orphans (his parents were both dead when he was thirteen years of age), beginning life empty-handed and without friends. But he was sturdy, honest, reliable, and in the main successful. In the beginning of the war he, was in the South, and in order to escape joined the Confederate army, where he remained about twenty-four hours, and on making his way to St. Louis entered the army under General Fremont. He also served in the Red River expedition and afterwards was with Sherman in his raid to the sea. In 1865 he was mustered out and went to work as a farmer at the infirmary. In 1871 he held the position as captain of the guard under Ira Wood for five years at the workhouse. In 1876 he was appointed as lieutenant of the police force of the Twenty-fifth ward, and in 1877 as superintendent of the city infirmary. In 1878 he was legislated out by the O'Conor legislature, and until 1880 was United States store-keeper, appointed by Amor Smith, collector of the First district, at the end of which time he was reappointed to the position of superintendent of the infirmary. His amiable wife, formerly Miss Elizabeth of Cincinnati, matron of the infirmary, is a woman well fitted for the position she holds, having worked in and filled all the minor posts of the institution previous to her promotion. The infirmary now furnishes a home for five hundred and sixty persons.
From History of Hamilton county, Ohio, Henry & Kate Ford, L. A. Williams & Co., Publishers, 1881