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Military Service: Army

War(s) Served:  Spanish-American War

AMOS WALKER BARBER was born in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania, he served as a physician at a number of hospitals before being placed in charge of the Military Hospital in Fort Fetterman, Wyoming while serving in the Army. He later took charge of the hospital of the Wyoming Stock Association, after which he began general practice in Cheyenne in 1889. He was elected Secretary of State in 1890 for a five-year term that was interrupted by his service as Acting Governor after the resignation of Francis Warren. During his gubernatorial administration, Barber called out the state troops both to quell the Pine Ridge Indian outbreak and to help settle the Rustler War between cattlemen and sheepmen. After completing his term of office as Secretary of State, he served as an assistant surgeon with the Army during the Spanish-American War, and later returned to his medical practice in Cheyenne.

Sources:

The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, Vol. 11. New York: James T. White & Company.

Sobel, Robert, and John Raimo, eds. Biographical Directory of the Governors of the United States, 1789-1978, Vol. 4. Westport, CT: Meckler Books, 1978. 4 vols.

Wyoming State Archives