Martin Welker

Martin Welker (April 25, 1819 – March 15, 1902) was a U.S. Representative from Ohio.

Biography
Born in Knox County, Ohio, Welker attended the common schools.

He studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1840, commencing practice at Millersburg, Ohio. He served as clerk of the Holmes County Court of Common Pleas from 1846 to 1851.

In 1848, Welker was the Whig nominee for the Congress, but lost in the largely Democratic district. In 1850, he again was offered the nomination, but declined it. In January, 1851, he re-entered private practice. He served as judge of the sixth district of the Ohio Courts of Appeal from 1852 to 1857. He moved to Wooster, Ohio, in 1857. He served as the fourth Lieutenant Governor of Ohio and President of the Ohio Senate in the Fifty-third General Assembly in 1858 and 1859 under Governor Salmon P. Chase. He declined to be a candidate for re-nomination in 1859.

With the outbreak of the American Civil War, on May 14, 1861, Welker was appointed judge-advocate of the second brigade of the Ohio Volunteer Militia at rank of major, and served with General Jacob Dolson Cox. Welker was appointed as an aide-de-camp, with rank of colonel to the Governor of Ohio on August 10, 1861. He then served as Judge Advocate General of the State of Ohio for the balance of 1861, and was the superintendent of drafting under Governor Tod, commencing August 15, 1862. He served as assistant adjutant general in 1862. As the war waned, Welker enlisted on February 16, 1865 in the Union Army as a private in Company I, 188th Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He was mustered out September 21, 1865.

He was an unsuccessful candidate for election in 1862 to the 38th Congress. Welker was elected as a Republican to the 39th, 40th, and 41st Congresses (March 4, 1865-March 3, 1871). He was not a candidate for renomination to the 42nd Congress in 1870.

President Ulysses S. Grant appointed Welker to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio in 1873. He served until 1889, when he retired.

He was a professor of political science and international law at Wooster College from 1873 to 1890. He then served as president of the Wooster National Bank and vice president of the Wayne County Fair Board, and member of the Grand Army of the Republic. He died on March 15, 1902, in Wooster and is interred at Wooster Cemetery.

Welker married Maria Armour of Millersburg March 4, 1841. After she died, he married Flora Uhl of Cleveland January 16, 1896.