He was a deputy treasurer and recorder of Winneshiek County from 1854 to 1857, and the treasurer and recorder from 1858 to 1862, when he resigned to recruit a company for the Union Army in the Civil War. He was commissioned as captain and assigned to Company D the 6th Regiment Iowa Volunteer Cavalry. He served for three years in the Department of the Northwest, in response to uprisings in southern Minnesota and Dakota Territory by Native Americans against settlers. After the regiment was mustered out in 1865 he returned to Decorah and became cashier of the First National Bank.