Researching John Whistler

Shortly afterward, John entered the United States Army, and was sent to the Western frontier. He was sent on the Harmar Campaign of 1790, and was severely wounded in St. Clair's Defeat of 1791. He was a Lieutenant in the Legion of the United States, and helped build the United States forts in Fort Wayne. He commanded in succession, Fort St. Mary's (1795 - ), Fort Wayne, and Fort Dearborn. He was promoted to Captain on 1 July 1797 and transferred to Fort Lernoult in Detroit. In Summer 1803, he was sent with his company of the 1st Infantry from Fort Detroit to Lake Michigan, where he completed Fort Dearborn before the close of the year, on the site of the future city of Chicago. He served as the first commandant of the new fort.

Captain Whistler was recalled to Detroit in 1810. During the War of 1812, he was breveted to Major, and served with his company until the end of the war in 1815. After the war, he was appointed military store-keeper at Newport, Kentucky. In 1816, he was sent to Fort Wayne where he built the third fort there; having helped design the first two. In 1817 he moved to St. Charles, Missouri, and was the military storekeeper at Jefferson Barracks, near St. Louis, Missouri, a position he held until his death at Fort Bellefontaine in 1829.

His ancestor Ralph Whistler was the chief tenant of the Salters' Company Plantation of Ulster grant centred of Magherafelt, County Londonderry, from 1627 to 1635.

Whistler was the son of Hugh Whistler of Milton Parva, Oxfordshire. He matriculated at Trinity College, Oxford on 14 October 1597 aged 17 and was awarded BA on 17 February 1601. He entered Gray's Inn on 4 May 1601 and was called to the bar in 1611. He succeeded his father after 1612, and held a number of positions in his Inn, serving as reader of Staple Inn in 1620, and of Gray's Inn in 1628. He became a bencher of Gray's Inn in 1629, dean of the chapel in 1635, and treasurer between 1639 and 1640. In 1623 he was made deputy recorder of Oxford to Thomas Wentworth. In that same year he was also made a freeman of the city, served as a fee'd counsel and was appointed a Justice of the Peace for Oxford.

In 1624, Whistler was elected Member of Parliament for Oxford. He was re-elected MP for Oxford in 1625, 1626 and 1628 and sat until 1629 when King Charles decided to rule without parliament for eleven years. He succeeded Wentworth as recorder of Oxford on his death in 1627. Whistler contested Oxford again in March 1640 but was defeated. He was successful in November 1640 in gaining re-election for the Long Parliament. He supported the King and attended the Oxford Parliament in 1644, which caused him to be disabled from sitting in the House of Commons, probably in January 1644. He never married, and died in 1647, being buried at Little Haseley on 2 April 1647.