Winchester Township (part 6 of 30)

was one of the first citizens of West Union. He was first in a double sense. He was on the ground when the town was organized, and he was first in enterprise and public spirit while he remained a citizen of the town. He was born in New Jersey in 1779. In t8oo, he removed with his parents to Pennsylvania. In 1804, he was married to Elizabeth Jones, in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, and immediately emigrated to Adams County. He attended the sale of lots in West Union, May 17, 1804, ^^^ bought lots 4, 5, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, and paid $244.00 for them. On lots 21 and 22, in 1805, he built a tannery and operated it until about 1826. He was one of the foremost business men of West Union. He was not only content to buy hides, tan them and sell leather, but he started up a saddle and harness factory. He made his leather into saddles, harness and shoes, and kept a number of men employed in manufacturing these articles.

Rev. James B. Finley preached the first sermon ever delivered in West Union by a Methodist minister, at the home of Peter Schultz. John W. Campbell was present and took notes in shorthand.

In 1807, he joined the Methodist Episcopal Church under the ministry of the Rev. John Collins, and from that time until the day of his death was a most zealous, earnest Christian. He organized the first Methodist Society in West Union, and for the want of a church, it met at his house. He took a very active part in promoting the interest of the village, the county and of the Methodist Church. He accumulated considerable property while in West Union, and reared a large family. His children were Charlotte, John, Lucy, Joseph, David, William, Abbott, Ellen, Robert, Asbury and John Wilson Campbell. Four of them were married in Adams County. Charlotte married William Compton; John married Rhoda Burdage and Lucy married Charles Mick. Joseph married Elizabeth Mick. Ellen died in childhood. Having so large a family, he detennined to move to Indiana, where he could purchase more land and better than hie could obtain in Adams County. He gained quite a good-sized fortune, but lost a good part of it by security debts. But with his wonderful energy and by industry and economy, he accumulated another fortune. In Indiana, as in Ohio, he made a church of his home, and was as zealous a worker in the church in Indiana as he had been in Ohio. He died October 24, 1848. After his death, his widow refused $25,000 for the farm in which she resided, and there was much other property beside.

Peter Schultz was a man of energy and industry. He was the soul of integrity and honor. He was generous to every good cause and was lovied by all who knew him. He never took any part in politics, but devoted his whole time to business and to good works in the church and commtmity.

Among the early settlers of Adams County, Ohio, Rev. David Steele, D. D., occupies a prominent place. He was bom near Londonderry, Ireland, on the second day of November, 1803, and was of Scotch-Irish ancestry. He was the youngest of six brothers, whose father, David Steele, was the fourth generation from Captain John Steele of Lismahago, near Glasgow, Scotland, and who fought on the side of the Covenanters in the battle of Drumclog, June 22^ 1679. Descended from such stock, as might be expected, he was trained up according to the strict order observant in Covenanting families. He received his academical education on the old wall of Londonderry, famous in histor>' because of its siege in 1688 and 1689. When about twenty years of age, he emigrated to the United States, arriving in Philadelphia, June 7, 1824. After spending a short time with an uncle in Pennsylvania, he taught school in the first academy erected in Edinsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the meantime pursuing his classical and other studies. Entering the Western University of Pennsylvania as a Senior, he graduated from that institution in 1826. After studying theology with the late Dr. John Black, of Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, he was licensed to preach the Gospel, April, 1830. The following year, on May 4th, he was married to Miss Eliza Johnston, of Chillicothe, Ohio, and one month afterward, he was ordained and installed Pastor of the Reformed Congregation of Brush Creek by the Ohio Presbytery at a salary of four hundred dollars a year. When he settled on Brush Creek, the place was a wilderness, and he and his young wife found everything primitive and uncongenial to educated and refined Hving.

Thousands of miles he traveled on horseback yearly, having often to ford rivers when he had to get on his knees on the saddle to keep from being saturated with water as there were few bridges in those days. For twenty-nine years, he labored in this congregation upon a salary that was hardly sufficient to procure the necessaries of life. Although a little below medium in stature, he was possessed of an excellent constitution and this enabled him* to bear up under difficulties which would have been too great for others. As a scholar, he was far above most of his compeers, particularly in the ancient classics, as he could read the most difficult Latin and Greek authors at sight. He was thoroughly versed in theology and his "Notes on the Apocalypse" show that he was a master in the exposition of the Bible truth. He was instrumental in training quite a number of young men for the Gospel Ministry. His home was the resort of all educated people, who came to the neighborhood, and hospitality was a marked feature of his house. It is but proper to state that his wife 40a co-operated heartily with him in all his plans for the elevation and culture of all who dwelt in the vicinity of Brush Creek. His influence for sound morality, godly living and consistent Christianity was felt far and wide and left its impress upon the whole community. Brush Creek owes much in culture and refinement to the early settlement of him and his wife. As an orator, Rev. Steele was concise, clear and frequently eloquent and impassioned, and his discrimination in the use of words showed his mastery of the English language. He received the degree of Doctor of Divinity from his Alma Mater a few years before his death.

After leaving Ohio, he spent several years in Illinois near Sparta. The remainder of his life was spent in Philadelphia, and he died in the fifty-fourth year of his ministry at the age of eighty-four. His remains lie in the cemetery of Petersburg, Huntingdon County, Pennsylvania.

was born in 1790 in Pennsylvania. He came to Adams County with his parents when a child and they located just east of where West Union was afterwards located. When a young man, he lived in Hillsboro. He began the business of merchandising in West Union on the corner now occupied by the present post office building, northeast corner of Main and Market Streets, in about 1820, and continued in that business until 1830, when he went to Union Landing, where he remained until the death of his wife in 1833. He returned to West Union in that year and went into the banking business and continued his residence in West Union until the thirty-first of July, 1847, when he died, and was buried in Lovejoy Cemetery. He was twice married. His first wife was Johanna Kelvey. She died September 26, 1823, aged twenty-three. She left a daughter who survived to the age of thirteen years. He was married to Sarah Sinton, sister of David Sinton, of Cincinnati, October 2, 1828, by the Rev. Dyer Burgess, who signed his name to the marriage record, "V. D. M."

While in the dry-goods business at West Union, he was in partnership at one time with Thomas W. Means, under the name of Sparks & Means. They were also the owners of Union Furnace. George CoUings, the father of Judge Henry Collings, and John Sparks once owned and conducted a queensware store at Maysville, Kentucky. Mr. Sparks afterward sold his interest to a Mr. Pemberton.

Mr. vSparks had been a banker in West Union but a short time when he became a merchant. He was a man c^f great personal popularity in the county, and although often solicited, he would never consent to run for public office at a time when almost everybody did run for crffice. He loaned money and helped a great many men. John Fisher remarked of him that he was the best friend he ever had. John I^oughry, of Rockville, said the same thing. Most of his life was spent in merchandising pursuits in Adams County. There were three children of this second marriage - one died in infancy, another is Mrs. Mary J. McCauslen, widow of Hon. Thomas McCauslen, of Steuben ville, who has a separate sketch herein, and the third is George B. Sparks, a farmer, of Clinton, Indiana.

The esteem in which he was held by the citizens of Adams County was expressed at the time of his funeral. He is said to have had the largest funeral ever held in the county. Everybody turned out to show respect to his memory.

was bom January 6, 1797, in Ohio County, West Virginia, but when he was six years old the family removed to Belmont County, Ohio. He was educated in the Grammar School of Steele & McMillan in Xenia, Ohio, then in the Classical School at New Athens, which afterward became Franklin College. He also studied in the academy at New Washington, which grew into Madison College. He studied theology in the Western Theological Seminary two years under Dr. Herr and one year with Rev. Mingo Dick, Professor pro tern. He was licensed to preach May 26. 1830, by the Second Ohio Presbytery (United Presb)rterian Church), and was ordained in December, 1832. At the time of his ordination ( by the first Ohio Presbytery) he was installed pastor of the Cherry Fork and West Fork Churches in Adams County, Ohio. In 1838, he resigned the West Fork Branch of his charge and gave all his time to Cherry Fork. He died November 24. 1851.

Rev. Marion Morrison, of Mission Creek, Nebraska, says of him: "It was my privilege to have been a member of his congregation for several years, in my youth. While he was a very instructive preacher, he excelled in his work as a pastor among his people. As a companion, he could not be excelled. He was always cheerful and lively, but was never in the company of old or young for any length of time without imparting some word of instruction that would help in the journey heavenward. He was always ready for a joke, but carefully avoided offending in such pleasantries. He looked upon the pastoral relation with the same sacredness as the marriage relation." Cherry Fork was his first and his only pastoral charge. There he married Martha, the eldest daughter and child of John Patton. There his children were born and there he took his departure to the church triumphant. It is said of him that it never occurred to him to change his pastoral relations from Cherry Fork.

Aaron Faris Steen was a grandson of Robert Steen, who was born near Coleraine, Ireland, about 1735, removed to the British Colony of Pennsylvania, in America, about 1758; was married to Elizabeth Boyd about 1760, secured a farm and established his home near Chestnut Level, in Lancaster County, Pa., not far from the Susquehanna River, where he brought up in comfortable circumstances a family of five children, three sons and two daughters, whose names were Samuel, Robert, Mary, Elizabeth, and Alexander Steen. The grandfather, Robert Steen, was a patriotic citizen opposed to British oppression or Toryism, and espoused the cause of American Independence, at the time of the Revolutionary War. He was a thorough Scotch-Irish Presbyterian, an earnest Christian, a successful farmer, especially fond of music and good society, and lived to an old age.

Alexander Steen, the father of Aaron F. Steen, was the youngest child of Robert and Elizabeth Boyd Steen, and was born near Chestnut Level. Pa., February 14, 1773, and brought up on his father's farm. He early removed to Berkley County, Va., and was married at Martinsburg, Va., February 2, 1803, to Agnes Nancy Faris, she having been born at that place March 2, 1777, and died at the home of her son, Aaron F. Steen, in Adams County, Ohio, November 17, 1852, when she was seventy-six years of age. In 1805, Alexander Steen removed with his family and located near Flemingsburg, Ky., where he resided nearly fifteen years, and where all his children except the eldest were bom. In 1820, he removed to Adams County, Ohio, and located upon a farm two miles northeast of Winchester, now on the turnpike road to Buck Run. He afterwards purchased a large farm one mile north of the Mt. Leigh Presbyterian Church where he spent the remainder of his life. He was a man of strong character, a zealous Presbyterian, and an enterprising farmer, a successful music teacher, and maintained a wide influence. He died at his home near Mt. Leigh, April 30, 1837, in the fifty-sixth year of his age. He was the father of nine children, all of whom except the eldest were married and brought up families in Adams County, Ohio.

Aaron Paris Steen, the subject of this sketch, was the third child and eldest son of Alexander and Agnes Nancy Paris Steen. He was bom on his father's farm two miles north of Flemingsburg, Ky., August 23, 1807. and died at his home near Xenia, Ohio, Tuesday morning, February 15. 1 88 1, in the seventy- fourth year of his age. He spent a happy childhood in the "Old Kentucky home,*' and was brought to Adams County, Ohio, by his parents when a mere lad of thirteen years. Here he grew up to manhood upon his father's farm, attending school in winter. When a young man, he taught school. He devoted most of his time and attention to music and became an efficient and very popular teacher, having classes in various parts of the county. For many years he was the leader of music in the Mt. Leigh Presbyterian Church. His social nature and genial disposition made him a general favorite in the society of both old and young.

Aaron F. Steen was married at the residence of Michael Freeman on Scioto Bmsh Creek, ten miles east of West Union, March 25, 1830, to Miss ^lary Freeman, the youngest daughter of Michael and Elizabeth Freeman, she having been bom in the same house in which she w^as married, October 7, 1810, and died at the home of her son in Knoxville, Tenn., July 27, 1895, ^^ the eighty-fifth year of her age. Soon after his marriage, Aaron F. and Mary Steen located on a farm on Brush Creek two miles east of Winchester, and united with the Mt. Leigh Phesbyterian Church of which they were for many years active and useful members. In the Fall of 1834, Michael Freeman, now growing old, requested Mr. and Mrs. Steen to come and take charge of his farm and property on Scioto Brush Creek, which they accordingly did, residing there about fourteen years. But on the thirty-first of August, 1848, they removed again with their family to a farm near Mt. Leigh, three miles east of Winchester, near where he had been brought up. Here the whole family were regular attendants of the Mt. Leigh Church. Aaron F. Steen was ordained an elder, December i, 1849, which office lie continued to hold so long as he remained in that locality, and frequently represented that church in the meetings of the Presbytery of Chillicothe. In the autumn of 1865, he sold his farm near Mt. Leigh and purchased a tract of land adjoining Xenia, Ohio, to which he removed and spent the remaining sixteen years of his life. Here, himself and wife united with the First Presbyterian Church of which Rev. Wm. T. Findley, D. D., was at that time pastor. He cultivated his little farm, and with his eldest son kept a provision store in Xenia. In 1874, a delightful family reunion was held at his home near Xenia, at which all his living descendants were present.

Pioneer Character Sketches 629

Old associates were revived and many incidents connected with every life recalled. Before they separated religious services were held in which all joined heartily, every member and descendant of the family over ten years of age being consistent members of the Presbyterian Church. The fiftieth anniversary, or golden wedding of Mr. and Mrs. Steen, also duly celebrated at their home March 25, 1880, was largely attended, and all present, concurred in the opinion that it was one of the most delightful occasions of the kind ever witnessed. Only a few months later Mr. Steen died.

Aaron F. Steen was a man of sterling character and energy, highly respected and beloved by those who knew him. He was the father of nine children as follows : Wilson Freeman, Eli Watson, Samuel Martin, John Freeman, Moses Duncan Alexander, Josiah James, Sarah Catharine, Isaac Brit and William Wirt Steen, only three of whom are now living, Prof. E. Watson Steen, Knoxville, Tenn^, Rev. Moses D. A. Steen, D. D., Woodridge, Colo., and Mrs. Kate Steen Coil, Marietta, Ohio.

was born on a farm two miles east of Winchester, May 16, 181 1. He was the seventh child of Abraham and Margaret (Barker) Thomas. His great-grandfather, Reese Thomas, was bom in Wales, June 5, 1690. This ancestor was the father of a large family which he brought to America and settled in Virginia during the first part of the eighteenth century. Subsequently, some of the stock moved to Maryland and some to Kentucky, where numerous individuals of the same lineage now reside.

The subject of this sketch obtained such education as he could at the schools of Winchester. They were subscription schools, and were not in session more than three or four months in a year. He had to walk over two miles through woods to attend school, frequently running the gauntlet of wolves.

In 1832, he went to the State of Arkansas with the intention of making that his future home. He spent but one year there. During that time he became so thoroughly disgusted with southern institutions as to create within him an intense antagonism to the system of human slavery and the practice of duelling, which remained dominant principles with him through life. In 1833, he bought a farm near where he was bom, and he and his brother, Silas, erected a cabin in the woods - a bachelor's hall - and commenced clearing away the timber preparatory to cultivation. Here he worked and lived until December 29, 1836, when he married Mis's Esther A., daughter of John and Esther Archer Moore, pioneer settlers of Wheat Ridge, in Oliver Township. This marriage was solemnized by Rev. Dyer Burgess. There were eight children : Francis Marion, married to Annette Holmes, and practicing medicine at Samantha, O. ; Margaret, residing at Winchester; Sarah Jane, died in 1861 ; Wilson Chester, died in i860; Silas Newton, died in the U. S. Military service in 1864; Albert Luther, resides with his two sisters at the old homestead; John Wesley married to Roberta Butler, and is a physician at Lyle, Kansas, and Lily Belle, residing at Winchester, Ohio.

Mr. Thomas was a man of decided convictions. He voted for Jack- ^ son in 1832, but after that he voted uniformly the Whig ticket until the* election of 1852, when he supported John P. Hale. He united with the

Republican party at its organization, supporting Chase for Governor in 1855 and Fremont for President in 1856, and continued a member of that party until his death. For some fifteen years preceding the Civil War, he was a conductor on the Underground Railroad, and scores of fugitive slaves have shared his hospitality and received his assistance on their way to freedom. While he was under surveillance frcMn the slave hunters, not a single fugitive whom he took in charge was ever reclaimed and sent back to slavery. During the Civil War he was a strong Union man. He offered two sons to the service of his country and no one rejoiced more than he when peace, liberty and union were established. He was honest in all his dealings. He was a good conversationalist and could tell a story in good form. He always had a host of warm friends. He never united with any church but believed in the doctrines of the Baptist Church. He was a strong temperance man, practicing total abstinence, and in his early years as a farmer it was sometimes hard for him to get help in the harvest fields, because he would not treat to some kind of liquor, as was customary during the time referred to. He died March 17, 1892, in his eighty-first year. He is interred with his wife in the cemetery at Mt. Leigh.

In considering the pioneers of Adams County, Ohio, there is none whose memory deserves more to be praised. It has been sixty-four years past since his life here terminated, and his death amounted to almost a tragedy; yet, in his time, he was of the most highly esteemed, and most deserving of it. Like most of the pioneers of Adams County, he had an ancestry which could be traced back over two hundred years. The family was Dutch.

Stephen Coerte Van Voris emigrated from Holland in April, 1660. and settled at Flat Lands, Long Island, where, on the twenty-ninth of November, 1660, he purchased corn land, plain land and salt meadow, with house and lot, for three thousand guilders. He was a prominent and useful man, a member of the Dutch Church, and a magistrate. He died at Flat Lands, February 16, 1684. Of his numerous descendants, Rolyff Van Vorhees, born in 1742, and married to Elizabeth Nevins, was the first to drop the Van and write the name Voris. Roloff's son, Ralph, bom 'August 5, 1775, married in Pennsylvania, near Conewago, Margaret Mc- Creary, of Scotch parentage. This Ralph Voris removed to Paris, Kentucky, but not liking it there, moved to Red Oak, in Brown County, Ohio, where he was a ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church from 1807 until his death in 1840.

This Ralph Voris was the father of Dr. William McCreary Voris, the subject of our sketch, who was bom in Kentucky, August 5, 1801. When he grew up he studied medicine and gfraduated as a physician at the Medical College, at Lexington, Kentucky.

He located at West Union, Ohio, to practice his profession, about 1824, and joined the Presbyterian Church there. On April 24, 1827, he married the only daughter of Col. John Means, Elizabeth Williamson Means, and they went to housekeeping in West Union, Ohio, on the southeast comer of Main and Market Streets, in what is known as the James Hood property, and there they resided until January, 1832, when they re-

James Baldwin Thomas Pioneer Character Sketches 631

In May, 1835, Alex. Mitchell, aged thirty, the father of Mrs. Samuel Burwell, was living on Ohio Brush Creek between the Forge and the mouth of the creek. He was operating a saw mill and a grist mill. He and Dr. Voris, then aged thirty-four, arranged it between them to load a flat-boat, half with iron and hollow ware, and half with. lumber, and float it down to Cincinnati, and sell the cargo. They did so and floated the boat from the Forge to Mitchell's mill, where the lumber was put in, and thence they floated it to the Ohio River. Dr. Voris and Alex. Mitchell went in the boat as far as Maysville, Kentucky, where they landed for repairs to the boat. There Alexander Mitchell was taken down with the dread Asiatic cholera, and died and was buried.

Dr. Voris left the boat and went on to Cincinnati by a steamboat, and had scarcely arrived there, when he, too, was stricken with the Asiatic cholera, and died within a few hours.

In those days, such was the fear of the dread scourge, that when a person died of it, there was none of the usual funeral ceremonies, but the body was buried within a few hours after death, and at the most convenient spot to where death had overtaken the victim. Such was the case with Alexander Mitchell, but not with Dr. Voris. When the news of the latter's death was brought to his wife, she was so overwhelmed with grief, that she sat as one dumb for six weeks.

The attachment between her and her husband was of the most devoted character. Aside from the estimate of Dr. Voris by his family and friends, he was most highly esteemed by the community in which he resided. Like St. Luke, he was, in his social circle, the "Beloved physician," and his death produced a shock which is remembered to this day by those who were living at that time.

The pleasant home at the Forge was broken up, and, with her two little girls, his wife returned to the home of her father. Col. John Means, where A. V. Hutson now lives, on the Maysville Turnpike, just west of Bentonville, where she resided during her widowhood. Mrs. Voris was a woman of lovely Christian character, and was one of the saints upon earth. She belonged to families, both on her father's and mother's side, which could boast of a long line of honorable ancestry, distinguished for their adherence to high principles. Her father left South Carolina with twenty-four slaves in order to give them their freedom in Ohio, and her uncle, the Rev. William Williamson, her mother's brother, brought twentysev^en slaves from South Carolina to Ohio, in 1803, in order to give them their freedom. She was of the material of which the martyrs are made, and had she been condemned to have gone to the stake for conscience' sake, she would have gone with a smile on her face, and perfect peace in her heart.

In 1842, she married the Rev. Dyer Burgess, and he and she removed to Washington County, and for twenty years they lived together at Warren, six miles from Marietta. Rev. Burgess died September 2, 1872, at the age of eighty-eight. After his death she spent the remaining seventeen years of her life in Marietta, Ohio, with her daughter, Mrs. Wm. P. Cutler.

She fell asleep February 28, 1889, in the ninetieth year of her age, having survived the husband of her youth fifty-four years. In a memorial of her, it was said she united with the Presbyterian Church in youth, and as the years passed, her character and life developed into the rarest beauty and symmetry. She gave liberally to all good subjects, from the promptings of a heart overflowing with sympathy and love. She was always active in doing good. She was charitable in her judgments, and her amiability and cheerfulness and childish faith scattered sunbeams wherever she was. Her life was a blessing to all who knew her. Doctor Voris left three children. The eldest was Anne Eliza, bom February 26, 1828, married to the Rev. James S. Poage and deceased in 1848, leaving a daughter of tender years, who was reared by her grandmother, Mrs. Burgess. The second daughter, Elizabeth Williamson, was bom July 25, 1832. She married the Hon. Wm. P. Cutler, of Marietta, one of the most prominent citizens of the State. He was a member of three Legislatures in this State and Speaker of the House in one. He was a member of the Thirty- seventh Congress and was mainly instrumental in the construction of the Marietta and Cincinnati Railroad. To his daughter. Miss, Sarah J. Cutler, we are mainly indebted for the facts of this sketch.

The third daughter of Dr. Voris, Margaret Jane Williamson, was posthumous, born August i, 1835. She married Mr. Henry Humiston. and lives in Chicago. She has two sons. One of the Sparks boys of West Union was with Dr. Voris when he died. His body was brought to Manchester, Ohio and there interred.

This young man came to West Union, June 17, 1823, and began the publication of the Village^ Register, He continued to publish it until hjs sudden and unexpected death on March 6, 1828, at the age of twenty-eight. He was sick but nine days of a congestive bilious fever. He is buried in the Kirker Cemetery. He had married Mary Kirker (the daughter of Governor Kirker) in 1825, and had two children. One of these, Thomas Voorhees, was a steamboat captain on the upper Mississippi River for almost twenty years. His widow married Hayden Thompson, of Ripley, and was living in 1880.

Mr. Vorhees conducted his ^ paper according to his best lights but it had no local news. In that day, local news was not thought worthy of publication. There were plenty of legal ads, sheriff's sales, auditor's notices, tax collector*s notices, many estray notices - nearly all horses, a number of runaway apprentices, occasionally the notice of a reward for a runaway slave with fifty to a hundred dollars reward. The merchants used the paper to advertise their goods and dun their customers. These files, which have come to us, were preserved by the late John P. Hood, who worked in the office, when a boy. The proceedings of Congfress and of the State Legislature were given very fully; also the Governor's and President's messages. Foreign news in plenty was given, but local news was absolutely tabooed. The very facts we would like to know now are suppressed. The people then knew all the local news. It passed from mouth to mouth, and it was thought idle folly to repeat it in a newspaper. The paper aimed to be neutral in politics, but the editor was a Democrat- Republican. It was largely filled with literary extracts from magazines and books which we would not at all look at now, but to tell us what people of the time thought, their political and religious views, what interested them most, or at all, there is not a word. The local news of that day is lost except from tradition.

It is difficult to write of a subject after the mists of seventy-one years have obscured him. There is some light on the life and character of Ralph M. Vorhees to be gathered from the old and yellow files of the Village Register. What it is, is clear and distinct, and the picture it reveals is as clear as yesterday. The parts that are left out are, however, forever lost. His widow is long dead. His son is either dead or cannot be traced, and we must rest content with those few fragments which have been handed down to us.

Ralph Voorhees was a man much loved by those who knew him. He was a young man who had but few enemies and they found much in him to admire. He was true and loyal to his friends and treated those who did not like his course with great consideration. He undertook to conduct an independent local paper, an impossibility, and the only enemies he ever made was in this attempt. He offended some because he favored his father-in-law, Governor Kirker, for office, but had he not favored the Governor, he would not have been human. Had he lived, he would, no doubt, have succeeded with his paper and made a respectable citizen, but alas, that fate which none can control, took him from his young wife and infants, from the society and companionship of his friends and cut shon a career of great promise.

was a grandson of John Wasson, a native of Ireland, and with his wife emigrated to Rockbridge County, Virginia, rearing a large family there. Among his children was a son, Thomas, who married Rebecca Cowen and moved to Ohio in 1804. He located within four miles of Winchester in what was then Wayne Township. He lived there a year or more and then moved onto the farm near Cherry Fork occupied by our subject during his lifetime. Thomas Wasson and wife connected with the U. P. Church at Cherry Fork soon after its organization in 1805 and remained members thereof during their lives.

Mr. Thomas Wasson contracted a second marriage with Elkiah Spencer, by whom he had one son, William F., born August 29, 1845, and who died in the military service of the United States in the War of 1861.

The subject of our sketch was bom May 20, 1812, and was reared on his father's farm in Wayne Township. He married Martha Patton Campbell February 9, 1832. Of this marriage there were eight children, five of whom, three sons and two daughters, grew to maturity and married. His eldest son, Thomas Stewart Wasson, is a retired farmer living at Seaman, Ohio. His second son, James P., now deceased, has a sketch in this book. His third son, Samuel Y., also has a sketch in this book. His daughter, Matilda J., widow of B. F. Pittinger, now resides at Min- neapolis, Kansas. His youngest daughter, Martha, married to Steele Glasgow, resides at North Liberty. Thomas Campbell Wasson was a man of the strictest integrity and of remarkable energy and industry. He was of strong prejudices every way. If he loved one, there was nothing too much he could do for him. If he hated one, he did it with all the powers of his soul. Once his friend, he was attracted to you by hooks of steel ; once your enemy, he was likely to remain so. He believed in the religion taught in the doctrines and practice of the United Presbyterian Church, and all the powers of Hell could not have moved him from his faith. When the right and wrongfulness of human slavery began to be discussed, he became convinced that that institution was a monstrous sin against both God and man, and from that hour until the war destroyed it, he was its most inveterate enemy. He would tolerate no political party which would excuse or apolc^ize for it, and by word and deed, he did all he could to destroy it. No poor hunted fugitive ever applied to him in vain, and his home was a well-known station on the Underground Railroad.

He was an excellent farmer and by great industry and economy, with the best of management, he acquired a competence and spent his latter years in ease and comfort. He did eeverything in life most ernestly. He was not one of the meek and lowly Christians but one of the fighting kind who believed in taking the Kingdom of Heaven by storm. He believed in struggling and fighting for the right, both in Church and State. His life is best illustrated in the character of his three sons, two of whom are men of influence and importance in their respective communities, and a third son, now deceased, held a like position in the State of Kansas where he died recently. These three sons, like their father, have been able to manage their own affairs successfully and to accumulate competencies.

Campbell Wasson, the name by which he was best known, never sought or held public office, but he always believed in taking an active part in the counsels of his own party and did so. He was a Whig first and a Republican afterwards, but all the time he was anti-slavery and believed in the abolition of that institution. He believed in making his views on all subjects felt, and as a consequence he was a man of positive influence both in Church and State. He was never the one to drift with the current, or follow the lead of others, but sought to make all men within his influence feel and think as he did. His influence was always on the side of good order, religion, right and justice. That part of the world which he knew and which kneiw him was better that he had lived.

The wife of this subject died May 13, 1871, and in 1872, he contracted a second marriage with Mrs. Eliza J. McNeil, who survived him. He died the eighth day of January, 1888.

Sometimes a man's career can be judged by his ancestors and sometimes by his posterity, and sometimes we can look to both, to give a fair estimate of him after his life work has been done. The subject of this sketch will bear favorable investigation in both ways.

The Rev. William Williamson was born September 23, 1762, near Greenville, N. C. He was the eldest of six children. His father, Thomas, was born in 1736 and his mother, Anne Newton, related to the family of

Pioneer Character Sketches 635

Sir Isaac Newton and Rev. John Newton, was bom in March, 1738. Her father emigfrated from England with his wife and family. He and they were thirteen weeks crossing the ocean, contending with storms and sickness, and buried two children at sea. Anne and Elizabeth survived and married brothers. Thomas and Anne settled at Greenville, N. C, where all of their children were bom.

During the Revolutionary War, William entered the Revolutionary army and served under General Gates in the hard campaign in the summer of 1780. His command saw very severe service and he has often related of forced marches in the great heat, when the soldiers were not allowed even to stop and drink at the roadside, and that often the soldiers were half starved.

Young Williamson was small for his age and not strong, and he and two hundred of his command were captured at the battle of Camden, S. C., August 10, 1780. During young Williamson's service, his mother would would often stay up all night, and, assisted by her servants, cook food for the soldiers, which his father would carry to them in his wagon the day following. When the war was over, Thomas Williamson, with his family, moved to uie Spartansburg District, S. C. He purchased a cotton plantation there, un which the county seat was afterwards located. After this event, he sought a place a few miles distant from the courthouse, on which he lived until his death in 1813.

Young William Williamson, after the Revolutionary War, was sent to Hampden Sidney College in Virginia, where he received a liberal education and was graduated. He studied theology and was installed as pastor of the Fair Forest Presbyterian Church in April, 1793.

The Rev. William Williamson believed in the married state. His first wife was a Miss Catherine Buford, of Abbeville, S. C. By her, he had four daughters, Anne Newton, who married Dr. William B. Willson in 1 818; Mary married James Ellison; Elizabeth married Robinson Baird, and Esther married William Kirker.

His second wife was Jane Simth, of North Carolina, by whom he had two children, the Rev. Thomas Smith Williamson, missionary to the Dakotahs, and Jane Smith Williamson, who never married, but has always been known as Aunt Jane. He also had a third wife in his old age, Hannah Johnson, a widow.

The Rev. William Williamson had a brother, Thomas, sixteen years younger than himself. They were devotedly attached to each other and both espoused strong anti-slavery notions. Thomas became an accomplished physician.

William Williamson and his second wife regarded slavery as a gfreat evil. While they owned slaves, they believed it wrong to sell them. Mrs. Williamson felt the condition of the slaves so strongly that she undertook to teach them to read. This, of course, came to the ears of her slaveholding neighbors and she was remonstrated with time and again to no purpose. Finally the patrol visited her and told her if she did not stop, she would be prosecuted under the stringent laws of South Carolina, forbidding slaves to be taught to read. Mrs. Williamson had high notions of right and wrong and was a Southern woman of great spirit. Her husband warmly sympathized with her and both thought they might do as they chose with their own property. The authorities, however, were as firm as Mrs. Williamson, and she and her husband resolved to take their slaves to a state where they could teach them to read without let or hinderance. They took their slaves and emigrated to Ohio in 1805. His father dying in 1813, by his will gave his slaves to his son William, but with directions to set them free. To accomplish this, his mother left South Carolina soon after the death of his father and brought her slaves to Ohio and set them free. She continued to live with her sons in Adams County till her death in 1820.

Our subject's mother was a superior woman, a sincere Christian and a philanthropist. She gave a liberal education to two of her slaves - Rev. Benjamin Templeton, who became a Presbyterian minister in Philadelphia, and John N. Templeton, who graduated at the Ohio University and became a successful teacher in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania.

William Williamson took up lands not far from Manchester and made a home there during his life. His lands were near those of his brotherin-law, Col. John Means, who married his sister Anne, bom August 17, 1760. This sister had been married to Col. Means in South Carolina, April 10, 1778. Col. Means, however, did not move to Ohio till 1819.

The home of Rev. William Williamson in Adams County was called "The Beeches." It is now the property of John Meek Leedom. Our subject accepted a church at Cabin Creek, Kentucky, on the Ohio River, and about four miles from his home, on the sixteenth of May, 1805, ^tnd continued to minister to that church until 1820. His record there was that the church grew and prospered and he was esteemed one of the most devoted, pious and popular ministers of his day. He was also minister to the Presbyterian Church in West Union, Ohio, from May, 1805, till 1819, when he was succeeded by the Rev. Dyer Burgess. His religion must have seen sincere and deep, for in 1809, when the stone church was to be built at West Union, he subscribed one-half of his salary towards it. He was received into the Chillicothe Presbytery from the Second Presbytery of South Carolina, on August 28, 1805, along with the Rev. Robert G. Wilson and the Rev. Gilliland. They became the fathers of Presbyterian ism in southern Ohio, and to him and his associates is due the strength and power of the Presbyterian Church in southern Ohio to-day. They laid the foundations upon which others built. Rev. Williamson was many times Moderator and often Clerk of the Chillicothe Presbytery. He was influential, active and useful in the church and as a citizen. When the Rev. Dyer Burgess took charge of the West Union Church in 1829, Rev. Williamson thereafter devoted his labors to the Manchester Church, so long as he was able to perform ministeral duties.

If, before becoming acquainted with his history, we had learned that of his patriotic father and heroic mother, and had learned that of his son. Rev. Thomas S. Williamson, and his daughter, Jane Williamson, we could outline his character and point out his place and power, just as the astronomer can find a new star and state its magnitude and give its orbit from those which surround it. We reason forward from Thomas Williamson and Anne Newton, his wife, that persons of such noble character must produce a like son. From the daughters and son reared by the Rev. William Williamson, we see the characters he has molded and sent forth to bless the world. No hero ever did nobler or better work than the Rev. Thomas Smith Williamson, the missionary to the Dakotas. No woman showed a greater spirit of devotion to the church and to humanity, than his sister, Jane Williamson, coadjutor in the work of evangelizing the Red Men. If they were Thomas Williamson^s children, what must have been the father, to whom they owed the missionary spirit? His four daughters, by his first wife, were godly, pious mothers, who reared large families of sons and daughters and taught them the love of God and the devotion to right and justice, which characterized their father and mother before them.

The descendants of Rev. William Williamson were wonderfully numerous. They, in their several generations obeyed the eleventh commandment to multiply and replenish the earth, and they to-day, wherever found, are the same God-fearing, God-loving people - pious and devoted to the right as they undelrstand the right, as their progenitor was before them.

The memory of these pioneers in the Church of God should be carefully preserved and treasured. This generation should know every detail of their labors and sacrifices.

Where a man could break up a pleasant home, bid adieu to all he had ever known and travel eight hundred miles through a wilderness that he might live in a free State and might give the blacks he owned, the blessings of freedom - such a man was a hero and he deserves to be remembered by posterity.

This generation should be proud of such a man and revere his memory, and regfret that it has no such opportunity to demonstrate its devotion to right and principle.

This lady, eminent for her piety, her good works and her missionary labors among the Dakota Indians, was born at Fair Forest, South Carolina, March 8, 1803. Her father, the Rev. Williamson, a Presbyterian minister and a Revolutionar}^ patriot, and her mother, Jane Smith Williamson, brought her to Ohio, an infant, in 1804. Her father and mother believed slaves had souls, and brought their twenty-seven slaves to Ohio, and set them free. Her mother had been fined in South Carolina for teaching her own slaves to read the Bible, and she and her husband removed to Ohio to free their slaves, and to be able to teach them to read and write. She was brought up in an atmosphere of sincere and deep piety and of devotion to Christian teachings. For early educational advantages in a new country were necessarily limited, but she made the most of them. She studied gframmar and syntax practically, and mastered all the branches open to her study while she was a girl.

She was accurate in the use of language, both spoken and written. She wrote a hand like copper-plate, mnd was thorough in everything she studied. She read all the good and useful books which were accessible to her. She had an excellent memory and a lively imagination, and with a wide reading, she early acquired the art of writing most interesting letters.

From her parents and grandparents, she inherited that marked sympathy for the colored race which was an eminent characteristic of her entire life. At all times and on all occasions, she stood up for the colored people. In her young and mature womanhood, when there were no public schools in her county - or none worth the name - she taught subscription schools both in West Union and Manchester. In West Union, the venerable David Dunbar, now of Manchester, was one of her pupils, and in Manchester, Mrs. David Dunbar and Mrs. D. B. Hempstead, of Hanging Rock, were" among her pupils. She never excluded a pupil because his or her parents or friends were unable to pay tuition. She sought out the poor and invited them to attend her school. She accepted colored pupils as well as whites.

Her teaching the colored people aroused bitter feeling in the community, but she was such an excellent teacher that it did not decrease the number of her white pupils, and her control of her pupils was so perfett that the bringing of the colored pupils into the school did not affect the government of her school. The progress made by her pupils was rapid, and her teaching so thorough that the presence of the colored pupils did not drive the white ones away. There were many threats of violence to her school, but she was not alarmed. On more than one occasion, friends of hers, dreading the attempt to forcibly break up her school, took their rifles and went to her schoolhouse to defend her. Some of these men were rough characters, and hard drinkers, and some of them were pro-slavery, but they were determined her school should not be disturbed. They regarded her as a fanatic in her views, but, as they regarded her as an efficient teacher, they did not propose that hei work should be interfered with.

She was always a volunteer in houses where there was sickness. At the age of twenty-six, she went to General Darlinton's and nursed the mother of Mrs. Rev. E. P. Pratt through a spell of sickness. Mrs. Urmston was then a young married woman, just come to Ohio from Connecticut.

On June 8, 1835, she was teaching near "The Beeches," in Adams County. The next day she learned of the death of Dr. William M. Verbis, of cholera, at Cincinnati, and it became her painful duty to inform her cousin (his wife) of the fact. At first, she told her that Dr. Vorhis had been very sick in Cincinniati. As cholera was prevalent there, the wife at once divined the truth, and swooned away. She went from one swoon into another, and Miss Williamson, in order to terminate her swoons, went out and brought in her two little girls, one seven and the other three years of age, and, leading one by each hand, asked her if there were not two good reasons for her to live and to work for.

Her love for children was a distinguishing trait of her character. She won their affections entirely, and thus ruled them without any apparent effort.

The missionary spirit was a part of her life, bom with her, and a heritage from several generations. When her brother, Thwnas S. Williamson, went as a missionary to the Dakota Indians in 1835, she wanted to go with him, but felt that she must remain at home and care for her aged father, who survived until 1839, and died at the age of seventy-seven ; but she did not get to go to her brother until 1843, when she had reached the age of forty. Her life, prior to this, had been a preparation for missionary work. For years she had been an active worker in Sunday Schools, prayer meetings and missionary societies. In her day school, she had made public religious worship a prominent feature.

When she reached Minnesota, she went to work directly and worked with great energy, and with an untiring industry greatly beyond her strength. She had an unusual familiarity witli the Bible. She taught several hundred Indians to read the Word of God, and, the greater part of them, to write well enough to write letters. She ministered to all the sick within her reach, and devoted a great deal of time to instructing Indian women in domestic duties. She led the women in prayer meetings, and spent much time conversing with the women as to their souls. The privations of the missionaries, at that time, were great. White bread was then as much of a luxury as cake would now be considered.

Lac-que-Parle, her first missionary home, was two hundred miles west of St. Paul. It was more than a year from the time she kift Adams County before a single: letter could reach her. She was out in the Indian village when the first mail reached there. She heard of its arrival, and was so eager for new.s from her old home that she ran to her brother's house as swiftly as a young girl. She saw no signs of the mail, and asked where it was. They told her it was in the stove-oven. The mail carrier had brought it through the ice, and it had to be thawed out The mail contained over fifty letters for her, and the postage on them was over five dollars. This in 1844.

She moved to Kaposia, now South St. Paul, in 1846, and to Pajutazee, thirty-two miles below Lac-que-Parle, in 1852. The Dakotas called her "Dowan Dootanin," which means "Red Song Woman."

In the Fall of 1894, when nearly two thousand converted Dakota Indians were gathered together, to plan for religious work among their people, she was the only survivor of the first missionaries.

In the Fall of 1881, she saw a poor Indian woman suffering with the cold. She took off her own warm skirt and gave it to the woman, and from this she took a cold and a spell of sickness followed, resulting in her total blindness.

After the Indian outbreak of 1862, the way never opened for her to resume her residence among the Dakotas, but she was given health and strength for nineteen years* more labor for the Master. Her home continued to be with her brother, at or near St. Peter, until her death in 1879, and in his old home two years longer. In that time she did much for the Indians who lived with her brother, toward their education. She kept up an extensive and helpful correspondence with native Christian workers.

As a Sunday School teacher, she labored with untiring patiefnce for the conversion of her pupils, and to train them as Christian workers. She was active in female prayer meetings and missionary societies. She lost most of her patrimony in lending to those most needing money, instead of to those most certain to pay. Her friends, kowever, were liberal in their donations to her work, and she was able to relieve most of those under her observation in serious want.

Here is the story of a modest, unassuming heroine. Without husband or children, alone in the world, she did not repine but made herself useful, wherever she was, in teaching secular learning and religious truth, and in ministering to the sick and afflicted, the downtrodden and oppressed. She never sought to do any g^eat or wonderful thing, but only to do good as the opportunity offered. It ha.s been thirty-two years since she left Ohio, and most of her friends there are dead, but those living, who remember her, recall her with g^eat love. So long as she can reflect on the record of her life, she cannot recall any opportunity slighted, any duty left undone.

He was the only son of Rev. William Williamson and Mary Webb Smith, his second wife ; was bom in Union District, South Carolina, March 6, 1800, and removed with his parents to Mason County, Kentucky, in the Fall of 1802, and to "The Beeches," two miles from Manchester, Adams County, Ohio, probably in the Spring of 1805.

He prepared for colkge at home, went on horseback to Jefferson College, Cannonsburg, Pennsylvania, where he received the degree of A. B. in 1819. He read medicine with his brother-in-law. Dr. William B. Willson, of West Union, Ohio, and was for two years principal of an academy at Ripley, Ohio, where he prepared a large number of young men for college. He studied medicine in Philadelphia and New Haven, and received the degree of M. D. from Yale College in 1824.

He settled in Ripley, OJiio, and built up a large practice. He married Margaret Poage, daughter of the town proprietor, a lady of high Christian character, and most admirably adapted in all respects to be his helpmeet. Settled in a pleasant town, surrounded by warm friends, in the house he regarded thia most pleasant in the place, he had everything he could desire to make life happy. But he felt a voice within him, which, to his death, he never for one moment doubted, was the voice of God calling him to leave all these comforts, and endure hardships in bringing to Christ the wanderers of our Western wilderness. His wife was in full accord with him. In the spring of 1832, he placed himself under the care of the Chillicothe Presbytery. August 21, he left his pleasant home, removed with his family to Walnut Hills, and entered Lane Theological Seminary. In April, he was licensed to preach, and May 2. he left Cincinnati to make a tour of the West, and to select a suitable field of labor under the care of the A. B. C. F. M. He decided to begin work at Fort Snelling. Returning, he was ordained by the same Presbytery that licens-ed him, September 18.

Early in the spring of 1835, he started with his family, and reached Fort Snelling May 16. Here, June 11, he organized the first Presbyterian Church within the present limits of Minnesota - ^the first Presbyterian Church of Minneapolis. Finding other laborers at Fort Snelling and believing that more could be accomplished by a division of the forces, he pushed on to Lac-qui-Parle, two hundred miles farther west; this last journey then requiring over three weeks.

He worked with indefatigable zeal to acquire the Dakota language, and also the Canadian French, and was soon able to preach in both languages.

Practicing medicine to relieve their bodies, earnestly sympathizing with those in distress, undauntedly courageous in danger, he soon won the respect of the Indians, of the traders and of the Government officers. He often made long journeys to visit the sick, and was unceasing in his labors to win the savages to Christ. He entertained a great number of travelers and Government officials. He kept up his studies, and in his later years, he could translate from Latin, Greek, or Hebrew, with the same facility with which he read English. He kept up with the progress of improvement in medicine. He made himself familiar with the botany of the region, thoroughly studied the history of the Northwest, contributing many valuable papers to the Historical Society and the magazines. He was untiring in his efforts to secure the Indians their rights, involving a large correspondence with Indian Commissioners, with leading Senators and Representatives, and made several trips to Washington. His thorough good sense, and his reputation for absolute accuracy in the statement of facts, almost always secured him at least a respectful hearing.

His whole heart was in the work of winnmg soiils to Christ. All his studies were subordinated to this end. In 1836, he organized a small native church at La-qui-Parle, the second Protestant church in the present State. He prepared a Dakota reader with the aid of the Ponds, and a part of the Bible with the aid of Mr. Henville

By 1846, he and his helpers had built up a church of nearly fifty native members. It was his decided personal preference to remain, but he felt the call of duty in a request from the Kaposia band, and removed there, to where South St. Paul now is. This move probably hindered his work for the Indians, but it made him an influential factor in building up work among the whites. He preached the first Protestant sermon in the English language, and also in the French language, within the present limits of St. Paul, and secured for that place its first teacher. Miss Harriet Bishop, and its first minister of the Gospel, Rev. E. D. UsilU D. D.

The Indians having sold their land, he removed to Pajutazee, on the Minnesota, nearly thirty miles below Lac qui-Parle, in 1852. Here he labored until 1862. On August 18, the terrible outbreak occurred at daybreak, thirty-eight miles nearer the white settlements. On Tuesday, the Doctor sent away his family, except his wife and sister, who were unwilling to leave him, hoping that by remaining, he might check the spread of the outbreak. The Christian Indians rallied around him, but it became evident by night, that if they remained, they would be attacked by the hostiles, causing much bloodshed. Aided by Christian Indians, he escaped in the night, overtook his family, came near Fort Ridgely just after the second attack on it, and escaped safely to St. Peter.

Many were ready to cry that the mission work was a failure. All the other missionaries began to talk of leaving, but the Doctor and his son did not, for one moment yield to hesitation, but pushed their work with redoubled zeal. However much the Christian Indians might be abused by excited whites, he knew that they had done all in their power to diminish the massacres, had aided hundreds in escaping, and had held the hostiles in check, diminishing, by more than one-half, the size of the war. Had every Christian Indian now gone back to heathenism, the effect of the work in diminishing this blow, would have saved to our country at least fifty times the cost of the mission.

The Doctor lived to see more than one thousand communicants, members in the Presbyterian and Congregational Churches, the direct result of the mission of himself and his coadjutors. The Episcopalians, building on the foundation they had laid, gathered about as many more. In September, 1894, at a meeting of the Presbyterian and Congregational Dakotas, nearly two thousand were gathered together, earnestly planning for the spread of the Redeeimer's KingdcMn in their tribe.

The Doctor never removed his family from St. Peter. He spent his summers in missionary tours, his winters partly in correspondence with native pastors and other Dakota workers, and the various labors already alluded to, but chiefly in translating the Word of God. He was extremely anxious that the exact meaning of the Hebrew and Greek Scriptures should be rendered into idiomatic Dakota. To this end, he spent almost as much time in revising the translation of Dr. Riggs, as in making his own. Dr. Riggs also revised his, and Prof. J. P. Williamson, son of Dr. Williamson, also revised nearly all. As a result, very few languages have as good a translation of the Bible.

The Dakota Dictionary, regarded as the best of any Indian language and originally prepared by the Messrs. Pond, owed very much to the painstaking scholarship of Dr. Williamson, though it bears the name of its editor. Dr. Riggs.

Mrs. Williamson died July 21, 1872. No couple were ever happier in each other, or mutually more helpful. Still cheerful, he did not, after this time, show the overflowing spirit of calm rejoicing, which, to his family, had always seemed to characterize him, even in the most troublous times. He completed his translation of the Bible in 1878. There was other work he would have liked to do, but the strain of work without his loved companion to solace him had worn him out. His great work was done, and the earnestness in this no longer sustaining him, he gradually failed, and June 24, 1879, fell asleep in Jesus, in his eightieth year. Four children survive him: Rev. John P. Williamson, of Greenwood, South Dakota, since i860, a missionary to the Dakotas ; Andrew W. Williamson^ Professor of Mathematics, Augustans College, Rock Island, Illinois ; Mrs. Martha Stout, Portland, Oregon, and Henry M. Williamson, editor of the Rural Northwest, Portland, Oregon. His daughter, Nancy Jane, was a missionary from 1869 to her death in 1878, performing a grand work. His granddaughter, Nancy Hunter, having lost her mother in infancy, was adopted and soon after his death began the same work, in which she is still engaged, the last three years as the wife of Rev. E. J. Lindsay, Poplar, Montana.

Dr. Willson was bom in Rockbridge County, Virginia, in 1789. He studied medicine there and received his diploma from Jeffefson Medical College, Philadelphia. He located at West Union in the summer of 1816, and the same year he was married to Ann Newton, daughter of Rev. William Williamson. It must have been a case of love at first sight, as he was married soon after locating at West Union. He continued to practice medicine at West Union until his death, July 21, 1840. Dr. Willson was an old-fashioned Virginia gentleman in every sense of the term. He stood high in his profession and as a citizen, and was a devout and faithful member of the Presbyterian Church. His home in West Union was on the lot now occupied by the miller, Plummer. As ?. man, Dr. Willson was inclined to take the world easy. He did not trouble people with his opinions and did not desire to be inflicted with theirs. He was conscientious and worked hard. There were no drug stores in his day, and he compounded all of his medicines and consequently had to keep a stock of those on hand. He was the only practicing physician in West Union between 1816 and 1840, except Dr. William Voris, who was in West Union a short time. He would go at the call of a patient the coldest night in the year and would often ride eighteen or twenty miles in the most inclement weather, and it was to this exposure! that he owed his early death. He usually had several yoimg men students at his home, and among them were Dr. William F. Willson, his nephew, who has a separate sketch herein ; Dr. Thomas Smith Williamson, also sketched herein ; Dr. Hamilton ; Dr. David McConaghy, and Dr. Henry Loughridge. His son was also a student with him. When he was out on professional business, his wife could compound a prescription as well as he. He often boarded a number of students in order to have them under his direct care. In that day, people did not send for a physician for every little ache and pain. They made it a rule not to send for one unless desperately sick, and then the physician was expected to ride furiously to reach the patient and to give him heroic treatment when he did reach him.

During the cholera epidemic in 1835, Dr. Willson was called away to attend a cholera case at some distance. A brother of the patient had come tor him and was waiting to accompany the doctor. While waiting, the brother was attacked by the dread disease. It became a question what to do. In the dilemma, the Doctor consulted his wife. She at once proposed that she should take care of the case of the messenger, and would carry out the Doctor's directions, while he should visit the brother. This was done and her patient recovered.

Mrs. Ann Newton Willson, wife of Dr. William B. Willson, was born in South Carolina in 1793. Her father, already mentioned, is sketched elsewhere. After her husband's death, in 1840, she resided in West Union until 185 1, when she took up her residence in Catlettsburg, and later, with her daughter, Mrs. Hugh Means, at Ashland, Kentucky, with whom she resided until her death. She had three full sisters and one half sister. Her full sisters were Mrs. Esther Kirker, Mrs. Robinson Baird and Mrs. James Ellison. Her half sister was Jane Williamson, who has a sketch herein. Mrs. Willson had much more will power than any of her full sisters. Her step-sister, Jane, was more like her than her full sisters in respect to will power. She might be said to have been an imperious woman, yet she had her own way without creating great antagonisms. Her great force of character she derived from her mother, who was a woman of the strongest convictions and great will power. Her mother's convictions on the subject of teaching the Bible to her slaves caused her to defy the laws of South Carolina against teaching slaves to read, and when she could do it no longer, to take those slaves through the wilderness eight hundred miles and locate in another wilderness where she would be free to carry out what she believed to be right. The same spirit animated her daughter, Mrs. Willson, and she would stop at nothing to carry out what she deemed to be right. No sacrifice would be considered for a moment in deterring her from any course she deemed to be right and duty. She had unflinching nerve, great self-reliance and most excellent judgment. These qualities stood her in good use in aiding her husband in the practice of medicine. In the cholera scourge of 1835, she went from house to house, caring for the sick with untiring energy. She had no fear of the disease, and her great will thrice armed her against it, but unlike the Rev. Burgess, she did not defy the dietary of cholera times. In assisting her husband, she acquired an unusual knowledge of remedies, and never hesitated to apply or use them in emergencies when her husband was absent.

She was an ardent Abolitionist, outspoken on all occasions. Her earliest impressions of the institution of slavety set her against it. She was a born reformer and had she lived in the days of the martyrs, she undoubtedly would have been one of the principal ones among them. While she was chiefly self-educated, she was always an earnest, eager learner and desired to impart to others those truths so dear to her and the contemplation of which filled her soul. It was her delight to share with others whatever she possessed of material or spiritual good. She had no pride or vanity. She was free from self-consciousness and was never troubled for an instant as to what the world thought of her opinions. She was guided by her own conscience and reason, enlightened by her strong religious faith. She was aggressive at all times for what she believed was right. Her stern faith took the practical form. She was always desirous of doing good for others. As old age came on, the strong-willed woman became the* indulgent grandmother. The old earnestness and zeal never abated but they were tempered by a large tolerance, a wider sympathy and a gentler spirit. She was always ambitious to be doing good herself, and wanted to see her friends about her, and particularly her young friends, doing something in the service of religion. That spirit within her never abated with her years, but continued until her demise. The writer, as a child, knew her as an aged woman, but he always felt that she carried sunshine with her and had that feeling whenever in her presence, and she made this same strong impression on others which she made on children. Of all women who have lived in Adams County, there are none who have done more good or have been more useful in their day and generation.

William F. Willson, M. D., was a citizen of Adams County from 1836 to 185 1. He was born near Fairfield, Rockbridge County, Virginia, September 9, 1815, of staunch Presbyterian, Scotch-Irish stock. His father was James A. Willson and his mother, Tirzah Humphreys. He was educated in the schools of his native county. When he was twelve years of age, an event took place which determined the whole course of his life. About twenty-five or thirty years prior to this, a farmer named Steele in Rockbridge County had died leaving a few negroes and a large sum of debts. By an agreement between the Widow Steele and her husband's creditors, they agreed to wait until the increase of the negroes would pay their debts. Among the Steele negroes at the time of his death was a likely young woman. She contracted a slave* marriage with a negro, Harry Moore, the property of a neighbor, and had given birth to sixteen children before the time came for the sale required by the creditors of Steele. The wife of Harry Moore and his sixteen children from a babe in arms to grown youths were put on the block, with twenty-three other negroes, and sold.

Pioneer Character Sketches 646

Harry Moore was compelled by his master to be present and to hold his small children in his arms while they were roughly handled by the brutal traders and to the persons of his daughters, women grown, indecently exposed on the block. Young Willson knew all of Harry Moore*s children and had played with them many a time. He was a great friend of Harry's as a boy is often friendly to his inferiors. Young Willson came to the scene first as Harry was holding in his arms a four-year-old child, which was being auctioned oflF. The great tears were streaming down Harry's cheeks, and the child seeming to understand the situation, was weeping also. Willson looked on the scene and the flood gate of his tears was opened. He being free to go where he chose returned and hid himself to conceal his sympathy and grief. As soon as he could dry his tears, he came back to the scene, but could not contain himself and wept afresh. He had been brought up to believe slavery was a divine institution ordaineid of God and sanctioned by Holy W^rit, but he then and there resolved it was a wicked and cruel institution and that he would never live in a state which tolerated it, after he was free from his father's dominion. He so informed the latter, and though the father tried to dissuade him and persuade him to remain in Virginia as the support of his old age, he would not give up his resolution. It was strengthened by a subsequent private interview with his friend, Harry, who told him God would bottle up his tears against his old mistress who sold his wife and children away. William Williamson at that time became an Abolitionist and anti-slavery and remained such till his views were carried out m the midst of the Civil War. He had an uncle who had located in W^st I'nion, Ohio, in 1816, and to him he determined to go as soon as he was of age.

In December, 1836, he started for Ohio, traveling to Charleston, West Virginia, by stage; thence down the Kanawha and Ohio Rivers by boat to Manchester, where he landed January 3, 1837. He walked from Manchester to West Union by the old road up Isaac's Creek and over Gift Ridge. At the Nixon place, he sought refuge from a heavy rain, but ran into the small-pox and retreated in an undignified manner, the only time in all his life he did anything unbecoming the dignity of a Virginia gentleman. At West Union, he was welcomed at the house of his uncle, Dr. William B. Willson, who had married Ann Newton, a daughter of the Rev. William Williamson. Here he found sympathy with hi§ views on the institution of slavery, for both his uncle and aunt were pronounced in their anti-slavery sentiments. He taught school in West Union in the old stone schoolhouse, which stood where John Knox now resides, for twentytwo dollars per month. He read medicine with his uncle who was then tbe only physician in the place and who resided in a dwelling formerly standing on the site of the present residence of Jacob Plummer. In May, 1839, he located in Russellville, Brown County, to practice medicine, but in July, 1839, he witnessed a brutal fight on the streets, which the bystanders seemed to enjoy, and he concluded that that was no place for him and left. In August, 1839, he located at Rockville, Ohio, and remained there until August, 1840, and some of the most pleasant hours of his life were spent there. He enjoyed the society of James and John I^oughry, James McMasters, Judge ^Ioses Baird, Rev. Chester and their families. At that time, Rockville was more prosperous than it ever was before or has been since, because at that time there was a great deal of boat building going on there and the stone business was flourishing. In May, 1840, his uncle, Dr. William B. Willson, of West Union, was suflFering from quick consimiption and was compelled to give up his practice. At his request, Dr. William F. Willson came to West Union and located to take up his practice. His uncle died July 21, 1840, in the fifty-first year of his age. When he came to West Union, Dr. Willson brought with him his letter from the Presbyterian Church at New Providence, in Rockbridge County, Va., and lodged it with the church in West Union, where he attended regularly. Among the worshipers was a niece of Gen. Joseph Darlinton, Adaline Willson, with black hair and black eyes and very comely to look upon. The Doctor fell in love with the young lady and on the twenty-eighth day of October, 1840, he was married at the residence of General Darlintcm by the Rev. John P. Vandyke, then the minister of the Presbyterian Church at West Union. There were present at this marriage Gen. Joseph Darlinton, his sister, Mrs Margaret Edwards, Mrs. Ann Willson, the Doctor's aunt, and her daughters, Eliza McCullogh and husband, Addison McCullogh, Miss Amanda Willson (since Mrs. Hugh Means), Miss Sophronia Willson, Davis Darlinton and wife, Newton Darlinton, Doddridge Darlinton and wife and Mrs. Salathiel Sparks, then a widow, and directly after the wife of Gen. James Pilson. Of that company but one survives, Mrs. Hugh Means, of Ashland, Ky.

In 1845, Dr. Willson and his wife, Mrs. Ann Willson, his aunt, Addison McCullogh and wife and Mrs. Noble Grimes withdrew from the Presbyterian Church at West Union and joined the New School. A church was organized at West Union and Doctor Willson and Addison McCullogh were made elders. From December, 1848, until April, 1849, E)^- Willson conducted a drug business at Pomeroy, Ohio, but with the exception of that period from May, 1840, until April, 185 r, he practiced medicine at West Union. From the spring of 1849 till April, 185 1, he was associated with Dr. David Coleman in the practice, under the name of Willson and Coleman. In the spring of 1851, the Doctor's health broke down, and he retired to Grimes' Well to recuperate, and was there during the cholera epidemic of 1851 in West Union.

In the fall of 185 1, he located at Ironton, Ohio, where he continued to reside the remainder of his life. In Ironton, he connected with the Presbyterian Church in 1852, and the same year was made an elder which office he held until his death. He represented his Presbytery in four different synods. He attended four general assemblies as a delegate and four more as a visitor.

While Doctor Willson would not live in Virginia and while he and his people there differed about slavery, yet he loved to visit his old home in that state. In April, 1843, he took his wife there and they remained till June. They traveled the whole way in a carriage.

In 1853, he was called to Virginia by the sickness of his mother, traveling by river to Guyandotte and thence by stage the remainder of the way. He had hoped to see his mother alive, but when he reachd there she was dead and buried. There were a number of young negroes about the place and the Doctor asked that one be given him and he selected a boy of nine named Sam and took him with him to Ohio, solely for the purpose of giv- ing him his freedom. Sam was as full of fun and glee as a young healthy animal and had a natural genius for cookery. Notwithstanding the Doctor's abhorrence of slavery, he consented to be a slaveholder for a week in order to get Sam out of Virginia. He kept Sam for seven years and taught him to read and write and cipher and gave him such further instruction as he could. In i860, he sent him to Cincinnati to learn the carpenter's trade. Sam could sew and do any housework as well as any woman. He always kept himself neat, clean and well dressed. Whenever the Doctor visited Cincinnati, Sam would buy a number of things for "Miss Adaline," as he called Mrs. Willson. Those articles were usually ladies' clothing or apparel and he could always select them with consummate taste and anticipate Mrs. Willson's wants. Sam always took good care of himself. He never married and is now living in New Orleans.

The Doctor, on the occasion of the last visit to his father in Virginia prior to the Civil War, had a great argument with his father, who was strongly pro slavery in his views and in favor of the Rebellion of the South. In this discussion, the Doctor predicted the Civil War and all its dire consequences to the South, including the abolition of slavery, but his father could not be convinced. They separated never to me^t on earth, as James Willson died in 1864, but the Doctor lived to see all his predictions verified. During the war he was very kind to his Southern male relatives who, with - the exception of his father, were all in the Confederate army and several of them prisoners at Camp Chase. To those who were prisoners, he sent money, clothing and necessaries, but at the same time no one was more loyal or devoted to the Union cause than he.

The Doctor and his wife were loved by the entire community, but especially was their church devoted to them. On the twenty-eighth of October, 1890, the fiftieth anniversary of their marriage was celebrated by the congregation of the First Presbyterian Church in Ironton, and it was a most notable occasion which would require an article as long.as this. Of those present at their marriage, all had passed away except Mrs. Hugh Means, Miss Sophronia Willson and Rev. Newton Darlinton. The two former were present on the fiftieth anniversary.

From 1890 until 1898, the health of the Doctor gradually failed. He was subject to vertigo and was liable to fall at any time and he had to give up his profession, but all the time he was the same cheerful, agreeable person he ever had been. He always welcomd his friends and made them feel refreshed and rejoiced that they had called. He loved to speak of those dear friends who had gone before, but never repined. On the eleventh of February, 1898, his wife passed away and he survived until the twenty-ninth of May, when he, too, received the final summons and answered it. After the death of his wife, an invalid in bed most of his time, imable to walk or stand alone, requiring an attendant all the time, he never complained. He often spoke of the great change which he felt was coming, but to him it was but passing from one room to another. He was ready at the Master's call and it came silently and gently. He passed from sleep to its twin. Death, and the chapter of his life was closed. He was a fine example of the old-fashioned Virginia gentleman, kind and courteous to everyone and quick to appreciate what would please those about him and gratify them. In Ironton, when the good men of the city were named, Dr. Willson's name was always first. Everyone felt that he was a sincere and fine Christian gentleman. The world is better that he lived. His life was a most excellent sermon, preached every day, and felt by those with whom he associated.

His old friends in Adams County have all passed over to the majority, but his memory among the younger is like a blessed halo, pictured about the Saints, of which he is undoubtedly one.

It is seldom we have biographies of women in works of this character. It is certainly not because they are not deserving of them, as what is said of them is usually said in sketches of their husbands, but the subject of this sketch is deserving of an entire volume, and had her recollections of Adams County been written down, they would make a more interesting volume than this.

She was born December 20, 1820. Her father died when she was but seven years of age and she was taken by Gen. Joseph Darlinton. of West Union, Ohio, her great-uncle, and was reared by him. Her home was with the General and his family from her seventh year until her marriage. The General, whose sketch and portrait appear elsewhere in this book, was a most devout Presbyterian, and as our subject has expressed it herself, she was reared on the Bible and the Missionary Herald. If her life is to be deemed a success, she attributed it to the careful training she received in her uncle's home. From her seventh to her ninth year, she listened to the Gospel expounded by the Rev. Dyer Burgess in the stone church at West Union. From her ninth year until she left West Union, in 1 85 1, she was taught in the same church by the Rev. J. P. Vandyke. As his great efforts were always in preaching doctrines, she was well grounded in the Presbyterian faith.

The General's house in West Union was the visiting place of all prominent persons who visited the village. In this way she met and associated with the best people of her time. When she was a girl, educational advantages were limited, but she had wonderful natural ability, and she took advantage of all opportunities for information and intellectual improvement. On October 2S, 1840, she was married in her uncle's home to William B. Willson, a young physician, who, in the May before, had located in West Union, and there she went to housekeeping, and resided till the fall of 185 1, when she removed to Ironton, Ohio. In West Union, she was the center of a delightful circle of friends of her own sex, who, in their old-fashioned way, took turn in spending the day at each other's houses. She read much, traveled much, and she was delighted in visiting the most noted historical places in our own country and never tired of telling of them. She had fine conversational powers, and that, with her wonderful memory, made her a most desirable companion or guest.

In the church was her great and chosen work, and she took great interest in the Women's Missionary Societies. In 1897, she wrote a fine paper for the Presbyterian Society, giving an account of the organization of the Women's Board of Foreign Missions, which she attended in 1870 at Philadelphia, and of five subsequent meetings at which she was present. She often dwelt on the advantages the young people had in the present day.

Pioneer Character Sketches 649

In her day, she said it was just a privilege for the young to live; that then the young people had nothing to do but to look on and listen to their elders ; that in her youth, nothing but obedience and industry was expected of the young.

This tribute is from the pen of Editor WiUson of the Ironton Register: "Mrs. Willson was a woman of strong character. Her mind was bright and aggressive. She studied the thoughts of today and kept informed on those subjects which are of real progress. She was a great reader and appreciated the best literature. Her interests lay deeply in religious themes, and on them she was entertaining and instructive. Her great delight was in the deep and solid orthodoxy of the Presbyterian Church, whose great doctrines were a part of life and thought. This gave her a setenity that was always beautiful and a seriousness that was always helpful, but through it all, her joys shone like an evening star through the twilight."

In the last five years of het life, she was afflicted, but not a great sufferer. July 29, 1897, she had a stroke of paralysis which thereafter confined her to her bed. She survived till February 11, 1898, when the end came. In all her sickness, she exemplified her religious belief and die^d with all its comforts sustaming her soul.

was born September 6, 1788. He died September 23, 1867. Ruth Shoemaker, whom he married as the widow of Samuel Bradford, was born August 18, 1793. She died August 25, 1879. The following children were born to them: James Hervey, born April 7, 1816; died March 18, 1844; Angeline, now the wife of George Sample, was born January 2, 1818: Caroline, now Mrs. S. P. Kirkpatrick, was born December 26, 1819; John Nelson was born May 11, 1822; David, born December 27, 1824; Matilda, bom April 20, 1829, afterward married a Mr. Locke, and is now deceased ; Ann Elizabeth, born March 25, 1830, married a Henderson; George W., born February 24, 1833, deceased; Joseph William, born December 12. 1834, now deceased ; and Francis Marion, born June 27, 1840.

Ruth Shoemaker is said to have been stolen by the Indians in 1796 while residing on Ohio Thrush Creek at Shoemaker's Crossing, in the vicinity of the mouth of Lick Fork. See history of Meigs Township and also biography of Samuel Grimes Bradford in this volume.

was born September 16, 18 16. in Logan County, Ohio. His father, John Wilson, was born December 17, 1776, in Kentucky, and died October 5, 1824. in Logan County. His wife, Margaret Darlinton, was born in Winchester, Virginia. She was married to John Wilson, in Adams County, August 6, 1 810. by Rev. William Williamson. She survived until March 8, 1869. Her father was born March 24, 1754, and died May 20, 1 814, at X'ewark, Ohio. Her mother was born April to, 1700, and died December 14. 1832. John Wilson, grandfather of our subject, moved to Maysville, Ky., about 1781, and bought land on the Kentucky side of the river for twelve or fifteen miles along its course. This land is all divided up, and a part of it, opposite Manchester, is known as Wilson's Bottoms.

The father of our subject had fifteen children, all of whom lived to maturity, married and had families. Our subject went to reside with his uncle, General Joseph Darlinton, in Adams County, in 1823. He was brought up in the Presbyterian Church and had such education as the local schools afforded. At the age of sixteen, in 1832, he became an assistant to his uncle in the Clerk's office of the Court of Common Pleas and Supreme Court. In 1837, when he had attained his majority, he started out for himself, with a certificate from J. Winston Price, Presiding Judge of the Common Pleas, that he was of correct and most unexceptionable moral character and habits. Gen. Darlinton also gave him a certificate that he was perfectly honest and of strict integrity ; that he was familiar with the duties of the Clerk's office, and that he had had some experience in retailing goods from behind the counter and in keeping merchant's books. Between 1837 and 1840, he was a clerk in the Ohio Legislature at its annual sessions. In September, 1838, he was employed in the County Clerk's office in Greenup County, Kentucky. In November, 1838, he obtained a certificate from Peter Hitchcock, Frederick Grinke and Ebenezer Lane, Supreme Judges, that he was well qualified to discharge the duties of Clerk of the Court of Common Pleas of Adams County, or any other Court of equal dignity in the State. In November, 1840, he obtained employment in the office of Daniel Gano, Clerk of the Courts of Hamilton County, as an assistant for four years, at $380.00 per year. He was married to Harriet Lafferty, sister of Joseph West Lafferty, of West Union, April 14, 1839, by Rev. Dyer Burgess. He formed a great friendship with Nelson Barrere, a young lawyer who had located in West Union in 1834, and several of Barrere's letters to him are in existence. To Barrere, he disclosed his inmost soul, as to a father confessor, and Barrere held the trust most sacredly. He seemed also to have had the friendship of Samuel Brush, an eminent lawyer of that time, who practiced in Adams County. In 1846, he was an applicant for the Clerkship of Adams Court of Comihon Pleas, when General Darlinton's term expired. He was recommended by George Collings, Nelson Barrere, William M. Meek, Chambers Baird, John A. Smith, James H. Thompson and Hanson L. Penn, but Joseph Randolph Cockerill was appointed. However, on September 18, 1846, he entered into a written contract with Joseph R. Cockerill, the Clerk, to work in the office at $30.00 per month until the next spring and in that period to be Deputy Clerk. In April, 1848, he was admitted to the bar at a term of the Supreme Court held in Adams County, but it is not now known that he ever practiced. He always had a delicate constitution and died of pulmonary consumption, December 16, 1848. His wife died August 12, 1850. They had two children, a daughter, who died in infancy, and a son, John O., who has a separate sketch herein.

was born in 1757, in Pennsylvania. He was married to Mary Stevenson, March 8, 1791. She was born March 5, 1765. In 1796, he went to Limestone, now Maysville, Kentucky. In 1803, he moved to Aberdeen, Ohio, then in Adams County. In 1805, he removed to West Union. His wife died there August 19, 1825, in her sixty-second year, and he died there April 2. 1834, in his seventy-seventh year. He was appointed County Surveyor by the Court of Common Pleas, at the April term. 1810, and as such laid off the town plat of Aberdeen, Ohio, and laid out Darlinton's Addition to West Union. He was also a school teacher. His sons were

Pioneer Character Sketches 651

Alexander and John. Alexander learned the trade of a cabinet maker and John learned that of a printer first and afterward the trade of a cabinet maker. John Woodrow was bom October 5, 1805, and married Jane Crawford in 1831, and removed to Lynchburg, Ohio, in 1832. He died in 1873. Andrew Woodrow's daughter, Milly Ann, married and is the mother of Mrs. Caroline Worstell, of West Union. James Woodrow, a son, died at the age of nineteen and is buried in the Harper cemetery, on Salathiel Sparks' place.

Andrew Woodrow's wife related to Mrs. Caroline Wortsell that when they went to West Union, it was almost all forest and the wolves often went howling through the town at night.

Andrew Woodrow was very fond of music. He had a violin and could draw a crowd at any time and sing and play his hearers into tears or laughter. One of his favorite pieces was the "Battle of Boyne Water.'' was bom in Virginia, November 20, 1788. He removed to Adams County in 181 1. He was a farmer. He first resided near North Liberty, afterward near West Union. He had a good common school education. He was married in the fall of 1810 to Hester Keyes Wasson, an aunt of Thomas Campbell Wasson.