USA > Indiana > Elkhart County > A twentieth century history and biographical record of Elkhart County, Indiana > Part 61
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
passed to his reward. AAll of his sons and daughters married and reared families of their own, and in the different localities in which they made their homes they were held in high esteem, and having inherited many of their noble father's qualities were honored and respected.
His second son, Jacob, was born in Northampton county, Penn- sylvania, about 1812 or 1813. and was brought up to the healthy life of a farmer's boy. Upon reaching man's estate he took for his wife Sarah Fravel, who was born in the same county as himself in 1822, and who was one of twelve children reared by Daniel and Fannie ( Myers) Fravel, the former of whom was born in Bucks county, Pennsylvania, and was of English parentage. He was left fatherless when a small child and was reared by strangers, and upon starting out in life took a wife from the same county as himself, and by her reared a large family of children, 'as follows: Jessie. Polly. Catherine, Fannie. Joseph. Re- becca, Elizabeth, Susan, Sarah, William, Daniel and Matilda. Jacob Coppes and his wife removed to Ohio at the same time that Rev. Dr. Samuel Coppes settled in this section, and there he remained for a period of about eight years, following the trades of shoemaking and mill- wrighting. In 1844 he came to Indiana and settled in Harrison town- ship. Elkhart county. For the first few years of his residence here his efforts were not prospered and he met with various reverses which kept him in straitened circumstances for some time, but he kept perse- veringly at work, and by the help of his oldest children managed to keep the wolf from the door, and at last secured enough means to purchase forty acres of land in Locke township, on which he resided until death called him home in 1874. Notwithstanding the hard luck which he met in his career through life he was never known to wilfully wrong any one, and was honest. industrious and public-spirited, ever casting his influence on the side of what he considered justice and right. In early life he supported the principles of the Whig party, and later the stand taken by the Republican party commended itself to his excellent judg- inent. With his wife he was a member of the Mennonite church, and his daily walk through life showed that he was a Christian. He was very domestic in his tastes, was devoted to his home and family and never cared to fill any public, position, the strife and turmoil of politics having no charms for him. His children are as follows: Daniel, Sam- uel, Amanda, Susan, Eliza, Rebecca, Saloma, Lucinda, John D., and Frank. Three children died in infancy-Amanda. Susan and Rebecca. A brief sketch of the members of this family will not come amiss.
Daniel was born in Pennsylvania. was reared on a farm under the watchful care of his father, and when still quite young began learning the painter's trade, at which he worked in Goshen, where he became a well known and popular young man. He was one of the first to respond to his country's call at the opening of the rebellion, and became a member of Company K, Thirteenth Regiment Indiana Volunteer Infantry, at Goshen, where he became a commissioned officer. He was faithful and
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fearless on the battlefield and was greatly loved by his regimental com- rades, who considered him not only a model soldier but also a true and trusted friend. At the battle of Murfreesboro he was wounded by a gunshot in the leg, and during the three days and nights that he lay on the battlefield he suffered indescribably. He was at last taken by his friends to a private residence, which had been turned into a private hospital, to be cared for, but there breathed his last the tenth day after receiving his wound. So dearly loved was he by his comrades that he was not buried in a ditch like most of the dead, but with willing hands and sad hearts they made him a rough board coffin and buried him be- neath a large oak tree on that historic battle ground. He was unmar- ried. One of his companions in battle saw him fall, and placing himself beside him tried to cheer him with encouraging words, and said : " Dan, I will stay with you or die," and in order to deceive the enemy placed himself beside his wounded comrade and pretended to be dead. He was discovered, however, taken prisoner and carried away, and for three days and nights the unfortunate young soldier, Daniel Coppes, was exposed to the rain and sleet which was falling and which without doubt caused his death. He was a brave and gallant soldier, the pride of Company K. and is still remembered with respect and affection by the old residents of Goshen, and in the hearts of his old comrades the memory of the brave young soldier who gave his life for his country is still kept green.
Samuel D. Coppes is a prominent banker of Nappanee, a more ex- tended notice of whom appears elsewhere. Eliza married Benjamin Yarian and died a few years later, leaving a family of five children, all of whom are living with the exception of the youngest. The eldest of these children was Elizabeth, who married Daniel Zook, a prominent business man of Nappanee; Frank was a journalist of Goshen. now de- ceased ; Ella, now the wife of Rev. R. J. Wade, pastor of the M. E. church of Kendalville, Indiana, has two children: Edward wedded Miss Ida Sloat, resident of Nappanee, and she is one of the bookkeepers in the Coppes, Zook & Mutschler Company establishment of Nappanee: Lu- cinda died at the age of three years. The mother of these children died in 1876.
The next child born to Jacob Coppes and his wife was Saloma, who married Benjamin Frazier, of Nappanee, by whom she became the mother of five children, the eldest of whom, Milo, was killed at the age of ten years in a wheat elevator at that place, by being sucked into a wheat bin and smothered : Nettie is now Mrs. William Lesh, of Ohio; Sadie, hav- ing lived with Samuel Coppes for a number of years, is now deceased : Laura, wife of V. D. Weaver. county auditor of LaGrange county, In- diana : Medie resides in Nappanee. Their mother was called from life in 1876.
The next of Jacob Coppes' children was Lucinda, who married John C. Mellinger. a prominent resident of Nappanee, by whom she has four children: Ella, who is Mrs. Harvey Banta of Goshen, and is the
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mother of three children. This represents now living in Nappanee four generations of the family. The younger members of the family are Mabel 1 .. John F. and Fred. The sisters of Mrs. Banta are Sarah, who died in infancy, and Emma, deceased, and Jeannette, wife of Ora Stout- mour, of Goshen. The next chikl born to Jacob Coppes was John D., of whom a sketch is given in this work, and Frank, a prominent resident of Nappanee. It can be truly said of Jacob Coppes and his wife that they were very worthy residents of the county, and showed much heroism in braving the dangers, hardships and discomforts of pioneer life in order to provide a home for their children and obtain a competency for their declining years.
JONAS CHRISTOPHEL.
Emerson has said that the true history of a nation is best told in the lives of its representative citizens. An eminently representative citi- zen of Elkhart county Mr. Jonas Christophel certainly is, and his biog- raphy will add one more link to the chain of historic facts which are set down in complete form in this volume in order to compose an enduring record of Elkhart county. Mr. Christophel during his active career has manifested the strength of character and resourceful ability which make him a man of prominence in his home township of Harrison, and he therefore needs no further introduction to the readers of this history.
Bom in Elkhart county, February 18. 1853, he was the second of a family of ten children, five- sons and five daughters, whose parents were John N. and Elizabeth ( Reed ) Christophel. Jonas is the oldest of those living, the others being: Noah E., who is a farmer in Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, and is married. Jacob W. is a prosperous farmer in Har- rison township. Hannah, the widow of Jacob Smith, lives on the old Christophel homestead in Harrison township. Harriet is the wife of Jacob Blosser, a farmer of Union township. Sarah resides on the old homestead with her mother.
John N. Christophel, the father, who was born in Pennsylvania in 1821 and died October 24. 1901, was reared and lived the life of a tiller of the soil. At the age of thirteen he accompanied his parents to Ma- honing county, Ohio, where he married, and in 1851 he brought his family and effects, by wagon and in true pioneer fashion, across the intervening country to Elkhart county, where he arrived after a journey of three weeks. A purchase of eighty acres of land in section thirty-two in Harrison township furnished hin a location, and a log cabin home soon gave shelter to his family. Politically he was a Whig, and he and his wife were strict members of the Mennonite church. His wife, who was born in Virginia, March 15, 1825. is still living, an aged and much heloved okl lady who has seen the passage of fourscore years.
The first school that the boy Jonas attended was in the woods of Union township. It was a round-log cabin, with a clap-board roof, heated by a box stove, the fuel partially cut by the larger boys, and the
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desks, seats and other equipments were of very primitive sort. It is the privilege of Mr. Christophel to look back upon these crude surroundings of his youth and compare them by actual experience with the schools which his own children attend. and thus reckon the progress that has been accomplished in a lifetime. When he was twenty-one years old and ready to leave the parental home, Mr. Christophel did not possess twenty-five dollars in capital, so that the prosperity which has come to him in later years is the result of his own efforts. He began as a wage- earner at eighteen dollars a month, continued that six months, and then remained with the same man for four years as a renter.
October 10, 1878, Mr. Christophel married Miss Salome Buzzard, and of the eight children, three sons and five daughters, born of their happy marriage, five are yet living. The son, Walter B., who, after fin- ishing the common school course, took four years in the . Elkhart high school and then followed teaching in Indiana and one term in Livingston county, Illinois, near Emington, chose medicine as his life work and is now working for his M. D. degree in the medical department of North- western University at Chicago. He married, June 8, 1904. Miss Alta Kurtz, a daughter of Jonathan Kurtz. She was educated in the common schools and the seminary at Elkhart, and studied stenography and type- writing and is also an art student. The son. John B., who received a common school training, is a practical farmer and stockman on the home farm. Anna E., who received her diploma from the common schools in 1899 and then took the three years' teacher's course, passed her first examination for a license at the grade of ninety per cent and is now one of the successful teachers of this county. She has also studied instru- mental music. Bertha M., who received her diploma from the public schools in 1903, is a student in the Latin-Scientific course in Goshen Col- lege. Elsie Mabel, the youngest, is in the fifth grade of school.
Mrs. Christophel was born on the old Buzzard homestead, where she and her husband now reside, in section 27 of Harrison township, on October 20. 1852, and was the fourth in a family of five children, one son and four daughters, born to John and Anna ( Weldy ) Buzzard. Only two of the children are living. her younger sister, Anna, being the wife of Abraham Kercher. a farmer in Elkhart township. John Buzzard, the father, was born in Northampton county, Pennsylvania, December 15. 18UI, and died April 14. 1897. Spending the first twenty-four years of his life in his native state, he then came to Medina county. Ohio, where he married his first wife, and in October. 1849. arrived in Elkhart county. Ile was a blacksmith by trade, but in this county purchased the one hundred and sixty acres of land in section 27. Harrison township, which composes the old farmstead. He paid twenty-two hundred dollars for the land, which was partially improved, and his first house was of hewn logs, in which Mrs. Christophel was born a few years later. He was a Republican in politics, voting for Lincoln, and he and his wife were members of the Mennonite church, in which he was a trustee at one
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time. The mother of Mrs. Christophel was born in Westmoreland county, Pennsylvania, May 10, 1810, and died August 25, 1885. At the age of three years she was taken to Tuscarawas county, Ohio, where she was reared. Both the Buzzard and Christophel families were pioneers in Elkhart county.
Mr. and Mrs. Christophel began their married life as renters in Union township, but after a year bought seventy-seven acres in Jackson township for thirty-five hundred dollars. Four years later they sold this and took charge of the Buzzard homestead, which in its entirety of one hundred and sixty acres has been operated by them since 1890. Their old home being destroyed by fire on June 18. 1893. in the same year they erected what is one of the most beautiful country homes in this vicinity. It is built of brick, two stories in height. finished in Georgia pine and lieated with a furnace. and is one of the model residences of Harrison township. The ground dimensions are twenty-eight by twenty-six feet. with an addition twenty-six by eleven, and every detail of the farmstead shows the neatness and thorough supervision of careful and enterprising owners. Mr. Christophel has given considerable attention to the better grades of live stock, for some years raising the Shropshire sheep, and now devoting more of his attention to the registered shorthorn cattle and the Hambletonian and Norman horses. In politics he is a stanch Republican, having cast his first vote for Hayes, and he and his wife are members of the Mennonite church near their home, he being a trustee. They are also interested in the Sunday school, and in all the forces of education and moral uplift in their part of the county.
SIMON FETTERS.
Born in Elkhart county, August 10, 1851, Mr. Simon Fetters ranks among the most capable and progressive of the native sons of this county. and he has been intimately identified with the affairs of Harrison town- ship for many years. Having made agriculture his choice of occupa- tions at an early age, he has followed it with increasing success from the primitive days of forty years ago to the present. His lifetime has also witnessed the wonderful development which has characterized all of northern Indiana in material, social and moral affairs, and he considers it a matter of gratulation that his career has been cast not only in the old but in the new order of events and circumstances.
Mr. Fetters belongs to a family that is well known in the history of Elkhart county. He was the third in a family of five children, three sons and two daughters, born to Peter F. and Nancy (Clark) Fetters. He has a brother and two sisters living: Benjamin, a farmer of Harri- son township: Ellen, wife of Daniel Knisely, a farmer in northern Michi- gan and also a minister of the German Baptist church: Catherine, a widow, and a resident of Harrison township.
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HISTORY OF ELKHART COUNTY
The father, who was born and reared to manhood and married in Ohio, came to Elkhart county at a time when civilization had made little progress in the transformation of the country from its virgin state. There were no railroads, nor had the Indians left their ancient haunts, and the first home of the family was a log cabin situated about four miles from Goshen in Elkhart township. He was a Whig, and later a Re- publican, and lie and his good wife belonged to the German Baptist church.
Mr. Fetters grew up in this county during what could still be called its pioneer period, and his own early experiences are those that belong to a past and, to the present generation. very unfamiliar epoch. He was a pupil in a sixteen by twelve log school in Harrison Center, where the desks and seats and entire furnishings were of that primitive sort de- scribed in the general history of this work. He did his writing with a pen fashioned by the master from a turkey or goose quill. Although his advantages in an educational way were limited, he has been a prac- tical man of affairs from early life, and by diligent application and intel- ligent effort has made a place for himself in his community. He has spent all his life on the homestead farm, and has made an unusual degree of success in his enterprises. One of his early experiences was in swing- ing a four-fingered cradle and a mowing scythe. implements now seen only in curiosity shops, but he has labored with them from sun to sun for many a day. The first threshing machine that entered the county created a lasting impression on his mind, as did also the first binder. He has also participated in the work of developing Harrison township for the better conveniences of civilization by assisting to cut several highways through the dense woods, and he has been familiar with Wakarusa's site from the time when it was covered with trees.
A stalwart Republican, who has cast his vote regularly for Grant, Blaine, Garfield. Mckinley and Roosevelt, he has always stood on the principles of the Grand Old Party, and at various times has been chosen delegate to state. county and district conventions. Elected precinct com- mitteeman in 1893. he held this office till 1903. and he has in many other ways supported his party and shown his public-spirited interest in the welfare of his community.
June 27. 1875. Mr. Fetters married Miss Hannah Krupp. They have become the parents of four children, one son and three daughters. one of whom is deceased. Bertha is the wife of George Shank. of Har- risen township, and they have a little daughter. Gale. Joshua has com- pleted the common school course and is a practical farmer on the home płace. Elsie is in the fifth grade of school. Mrs. Fetters was born in Ohio, January 23. 1848, a daughter of Joseph and Mary (Hunsberger) Krupp. She has been a resident of Elkhart county since she was nine years old. Mr. and Mrs. Fetters have resided on their present farm- stead since 1902, and in the same year erected their pleasant country
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home. They have made many improvements, and as successful and enterprising people they have gained the esteem of their entire com- munity.
HON. JOHN E. THOMPSON.
As one of the foremost stockmen in Elkhart county, we have else- where had occasion in these pages to refer to Hon. John E. Thompson and his valuable work in advancing the live-stock industry. But Mr. Thompson has a many-sided career, and in more ways than one his accomplishments and character have interest to the history of his county. A man whose individuality and efficiency have left their impress so permanently upon the county, he needs no introduction more than the mention of his name.
Much space has been given to the pioneers of the county, and de- servedly so, and in describing the career of Mr. Thompson we speak of one whose memory goes further back in the history of the county prob- ably than any other living man. Mr. Thompson was born in Wayne county, Indiana, September 20, 1828, and has been more or less con- tinuously identified with this county since 1829. His parents, Mark B. and Jane ( Thomas) Thompson, also had two daughters, but they are deceased, and Mr. Thompson is the only survivor of this genera- tion.
.A truly great character was that of Mark B. Thompson. Born in Orange county, New York, in 1802, the thread of his life being drawn out to threescore and ten, until June 23. 1872, in youth he learned the tanner's trade, but later gave his energies almost entirely to agricult- ure. In childhood his parents emigrated from the old Empire state via the Ohio river to Cincinnati, and settled in Butler county, Ohio, in 1803, only a year after Ohio had become a state and in the same year of the purchase by the government of the great wilderness since known as the magnificent Louisiana Purchase. Mark B.'s father had entered eighty acres of land in Wayne county. The latter was of a roving nature, had fought under Jackson at New Orleans, and fared among men and changing scenes throughout his life. Mark B. Thompson mar- ried in Fayette county, Indiana, later moved to Wayne county, and in 1829 emigrated to Elkhart county, and settled on the homestead where his honorable son now resides. He pre-empted, at the south end of the famous Elkhart prairie, a quarter section, and, obtaining the pre- emption of a friend, increased his holding to three hundred and twenty acres. On this truly magnificent estate there was a grove of six hun- dred sugar trees, justly famed for its produce during former years, and some of these old trees are still standing. At this place, then a dense forest and domain of nature, the family arrived on the 5th of April, 1829, and until a log house could be constructed a provisional shelter was made of rails, which the head of the household split from the trees.
Respecting yours, John 6. Thompson?
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Only a pioneer such as Mr. Thompson can picture in his mind the true circumstances of life at that time and the picturesque surroundings in which the first-comers lived. The Pottawottomie Indians lived in neighborly and peaceable juxtaposition to the whites, and one day the child John and his two sisters, their mother being away from home, were taken by some squaws down to the camp, where the daughters of the forest endeavored to entertain the little folks. On her return the mother at once missed her children, and we can imagine the sus- pense and anxiety endured by her until she found her children happy and contented among the pappooses of her red neighbors. Mark B. Thompson was one of the leaders among the early settlers of the county, held an influential place by reason of his strength of character, his suc- cess in affairs and general popularity among his neighbors. He was one of the stanch Whigs in this portion of the state, voting and taking part in the famous log-cabin and hard-cider campaign, and at a later time was equally strong in his advocacy of Republican principles. His wife, Jane Thompson, was born in Wales in 1805, being a child when she came with her parents to this country.
Jolin E. Thompson was seven months old when he became a resi- dent of Elkhart county, and the county had not yet been organized. The seventy-six years that have since slipped around in the cycles of time have dealt kindly with him. He stands as straight as an Indian, his clear eye and ruddy complexion show the wholesome life he has led, and many a man of fifty is not able to bear the alternate storm and sunshine of the world as well as he. During his lifetime the Victorian age has showered upon the world of the abundance of its gifts, and it has been Mr. Thompson's privilege to witness what no other generation of mankind is likely to behold- the development of railroads into vast trunk systems, several of which cross this county, the introduction of the telegraph and telephone, the application of electrical energy in won- drous ways in performing the work of humanity, and countless other changes which have transformed civilization within less than a single lifetime.
The first school he attended, a sixteen-foot square log cabin, stood near his father's estate, was equipped with puncheon floors, slab seats, rough board desk around the wall, heated by fireplace, and for text books there were the English reader, Elementary spelling book, Daboll and Pike's and the Davis arithmetic, Olney's geography, and Graham and Kirkham's grammar. The school was maintained by subscription. Schools have changed, and how striking is the contrast between that old log school of his memory and the beautiful high-school in Goshen only a pioneer like Mr. Thompson can fully realize. Many days he has swung the four-fingered cradle or the even more primitive sickle, and a scar on his little finger still bears witness to his use of the latter implement. Not a custom or condition of pioneer life in this county but he has experienced.
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When the Civil war came on he enlisted at the call for troops sent out in August, 1861, and at Goshen was enrolled in Company K, Thir- tieth Indiana Infantry, under Captain Hawks and Colonel Bass, being assigned first to the Army of the Ohio and later the Army of the Cum- berland, under Generals Sherman, Buell, and Rosecrans. From a pri- vate he was promoted to the rank of captain at Murfreesboro. He fought at Shiloh, at Stone River, where his comrades, Hapner and Coppes, were killed at his side, at Chickamauga, at Liberty Gap, in the campaign to and about Atlanta. where he was under fire one hundred and thirty days, and although having many calls he escaped without wounds or disability. and after a little more than three years' service received his final discharge at Indianapolis, September 29, 1864.
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