USA > Indiana > Newton County > Biographical history of Tippecanoe, White, Jasper, Newton, Benton, Warren and Pulaski counties, Indiana, Volume I > Part 3
USA > Indiana > Benton County > Biographical history of Tippecanoe, White, Jasper, Newton, Benton, Warren and Pulaski counties, Indiana, Volume I > Part 3
USA > Indiana > Pulaski County > Biographical history of Tippecanoe, White, Jasper, Newton, Benton, Warren and Pulaski counties, Indiana, Volume I > Part 3
USA > Indiana > Warren County > Biographical history of Tippecanoe, White, Jasper, Newton, Benton, Warren and Pulaski counties, Indiana, Volume I > Part 3
USA > Indiana > Tippecanoe County > Biographical history of Tippecanoe, White, Jasper, Newton, Benton, Warren and Pulaski counties, Indiana, Volume I > Part 3
USA > Indiana > Jasper County > Biographical history of Tippecanoe, White, Jasper, Newton, Benton, Warren and Pulaski counties, Indiana, Volume I > Part 3
USA > Indiana > White County > Biographical history of Tippecanoe, White, Jasper, Newton, Benton, Warren and Pulaski counties, Indiana, Volume I > Part 3
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The subject of this sketch was reared and educated in Wabash county, ending his school days at Wabash Seminary.
But while in school life he laid aside his predilections and allied himself with the " boys in blue," enlisting as a private, August 15, 1862, in Com- pany F, One Hundred and First Indiana Volunteer Infantry. Though lack-
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ing robust health and a vigorous constitution, he participated with his regi- ment in the battles of Perryville and Milton, and besides these he also took part in several severe skirmishes; but in recognition of his failing health he was relieved from the activities of the camp and the march, with their exhausting physical requirements, and placed upon detached duty, where he could perform services as necessary to the government yet within the scope of his physical abilities. He continued in this work until the expiration of his term of service, that is, until July, 1865.
Next he studied law two years in the office of Pettit & Cowgill, of Wabash, from which he was admitted to practice. In 1867 he located in Oxford, Benton county, being one of three attorneys then practicing in the county. From that day to this he has been a member of the Benton county bar. In 1875, on the removal of the county seat to Fowler, he took up his home in that little city and at once became identified with its material progress. However, in 1868 he was chosen by the people from among his colleagues to the office of state's attorney for the district then composed of the counties of Benton, White and Carroll, serving a term of two years. On locating in Fowler he formed a partnership with Mr. Henry S. Travis, which continued for about ten years, the firm title being Merrick & Travis. In addition to the general practice of law, they also did an extensive busi- ness in adjusting land titles and in abstracting and conveyancing. Mr. Merrick is one of the successful attorneys of Benton county, and he has accumulated, as the result of industry and frugality, a very desirable prop- erty. Among his possessions are two good farms, one of one hundred and thirty-three acres, near Fowler, and one of three hundred and twenty acres in White county, Indiana. Besides this he has a fine home and other property in Fowler.
He was commissioned postmaster of Fowler in 1889, and surrendered the office to the Democratic appointee in 1894. From 1895 to 1897 he served one term as county commissioner. He has always been an active Republican, zealous in the advocacy of the doctrines of that time-honored party. All his life he has been prominent in local politics, freely devoting a portion of his time to campaign work whenever circumstances seemed to require. For thirty years he has been prominently associated with the " brethren of the triple links," serving in every official capacity in the local lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.
In his father's family were seven children, of whom the eldest, William, was born in 1835, in Delaware, and spent his days upon the parental farm- stead in Wabash county, where he died in 1897; David, born in 1837, died in 1872; Thomas L., the subject of this sketch, was the third in order of birth; Rachel, born in 1842, became the wife of R. P. Mitten in Wabash and
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died in 1875; Isaac, born in 1845, is a farmer in Wabash county, on the old homestead; Henrietta, who was born in 1847, died at the age of thirteen years, at her parental home; and Sarah, born in 1850, is the wife of J. L. Gamble, a farmer near Wabash.
The genealogy of the Merrick family is traceable to English ancestors, and they have been identified with New England for many generations. The paternal grandparents, Isaac and Rachel (Sylvester) Merrick, were natives of Delaware, and both lived to a ripe old age, dying in their native state. The maternal grandparents, Thomas and Rebecca (Lockwood) Latchan, also natives of Delaware, are both deceased, she dying in 1823, and he, after coming west, in 1843, at the age of sixty-seven years. He was of Irish descent and she of English. This long line of American ancestors carries the family back to colonial days and identification with Revolutionary times. A period of two hundred years is covered by the generations represented in this sketch.
Mr. Merrick was married in Fowler, June 29, 1875, to Miss Martha Jane Hawkins, a daughter of Robert and Sarah (Carter) Hawkins, natives of Ohio. They came to Benton county, Indiana, in 1840, and were identified with the pioneer history of the county. The father, a prosperous farmer, died at Aydelott, in 1890, at the age of seventy-five years, and the mother at the same place, in 1882, about sixty years of age.
Mrs. Merrick was educated in her native state, and is a lady of accom- plishments. The only child by the marriage referred to is Laura, who was reared in tenderness and parental love, receiving a thorough education and a good training in music and art. She was married in December, 1895, and died March 2, 1898. She was a young lady of bright promise, a favorite among her school companions and girlhood friends. Mrs. Merrick is a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, but Mr. Merrick has never been identified with any religious organization. He contributes, however, to the support of the gospel and all worthy religious and charitable enter- prises.
JOHN SIMISON, M. D.
Dr. John Simison, of Romney, Tippecanoe county, Indiana, is now rounding out a half century of active practice in the medical profession in Tippecanoe county, and is the only physician now in the county who has been in continuous practice here since 1851.
The Simisons are of English descent. They came to America and settled at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, prior to the Revolutionary war. Robert Simison, Dr. Simison's grandfather, was a resident of Carlisle. He was
Ino, Simison
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BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY.
there married to a Miss Denny, and their children were Robert Elder, Boyd, Denny and Parker, and one daughter, whose name is forgotten, who mar- ried and settled at Mount Vernon, Alabama.
Robert Elder Simison, the father of our subject, was born in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and received a college education there. He learned the trade of hatter. In his young manhood he moved to New Garden, Columbiana county, Ohio, and in that locality married Miss Sarah Rogers, a native of Columbiana county. He passed the rest of his life in that part of Ohio, and died there at the age of fifty-two years. His children, in order of birth, were named Mary, Martha, Parker, John, David, Jane, Margaret and Catherine (twins) and Nancy. For many years Mr. Simison carried on a hat manufac- tory, but in later life engaged in agricultural pursuits. He was a man well known for his integrity of character, and had the esteem and respect of all who knew him.
Dr. John Simison was born November 16, 1824, at New Garden, Columbiana county, Ohio, and in his boyhood was a student at Atwater Academy, where he gained a thorough knowledge of the common branches, read some Latin and 'Greek, and became well versed in the higher mathe- matics. He then studied medicine in the office of Drs. Allen and Rice, of Rockville, Park county, Indiana, and attended the Medical College of Ohio, at Cincinnati. In the spring of 1851 he began the practice of medicine at Romney, Indiana, and soon established a large and lucrative practice over a wide range of the surrounding country, and became one of the best known of the early physicians.
About the time of his location here, in March, 1851, Dr. Simison mar- ried Miss Harriet Eliza Agnew, of Parke county, Indiana, who was born in that county September 30, 1832, daughter of Gibson and Eleanor (Smith) Agnew.
The Agnew family is an old and distinguished family of colonial Penn- sylvania, and, like the Simisons, traces its origin to England. Mrs. Simi- son's grandfather Agnew settled in Adams county, Pennsylvania, at a very early day, previous to the Revolution, and on a tract of land which he ac- quired he built a substantial, two-story stone residence. Being an edu- cated man, he built his residence large enough to have a school in one part of it, and he established and taught the first high school in that part of Penn- sylvania. Two of his brothers settled in the same vicinity, and all three were men of large landed possessions and were highly respected citizens. Grandfather Agnew's children were Smith, Joseph, Martha and Gibson. He was a member of the Seceder Presbyterian church, and lived to an advanced age. After his death his widow became the wife of a minister of that church. Each had a large family when they married-twenty-two children in all- 2
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and the school-room was then utilized as a part of the residence in order to accommodate them all.
Gibson Agnew, the father of Mrs. Simison, was born in 1708, at the homestead above referred to. In this connection it is a matter of interest to note that a portion of the great battle of Gettysburg was fought on this farm and the famous stone wall which was a part of the defence of the Union line was in part inade by Gibson Agnew. Mr. Agnew received a good com- mon-school education and taught school in his younger days. His brother, Joseph, was a physician in Pennsylvania, and Dr. Joseph Agnew's son, Dr. Hayes Agnew, an eminent surgeon of the United States Army, was President Garfield's physician at the time he was mortally wounded by Guiteau. When a young man Gibson Agnew went to Cincinnati, where he married Eleanor Smith, who was born in the neighborhood in which the Agnews lived, in Adams county, Pennsylvania, daughter of George Smith. The Smiths also were of English descent and among the colonial settlers of Penn- sylvania. George Smith was one of the pioneers of Cincinnati, where he kept a hotel and resided until his death, which occurred at a venerable age. After his marriage, about 1828, Gibson Agnew settled in Parke county, Indi- ana, near Rockwell, where he bought a tract of timber land which he cleared and improved, making a fine farm. On this farm all his children were born, namely: Martha, Sarah. Harriet Eliza, Amanda, William, Margaret, David, John, Mary, Smith, George and Irwin, -a sturdy pioneer family. In 1853 Mr. Agnew moved to Iowa and settled in Cedar county, on an improved farm consisting of half a section of land, and here he passed his remaining days, his death occurring in 1876, at the age of seventy-five years. Politically, he was a Democrat, and, religiously, a Presbyterian, an elder in the church from the time of his young manhood until his death, and he had three sons who were elders in that church, and the other three sons were deacons. All the daughters became members of the same religious body.
Dr. Simison and wife have spent the whole of their married life at Romney, and here have reared their family, their children in order of birth being Margaret A., Boyd Denny, Dr. John F., Charles G., David P. and Gertrude M.
The subject of our sketch has long been identified with the Masonic fra- ternity. He was one of the charter members of Romney Lodge, F. &. A. M., was its first worshipful master and held that office for several years. He has also taken the higher degrees of the order and is a member of the chap- ter and commandery at Lafayette. His religious creed is that of the Method- ist Episcopal church. For several years he has served as steward of the church and has always given liberally of his means to its support. Politically, he was first an old-line Whig, and when the Republican party was organized
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BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY.
in Tippecanoe county he was among the first to join its ranks, and was one of the founders of the Republican party in Randolph township. For four years he was one of the trustees of Randolph township.
In his long career as a physician Dr. Simison has accumulated a large and valuable medical library of the best medical books and is a patron of the leading medical periodicals of the day. The Doctor stands deservedly high as a physician among the medical fraternity of Indiana. His long and unbroken record of nearly half a century in active practice has thoroughly established his reputation, but he is best known and respected in the regions of his practice where he has so long been a familiar figure. He has always been noted for his kind and friendly disposition. He was never known to col- lect a bill by the aid of law and he has, without money or price, attended the sick and afflicted poor of his locality. His material reward, however, has been sufficient, gained by his honest industry and devotion to his profession. He is one of the largest land-owners in Tippecanoe county, having holdings to the amount of about two thousand acres of fertile land, and other valuable property. A few years ago he erected in Romney a beautiful and substantial residence, in modern style of architecture, and it is one of the finest homes in Tippecanoe county.
HON. EDWIN POLLOK HAMMOND.
Conspicuous among the representative members of the Indiana bar stands Hon. Edwin P. Hammond, who without question is one of the ablest exponents of the law in the state. The record of his career, as outlined below, must prove of interest to his innumerable friends and well-wishers, as it bespeaks the character and labors of a singularly successful, upright, patriotic citizen, who is now a resident of Lafayette.
Born in Brookville, Franklin county, Indiana, November 26, 1835, Edwin P. Hammond is a son of Nathaniel and Hannah H. (Sering) Ham- mond, the former a native of Maine and of fine old New England stock. He was married to Miss Sering in Brookville, Indiana, and became a pioneer of Franklin county, this state. In 1849 he removed to Columbus, Indiana, and later in life became a citizen of Jasper county, where he died in 1874. He was a temperate, industrious man, and was blessed with a happy old age. He left four sons and five daughters. One of the sons, Abram A. Ham- mond, was at one time governor of Indiana, and another son, William P., once represented Morgan county in the Indiana legislature, and later became a prominent lawyer of Albia, Iowa.
In early life the subject of this sketch worked on the farm, his educa- tional advantages being limited to the district schools, but by diligent appli-
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cation he obtained a wide fund of information. At the age of nineteen he became a clerk in the first wholesale dry-goods house established in Indian- apolis, and in 1855 he took up the study of law in the office of his half- brother, Hon. Abram A. Hammond, and Hon. Thomas H. Nelson, of Terre Haute. In the winter of 1856-7 he was admitted to the senior law class of Asbury (now DePauw) University, at Greencastle, and was graduated with the degree of Bachelor of Laws in 1857. Immediately afterward he located in Rensselaer, Jasper county, and there began his professional career, which has been a very successful one.
When the civil war came on, Mr. Hammond was one of the first to re- spond to President Lincoln's call for troops in defense of the Union. Vol- unteering in April, 1861, for the three-months service, in Company G, Ninth Indiana Infantry, he was elected second lieutenant and was after- ward commissioned first lieutenant of the company, which participated in the West Virginia campaign, under Colonel (afterward General) Robert H. Milroy. At the close of his service Mr. Hammond resumed his law practice in Rensselaer, and in October, 1861, was elected without opposi- tion as representative in the legislature from the counties of Newton, Jasper and Pulaski. In August following he assisted in recruiting Company A, Eighty-seventh Indiana Volunteers, and was chosen and commissioned its captain. March 22, 1863, he was promoted to the rank of major and on the 21st of the next November he was commissioned lieutenant-colonel. With the exception of a short time in the winter of 1863-4, when he was. at home on a recruiting service, he was continuously at the front, participat- ing in many of the most brilliant and hard-fought campaigns of the war. He took part in the battle of Chickamauga, September 19 and 20, 1863. When Colonel Newell Gleason, commander of his regiment, had been placed at the head of the brigade, Colonel Hammond assumed the vacated post of colonel of his regiment and continued in that capacity during the remainder of the war. This period included the hundred days of almost in- cessant fighting from Chattanooga to Atlanta, the march with Sherman to the sea and thence through the Carolinas to Washington. Colonel Hammond enjoyed the respect and good will of the officers and men under his com- mand and the confidence of his brigade, corps and division officers, who at the close of the war recommended that he be brevetted colonel of United States Volunteers, and accordingly he was appointed by the president to this brevet rank of colonel, his commission stating it to be " for gallant and meritorious service."
Quietly taking up the professional duties which he had abandoned in the hour of his country's peril, Colonel Hammond ere long had an extensive and remunerative practice, as he richly deserved. In March, 1873, Governor T.
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A. Hendricks appointed the Colonel to the position of judge of the thirtieth judicial circuit, and at the fall election of the same year he was elected to that office. Again, in 1878, he was elected without opposition for a term of six years. May 14, 1883, Judge Hammond was appointed by Governor A. G. Porter as judge of the supreme court of the state from the Fifth district. This appointment was made to fill a vacancy caused by the appointment of Hon. William A. Woods (then judge of the supreme court) to the judgeship of the district court of the United States for Indiana. In the fall of 1884 Judge Hammond was the nominee of the Republican party for judge of the supreme court from the fifth district, and with his party was defeated. Though he was not successful in the race, the fact that he received five thou- sand more votes than did the head of the ticket was ample evidence of the excellent record he had made and of his popularity with the people of the state. He retired from the supreme-court bench January 1, 1885, after hav- ing gained for himself an enviable reputation for judicial impartiality, firm- ness and knowledge of the law. For the next five years he practiced unin- terruptedly at Rensselaer, at the expiration of which period he was again elected judge of the circuit court and as such served until August, 1892. At that time he resigned and entered into partnership with Charles B. and Will- iam V. Stuart, under the firm name of Stuart Brothers & Hammond, now one of the strongest law firms of Lafayette, whither Judge Hammond removed in 1894. As a lawyer he has long sustained the reputation of being of the ablest in Indiana; as a judge his rulings and opinions have commanded the respect of the highest authorities. Gifted with a keen, analytical mind and rare powers of discrimination and judgment and intimate knowledge of the law, his services on the supreme-court bench, as well as on that of the circuit court, were such as to place him among the ablest jurists of the time. In appreciation and recognition of the high rank which he had achieved at the bar, Wabash College conferred upon him the degree of Doctor of Laws in 1892.
Previous to the civil war Judge Hammond was affiliated with the Demo- cratic party, but since that time has been an ardent Republican. He was' a delegate in the Republican national convention, at Philadelphia, in 1872, which nominated General Grant for his second term. Fraternally, he is a Mason, a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and of the Grand Army of the Republic.
In 1864 the Judge married Miss Mary V. Spitler and their children are as follows: Louie, wife of William B. Austin, of Rensselaer, Indiana; Angela, wife of Edward A. Horner, of Leadville, Colorado; Edwin P., Jr., a graduate of the Indiana State University, is now practicing law with his father; Jean and Nina V.
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BIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY.
JEROME H. CROUSE, M. D.
For nearly sixty years the Crouses, father and son, have been engaged in the practice of medicine in Dayton, Tippecanoe county, and have been prominently connected with all local progressive movements. They have been on the side of temperance, the father being associated with the old Wash- ingtonian Society and the son identified with the order of Good Templars. Both have been devoted to the Republican party, the father having formerly been a Whig, and later on of the foremost champions of the party which succeeded it, voting for John C. Fremont. His services on behalf of his party were recognized in his being elected to the state senate, in which he ably represented the public.
In following back the ancestry of the subject of this article it is learned that he is of German extraction on the paternal side. His great-grandfa- ther, George Crouse, come to America some time in the early part of the eighteenth century, and settled in Cumberland county, Pennsylvania. Henry Crouse, the grandfather, was born July 6, 1768, in Cumberland county, and married a lady of the same locality, Salome Hevison, she having been born February 15, 1766. Their children were as follows: Caroline, born May 20, 1792; Leah, March 6, 1794; Henry, August 1, 1796; Maria, July 15, 1798; Simon, July 25, 1802; John, August 15, 1804; David, September 18, 1808; Elizabeth, October 15, 1810; and Daniel, November 10, 1814. Henry Crouse removed to Germantown, Ohio, about 1820, and cleared a farm in that locality. In 1830 he settled in Marion county, Indiana, on land which was afterward chosen as the site of the asylum for the insane, near Indianapolis. He bought and cleared a quarter section of land there and spent the rest of his days on that homestead. He died while still in the prime of life, owing to injuries received from a falling tree, which he had cut down. He was a member of the German Reformed church.
Dr. David H. Crouse, father of our subject, was a young man when he accompanied the family to Marion county, in 1830, and for ten years there- after he assisted in the management of the property which his senior had purchased there. He then came to Dayton and bought land, gradually extending his possessions until he had about five hundred acres. For the most part, he purchased his farms from the original owners, and having greatly improved his special homestead, in 1860 he built a substantial two- story brick residence upon it, and within its hospitable walls his son, our sub- ject, has dwelt for many years. In 1843 he was graduated in the Jefferson Medical College, of Philadelphia, and had previously studied with his brother, Daniel B., a successful early practitioner of Dayton and vicinity. He at once established himself in practice in Dayton and for more than two-score
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years was a leading physician in this portion of the county. In the first years of his practice he was obliged to ride to distant places, as doctors were few and the population very scattering. For years he was a faithful member of the Presbyterian church and officiated as an elder in the same.
For his first wife Dr. David H. Crouse chose Rachel, daughter of Fred- erick and Catherine Gelwicks, of Franklin county, Pennsylvania. The Gel- wicks were of sturdy Dutch stock, and have been represented in this country since colonial days. The homestead owned by Frederick Gelwick was located some eight miles northwest of Chambersburg, and had been handed down from father to son for several generations. They were substantial farmers and were zealous members of the German Reformed church. The old Gelwick farm, a place of about three hundred acres, has never passed from the family and is now owned by a grandson of Frederick Gelwick. His children were John, Susan, Elizabeth, Mrs. Hartzell, Frederick and Rachel. To Dr. Crouse and wife Rachel several children were born, and those who lived to maturity were Salome C., who married Elijah Earl, Victoria V., wife of V. S. Burton; and Jerome H. Subsequently to the death of his first wife, in 1845, Dr. D. H. Crouse married Rachel Baker, by whom he had two children who survived: Meigs V., a former pastor of a Presbyterian church, and now the superintendent of a children's home in Cincinnati, Ohio; and Elda. The third wife of the Doctor, Mrs. Lydia Peter (nce Leibenguth) survived him, and is still living. His death took place Decem- ber 7, 1884, at his old home, where his active and useful career had been chiefly spent.
The birth of Dr. Jerome H. Crouse occurred December 30, 1843, in Dayton, Indiana. He attended Wabash College after he had finished a common-school education, but the civil war broke in rudely upon his studies. He enlisted at eighteen years of age in the Tenth Indiana Battery, light artil- lery, under Captain J. B. Cox, as a private, for three years or as long as the war should last. He served under the great leaders, Buell and Rosecrans, took part in the battles of Pittsburg Landing, Stone River, Chickamauga, Corinth and the great four-months struggle known as the Atlanta cam- paign. After the fall of Atlanta he and his battery were placed in charge of a gunboat on the Tennessee river, and he was honorably discharged at Nashville, Tennessee, February 1, 1865. His service was a most creditable one, and he was relied upon by his superior officers, who knew that he would always be found at his post of duty, whatever happened. Though he partici- pated in the numerous hard-fought battles and campaigns in which his battery took part, he escaped capture and wounds, save once, when he was accidentally injured in the left shoulder. For some time he was connected with Wilder's brigade and was sent on several raids in the neighborhood of Atlanta. Since
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