USA > Indiana > Blackford County > Blackford and Grant Counties : Indiana a chronicle of their past and present with family lineage and personal memoirs > Part 16
USA > Indiana > Grant County > Blackford and Grant Counties : Indiana a chronicle of their past and present with family lineage and personal memoirs > Part 16
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Warren Fergus was born on the old farm near his present home in Jefferson township, September 21, 1837. His early life was spent in the primitive surroundings of that time and his educational advantages were more practical than theoretical. When eighteen years of age he started for California, but on account of the "Border Ruffian" war of 1856, he
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only went as far west as Kansas. He traveled all over Kansas, then practically unsettled except by Indians. In 1860 he was married and in the following year he and his young wife went out to Iowa, locating in Paige county. There on August 9, 1862, he responded to the call for volunteers .in defense of the Union, enlisting in Company F of the Twenty-Third Iowa Infantry. As a private he served until his honor- able discharge, which was delivered to him on August 11, 1865. He made a splendid record as a soldier, was always on duty, never in the hospital, was never wounded nor captured, and the record of the Iowa regiment to which he belonged is practically the record of his individual service. He was in many of the great campaigns of the war, including the long series of operations about Vicksburg, Fort Gibson, Raymond, Champion Hill, Black River Bridge, where the regiment lost its colonel, through the forty-nine days of the actual siege of Vicksburg, later went down to New Orleans, and into Texas, participated in the Red River Campaign, where he saw some of his hardest fighting, was at the siege of Mobile, and so continued until the close of the great conflict.
In the fall of 1866 Mr. Fergus returned to Grant county where he was born, and bought eighty acres of land. There he began farming and carpenter work, a trade which he had learned in young manhood, and has since enjoyed a degree of success which ranks him among the most progressive men of Grant county. His estate now com- prises one hundred and eighty acres in Jefferson township, besides sixty acres in Washington township, Delaware county, Indiana. The property is all well improved and well kept, and about thirty years ago Mr. Fergus built a fine barn on a foundation fifty by fifty-six feet, and also a comfortable nine-room white brick dwelling house.
The wife whom he married in 1860 in Jefferson township was Miss Nancy Jane Horner, who was born in Ohio, September 9, 1837, and when fifteen years of age was brought to Jefferson township by her parents, Andrew and Nancy (Walker) Horner. Her father was born in Pennsylvania, and her mother in Rockbridge, Virginia, and after their marriage in the latter state, moved to Miami county, Ohio, where they improved a homestead, later going to Darke county, Ohio, and afterwards to Jefferson township in Grant county, Indiana. Mr. Horner was an industrious citizen and hard worker and after a worthy lifetime died in Jefferson township in 1873 at the age of sixty-seven. His wife died later at the home of her daughter, Mrs. Fergus, April 1, 1895, aged eighty-seven years. They were Presbyterians, and Mr. Horner was a Republican in politics. Mrs. Fergus has one brother living, Calvin Horner, who is a farmer at Upland.
The children born to Mr. and Mrs. Fergus are as follows: Ida M., is the wife of Eugene Heal, living in Delaware county, Indiana, and their children are Caroline and Alma. Oscar W. lives on a ranch near Santa Ana, California, and his children are Nevada, Floyd, Fern, and Grant. Emery W. and Elnora E. are twins, and the former by his marriage to Maude Lang has a son, Ernest R., and their home is in Santa Barbara, California. Elnora E. married J. William Richards, a farmer in Jefferson township, and they had one son, Ord, who died aged two and a half years. Lois A. is the wife of D. L. Richards, a sketch of whom will be found elsewhere in this publication. Orvil L. is a farmer in Delaware county, Indiana, and by his marriage to Della Owen has two children, Eva aud Forrest. Edward C. lives near Santa Ana, California, on a ranch, and married Pearl Powers. Clyde H. operates the home farm and married Olive Vida Watson of the state of California, and their one child is Warren R., Mrs. Fergus is a mem- ber of the Presbyterian church and Mr. Fergus attends that church. In politics he is aligned with the new Progressive party.
JOHN H. MOORE
MRS. JOHN H. MOORE
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JOHN H. MOORE. Successful and prosperous in all his undertakings in Monroe township, it is highly probable that John H. Moore is best known in these parts as a horse breeder and owner of fast horses. In this he is especially prominent, and he has an aggregation of horseflesh on his acres from year to year that is highly creditable to his judgment in those matters, the while he has bred and sold a number of horses that have gained lasting names on the race track. He is the owner of a considerable farm land in the township and county, and has accumulated a goodly portion of property of varied nature in the district. A man of the keenest business qualities, he has never stood a loss on any of his real estate transactions, in many instances doubling his money and always realizing a handsome profit. His property, of a farming nature, lies mainly in section 27, and his is among the finest farm land in the state. Eighty acres in Monroe township, devoted to grazing purposes, and one hundred and twenty acres in Jefferson township, put to the same use, comprise a part of his farming properties.
John H. Moore was born in New Cumberland, Guernsey county, Ohio, on October 20, 1855, and is the son of Henry and Rachel (Seaton) Moore. The father was a volunteer during the Civil war, and was killed at the Battle of the Wilderness, while serving as a member of Company G, 112th Ohio Volunteer Infantry in the Union army. His widow was left almost defenseless as regards material welfare with a family of six small children, all of whom she succeeded in raising to years of maturity. When the father found that it would be necessary to leave his little family, despite the fact that he could not provide for them in his absence, he bought a small place of three acres in Muskingum county, Ohio, and there established the mother and children. When he went away the mother heroically applied herself to the task of support- ing her family, and the death of the husband and father on the field of battle made necessary her continued activity in that work. She sewed and performed every kind of honest labor that came to her hand, but she maintained the growing family in comparative comfort, and gave them some sort of schooling, and when she died in October, 1901, she departed this life with the knowledge that she had been able to establish each of her children firmly in the way of life. The children are named as follows: Mary, the wife of George Lane, of Zanesville, Ohio; Charles, of Muskingum county, Ohio; John H., of this review; Andrew, of Perry county, Ohio; William, who was struck by lightning and killed in Guern- sey county, Ohio, in 1883.
John H. Moore left home at the age of eighteen years and came to Upland in October, 1874. He applied himself to such tasks as came to his hand, and his first work was in husking corn at $12 a month. He then went to work clearing land for $9.25 an acre, and while thus engaged just about made his board. In 1875 and 1876 he worked on a farm at the wage of $18 a month, and in 1877 he rented a piece of land and raised a fine crop of grain. In the fall of 1877 he bought eight head of big, raw boned cattle for $100 and found after fattening them for the market that he was in a position to make some money in that enterprise, after which he continued to feed live stock and crop his rented land on shares. In 1881 he engaged in a partnership with an acquaintance and they conducted a buying and selling business in live stock for the six years following, when he married and settled elsewhere. For twelve years thereafter he lived in Upland, engaged in the hotel business. During that time he invested $755 in a piece of corner property in Upland, which he held for eighteen years, renting it meantime, and then sold it when the oil and gas boom was on for $2,550. His hotel, which cost him $1,400, was a place suitable to accommodate forty guests, and in 1900 he traded the place for an eighty acre farm, where he now
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resides, and which is held assessable at $110 an acre. When Mr. Moore moved on this farm it had no buildings suitable for a dwelling, but he erected a nice home and also some barns. Through his wife, Mr. Moore has added eighty acres of desirable land to his other possessions, she having been the owner of that when she married him.
When Mr. Moore went to live on his present farm, the land was greatly impoverished, but he has since that time successfully built it up to a high state of productiveness. He is a firm believer in the conserva- tion of the soil through the breeding of live stock, and he has a fine herd of twenty head of Hereford and Shorthorn cattle. He has twelve horses, all high bred roadsters and racers, and for fifteen years he has been a noted breeder in these parts. Several well known horses have been foaled on his premises, and he has sold a number of famous racers from his stables. In 1904, Dolly Etta C, with a record of 2:19:4, and a product of his stables, brought him a fancy price, and others that have gained name and fame in racing circles are Coast Marie, 2:11:25; Rock Line, 2:16; Princess Margrave, about three years old, and starting the season of 1913, which won the three-year-old in Muncie, Ind., and he sold her for $1,175 to S. B. Smith of Chicago. She is now in Wisconsin and has never lost a race; Colored Girl, 2:22:5, is another well known horse of his. In addition, Mr. Moore has several high bred colts that promise well for the future.
Mr. Moore got his start in fast horses by securing a well known racing mare, Alexis, owned by Alvin Dickinson. This mare has produced several fine racers, and three of her foals have been sold from his stables at an average price of $1,162.50. One of them, Rockline, won first money at Manchester, Indiana, in the fall of 1912 in the 2:22 class.
On March 24, 1887, Mr. Moore was married to Mrs. Minnie Johnson, of Upland, and to them has been born one child, Bertha, who is now deceased.
Mr. Moore is a Republican, and he and his wife are members of the church of the Friends.
WILLIAM ALONZO BOLE. The residence of the Bole family in Jef- ferson township dates back to the year 1877. In section twelve of that township, one of the most productive and valuable farms in the com- munity is that of Mr. Bole, who in later years has retired largely from active participation in farming, but has sons who are carrying forward the work and continue to increase the prosperity so long enjoyed by this family.
The name Bole is of Dutch origin, and Grandfather William Bole was born in Pennsylvania in 1791, and died in Shelby county, Indiana, in 1862. He was married in Pennsylvania, and they moved out to Ohio and lived at Georgetown in Brown county, where all their children were born. Their family were: David, John, William, Abraham, and James, and four daughters, Jane, Ann, Elizabeth and Mary.
William Bole, father of the Jefferson township resident, was born in Brown county, Ohio, in 1814, and though reared on a farm, early in life he began an apprenticeship at the shoemaker's trade, and finally located at Neville, in Clermont county, Ohio, where he married Rosanna A. Melvin, who was born at Snow Hill, Maryland, in 1810, and came to Ohio with her father, William Melvin, who located at Neville, on the Ohio River. William Melvin was likewise a shoemaker, and William Bole worked in the same town with him after his marriage, but later moved to Foster's Landing in Kentucky, and in 1856 brought his wife and three children to Fayette county, Indiana, later lived both in Madi- son and Henry counties, and finally in Delaware county. In 1874 he
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moved to Grant county, but returned to Muncie, where his death occured in 1898 at the age of eighty-four years. His wife passed away in 1895 and she too was past eighty years of age. William Alouzo Bole, the oldest of the family, was born at Neville, Ohio, March 6, 1841. His sister Melissa, born in 1845, married J. S. Petty, a prominent and well- known man whose death occurred in Martinsville, Indiana. For her second husband she married a Mr. Fisk, a Massachusetts banker, and since his death her home has been in Muncie. She was at one time a skilled instrumental musician, and is a cultured and highly intelligent woman. She had two sons: Wilber and Walter, both of whom died after being married. James M. Bole, brother of William A. Bole, is a farmer in Jefferson township, and has a family.
William Alonzo Bole grew up in his father's home in the different localities of their residence, and was still under age when he enlisted September 5, 1861, in Company E of Eighth Indiana Infantry. One of his early engagements was the battle of Pea Ridge, Arkansas, and in the course of that conflict he passed his twenty-first birthday. With his regiment he saw a long and varied military service. From the early Missouri and Arkansas campaigns, the regiment went east of the Mis- sissippi, and took part in the battles preliminary to the capture of Vicksburg, at Fort Gibson, Raymond, Jackson, Champion Hill, Black River Bridge, and the Siege of Vicksburg. The regiment later was sent to the east, and was placed under the command of Sheridan, which valiant leader they followed in the battles of Winchester and Cedar Creek. He was never in the hospital a day, never wounded or cap- tured. On returning home to Delaware county, he took up the quiet vocation of farming, but after five years learned telegraphy, and be- came an operator. While living at Muncie, he married Miss Ida V. Hill, who was born in Indiana and died two years after their marriage. The one son of that union is Robert Bole, who is married and lives in California. In 1877 Mr. Bole came to Jefferson township in Grant county, and here married Mrs. Mary D. (Havens) Payne. She was born in Mill township of Grant county, July 29, 1845, was reared in Jefferson township until her marriage, and represents an old and prominent family in Grant county. Her parents were Jonathan and Gabriella (Clark) Havens, her father a native of Ohio, and her mother of Pennsylvania. They married and came at an early day to Grant county, where Jonathan Havens improved a farm in the midst of the timber in Jefferson township, and spent the rest of his years there until his death in 1863 when forty years of age. His wife is still living, her home being in Fowlerton. For further information concerning the Havens family, the reader is referred to the sketch of Jonathan Havens, elsewhere in this volume.
The children of Mr. and Mrs. Bole are as follows: Rolly, born October 14, 1875, educated in the public schools, a resident of Hartford City, married Ann Hickman, and they have four children, two sons and two daughters, Clarence, Robert, Clara and Pauline. Capitola, born November 12, 1877, is the wife of Alonzo G. Monroe, a farmer of Jeffer- son township. Their living children are four sons and one daughter : Raymond, Doris, Derward, Dwight and Dean. Winifred, born in 1880, is the wife of Walter Deddys of Hartford City, and they have one son and two daughters: Helen, Catherine and John. Jesse, born in 1882, is unmarried, and is the active superintendent of his father's farm of one hundred acres, a place thoroughly improved and kept up to the best standards of Jefferson county country life. Jennie is the wife of Dwight Blumer of Toronto, Ohio, and they have two sons and a daugh- ter, Clifford, William and Helen. Arley E. lives at home, and also assists in managing the farm. He was well educated in the local high
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school and in a business college. Mr. Bole belongs to the Christian church, while his wife is of the Primitive Baptist. He is a Republican in national politics, and in local affairs gives the strength of his influence in every movement to make life better and more comfortable in his town- ship and county. His three sons are all members of the Socialist party.
JAMES NOAH JOHNSON. Of the old-time families of Grant county, none better deserve perpetuation in the biographical annals of this section than that of Johnson, the first record of whom begins here in 1835, only a few years after Grant county was organized, and which has been con- tinued with honor down to the present. The Johnsons have for years been reckoned among the largest land holders in the county, and as they acquired their property by good business judgment and strictest honesty, so likewise were they always worthy factors in the development and in the civic and social activities of the county.
The late J. Noah Johnson, who died at his home at Upland in 1893, was of the third generation of the family in its identity with Grant county, and his children in turn have taken honored positions in the social and business affairs of this county. He was born on the old Johnson home in Jefferson township in 1858. His grandfather John Johnson of Scotch ancestry and of that substantial stock which formed so important an element in early Pennsylvania settlement, and of course of Presbyterian faith, was born in Pennsylvania, March 22, 1787, was a pioneer setler in Ohio, and spent most of his active career in Guernsey county of that state, where he died in 1862. He was a man of enter- prise who saw much beyond his immediate horizon, and one evidence of this was given when in 1835 he came to Indiana, and entered one hun- dred and sixty acres in section eight of Jefferson township in Grant county, and entered land to twice that amount in Delaware county. Securing this land, he returned to his old home in Guernsey county, where he lived until his death. He was married in that county to Mary Burns, and her birth also occurred in Pennsylvania, so far as known, its date being October 17, 1793. She died in Guernsey county in 1866. Both were strict adherents of the Presbyterian church. Their children were named as follows: John, James, Jane, William, Ebenezer, Jess, Martha and Nancy. All these children were married except Jess, who is now the only survivor, and is a resident of Mill township, this county. James, Nancy, and John many years ago came out and settled on the land entered by their father in Indiana. Nancy married a Mr. Crow and they spent their lives in Delaware and Grant counties, Indiana, dying on the Crow farm, now occupied by W. O. Modley, near Matthews. John J. died not many years after he came to his father's farm in Jefferson township, Grant county.
James Johnson, who was born in Guernsey county, Ohio, November 2, 1821, was married July 4, 1843, in that county to Elizabeth Schriver, who was born in Guernsey county of German ancestry in 1825. In a month or two after their marriage they came out to Indiana, and took possession of the quarter section of land in Jefferson township entered by his father in 1835. Though the early settlers had been at work for ten or fifteen years, Jefferson township still presented a great expanse of uncleared wilderness, and it was in the midst of the woods that James Johnson and wife began life in a log cabin. Eventually they de veloped their land into a beautiful farm, and the substantial frame house which finally replaced the log cabin is still in a state of fine repair, and occupied by the granddaughter of James Johnson. Besides the large dwelling house, James Johnson put up many other buildings, cleared up a large acreage for cultivation, and actually added by his own labor and management thousands of dollars in practical value to
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his home community. Few men of that time were more successful than James Johnson, who extended his possessions until at one time he was the owner of more than three thousand acres, most of which was situated in Grant county. He raised more cattle and sheep than any other man in Jefferson township, and was also an extensive dealer in timber. His death occurred at the old homestead in Jefferson township, December 1, 1908, when in advanced years. His wife passed away in January, 1902. They were Presbyterians, and belonged to the strict sect of that religion, and endeavored to bring up all their children in the same faith. Their children were John, Solomon, Emma and James Noah, all of whom were farmers, and were married and had children of their own except Solo- mon, who, while married, has no children.
The late J. Noah Johnson spent his early life on the old homestead, was a farmer, inherited much of his father's business ability, and increased the talents inherited from the preceding generation. He lived on the farm in Jefferson township until after his wife's death, when he moved to Fairmount. He was engaged in the banking business there a short time, when his father, James Johnson, organized the Upland Bank and Noah Johnson became its cashier and remained so until his death, November 10, 1893.
J. Noah Johnson married Bell Conley, who was born at Upland, and who died May 16, 1890. The Conleys were likewise a well known old family of Grant county. The children of Noah Johnson and wife were: Bertha, wife of Charles Snyder, whose sketch appears elsewhere in this work; Alva, engaged in the real estate business at Marion, and who has a family of two children; and Elva, a twin sister of Alva, and the wife of Charles F. Marley, whose individual sketch appears on other pages. Mrs. Marley was born on her grandfather's farm, April 30, 1885, was well educated in Grant county schools, and through her grandfather's will has become the owner of five hundred and eighty acres of land. She was married February 8, 1909, to Charles F. Marley.
BARZILLA B. PANCOAST. The following paragraphs contain a brief outline of the family history and the varied career of one of the most venerable men of Jefferson township, where he has lived and prospered as a farmer for the past thirty years. Mr. Pancoast is now over eighty years of age, has always borne the reputation of being a hard-working, honest and upright citizen, and in his community enjoys the esteem of a large acquaintance.
The Pancoast family is said to have been originally Swedish, and their early residence in New Jersey would bear out that assumption. The grandparents of the Jefferson township farmer spent all their lives in New Jersey, and so far as known practically all members of the dif- ferent generations have followed farming as a vocation. The father of Barzilla B. Pancoast was Henry Pancoast, born in Salem county, New Jersey, and died there in August, 1835. The other members of his family were: Edward, who was a farmer and lived in Salem county, was twice married, but had only one daughter, Sarah; William, who spent his life on a farm in Salem county, New Jersey, was married twice and had one son, Stacey ; Samuel, who lived and died on his farm in Salem county, was also twice married, had one son by his first wife, and a son and two daughters by the second; Sarah married Samuel Dickerson and her life also was spent in New Jersey.
Henry Pancoast belonged to a family that adhered to Quaker doc- trines, and that was also his own religious faith. He was a Jackson Democrat, and all members of the Pancoast family have been strongly inclined in that way of political thinking. Henry Pancoast was mar- ried in his native county to Hannah Hackney, who was born in Salem
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county in 1788, and came of English stock. After a long widowhood she died in New Jersey in 1878. She belonged to the Methodist church. Her five children are mentioned as follows: Mary, who in October, 1913, was ninety-five years of age, and a resident of New Castle, Dela- ware; she married Hiram Cook, by whom she had a family. Caroline died after her marriage to Isaac James, a machinist, and they had one son and a daughter. Rebecca married James Cook, a brother of Hiram Cook just mentioned, and they spent their lives in New Jersey, and of their children, two sons and three daughters are living. Edward, whose home is at Riverton, New Jersey, and who is seventy-eight years of age, and retired, had a very successful career as a contractor and builder, and by his marriage to a second cousin, Rebecca Hackney, he has one son and a daughter still living.
Barzilla B. Pancoast was born at Woodstown, Salem county, New Jersey, May 23, 1831. When he was four years of age his father died, and he was then reared by his mother and his uncle Samuel until he was sixteen years of age. His education was somewhat limited, and acquired in the schools at Woodtown. His preparation for a practical career of usefulness in the world began at sixteen when he entered an apprenticeship to the blacksmith's trade, and at twenty had become a master workman and started out as a journeyman. He worked in Cincinnati and various places in Ohio; also in Indiana and Tennessee, and finally went back to Ohio, and at Beavertown, Montgomery county, Ohio, where he was married, he established a smith and carried on a good business there and elsewhere until 1883. That was the year he came to Grant county. In the meantime, by his many years of hard work and by the thrifty habits which he had acquired early in life, he had enough money to buy eighty acres of land lying in sections eleven and twelve of Jefferson township, in Grant county. Since turning his attention to agriculture, Mr. Pancoast has seldom known a year which he could not call prosperous, and at the same time he developed and improved his land, until as a farm its equal is hard to find in this com- munity. All his land is in cultivation with the exception of five acres in timber. He has a comfortable dwelling, a big red barn, and has put up several other buildings for the home of his son. In December, 1857, in Beavertown, Montgomery county, Ohio, Mr. Pancoast married Sarah Bridgeman, who was born there September 24, 1841, and reared and educated in that part of Ohio. She has been a devoted wife and an able helper to her husband for fifty-six years, and their married companion- ship has not only endured much beyond half a century, but each year has strengthened the bond of their affection. Mrs. Pancoast's parents were Thomas and Esther (Johns) Bridgeman, her mother of Welsh stock, and her father born of Virginia parents. Mr. Bridgeman in his early day, when a young man, walked all the way from Harpers Ferry in Virginia to Montgomery county, Ohio, carrying his trusty rifle over his shoulder to protect himself from danger and also to shoot game on the way. He met Miss Sarah Johns in Montgomery county, where she was born, and after their marriage, they started life as farmers. She died, leaving two sons. He later married Esther, a sister of Sarah Johns. Mr. Bridgeman died in Montgomery county, in November, 1882, when eighty-four years of age, and his wife passed away at about the same age. They were both members of the Christian church.
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