USA > Indiana > Lake County > Encyclopedia of genealogy and biography of Lake County, Indiana, with a compendium of history 1834-1904 > Part 8
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Of the nine members of the Sigler family of 1837 one only is now living. Mr. Eh Sigler, of Hebron, for many years one of the principal busi- ness men of that town. He has a son in Crown Point, Mr. E. Sigler, jeweler, and a daughter, Mrs. W. B. Brown: and William Sigler has a son in this county, Charles Sigler, the hotel builder at Cedar Lake. Samuel Sigler. the
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pioneer, has in the county other grandchildren. His descendants are to be found in other family lines.
BELSHAW .- GEORGE BELSHAW came from England, with quite a large family, in 1834. The family located for a short time on Rolling Prairie in LaPorte county, where the older daughter. Mary, was married. The family soon came to the south part of Lake Prairie, that beauty of the In- diana prairie belt, and there settled on farms in this county of Lake. The sons were George. William, Henry, Charles, and Samuel. The daughter who came to Lake Prairie was named Ann. She died in 1846 when eighteen years of age. Her memorial is in the "Lake of the Red Cedars."
This family, with the exception of two sons, removed to Oregon in 1853, where George Belshaw, who had married the younger daughter of Judge McCarty, became a large and noted wheat-raiser.
WILLIAM BELSHAW, who remained in this county, had visited England in 1846 to see once more his birthplace, and in 1847 had been married to Miss Harriet A. Jones, continuing to live on his Lake Prairie farm, died there in November, 1884, seventy-one years of age. Of his three sons, one. Edward Belshaw, now lives at Lowell. His daughters are, in number, also three. all married and well settled in life.
HENRY BELSHAW, the other son remaining in this county, married Miss Mary Smith. He resided for many years on his pine grove farin and then removed to Lowell, where he died a few years ago. He had two sons and five daughters. One daughter is Mrs. Simeon Sanger, of Lowell, and the youngest, Candace, was married, October 22, 1884, to E. W. Dinwiddie, of Plum Grove.
J. D. JONES came to this county in 1847. He was born in Massachu- setts, January 9. 1808. was married, January 7. 1829, to Miss Polly Calkins, who was born June 9. 1809. This wife died April 10, 1856. One of her daughters, Miss Ann C. Jones, was married in 1846 to John Wheeler, after- ward Colonel Wheeler, who fell in battle on the bloody but decisive battle- field of Gettysburg. Another of her daughters was Mrs. Burr Judson, now
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living in Crown Point. And the third was married to William Clark, grand- son of the pioneer Judge William Clark.
.April 4. 1857, one year after the death of his first wife. J. D. Jones. then thirty-nine years of age, was married to a widow woman. Mrs. Nelson. who had two young sons, one of whom became the well known banker, now living at Lowell. Frank Nelson. He is therefore a step-brother of Mrs. Judson, of Crown Point. The father and step-father of these two well known citizens was a West Creek farmer, living many years on his farm in the Belshaw or Pine Grove neighborhood and died April 23. 1893. eighty- five years of age, for about forty-six years a citizen of Lake county.
MERRILL and MERRILLVILLE .- In 1837, when according to the Claim Register eighty-one men became settlers in the newly organized county, DUDLEY MERRILL bought a claim which had been made by Amsi L. Ball or by his son. John Ball, settiers of 1836, located on Deep River south of "Miller's Mill." But he soon obtained land at Wiggins' Point and made there a permanent home. WILLIAM MERRILL, his brother, came with him in 1837 as a settler. He also obtained land at Wiggins' Point, and at length erected a quite large frame dwelling house on the north side of the old Indian trail, opposite the Indian dancing floor where the Saxton family had located. that trail becoming the mail route to Joliet from LaPorte and a great thoroughfare for western travel.
Soon village life commenced. A hotel was opened and a store, and then a blacksmith shop, and the name of Wiggins' Point was changed to Centerville. A postoffice was needed before long, and the name was changed to Merrillville. Both the brothers had sons, and around the Saxton and Merrill families quite a community grew up. Dudley Merrill started into operation a cheese factory, having also for a time the hotel, and carrying on a farm. Only one of his sons, Charles L. Merrill. is now living; Dr. Wallace Merrill is a son of William Merrill; and one of his daughters be- came a good teacher. There were two other brothers of this Pennsylvania Merrill family who settled in this county, JOHN MERRILL and LEWIS MER-
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RILL., both of these being for some time citizens of Crown Point. Two sis- ters also became residents of the county; and of the descendants of William and Dudley and John and Lewis Merrill, and of the sisters, there are many to represent still their Pennsylvania ancestors, though not all bearing the Merrill name.
JACOB HURLBURT was a young man in Porter county in 1834. He was with the United States surveyors, as an assistant in some capacity, in the summer of that year, while they camped where afterward Crown Point grew up; and in October of that year he guided Solon Robinson with his party to that same locality. He at length settled in the eastern part of Lake county and gave name to what has long been known as Hurlburt Corners. He was a good citizen. He lived to be quite an aged man and died in February. 188T.
CYRUS M. MASON was born in Otisco, Onondaga county, New York, January 27. 1811. He was the son of Josiah Mason. When he was ten years of age the family removed to Berry township and there remained for some years. In the spring of 1832, then twenty-one years of age, he went with his father's family into Michigan Territory, a member of a true pioneer family in that newly settled region, a large tract of land in Indiana and Michigan having that year been purchased from the Pottawattamie Indians. He remained some time with his father in Michigan and learned the art of brickmaking. In 1838. about December, he went into LaPorte county, Indiana, and cultivated a farm there in the summer of 1839. In 1840 he came into Lake county and settied on a farm a mile east of Crown Point, where he lived through the remainder of a long, active, useful life.
In 1841 he commenced making brick according to the slow and labori- ous process of those days, and made one million before he discontinued the business. He was a constituent member of the Crown Point Presbyterian church, one of its first Elders. and from his official position was widely known as Deacon Mason. He lived to be eighty-six and a half years of age, a highly valued and valuable member of the church and of the community.
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His father died in Michigan about 1850, seventy-five years of age, and his mother, born in 1777. died in 1871. wanting only six years of filling out a century.
Before Deacon Mason's death, feeling that he would soon pass away, he requested the writer of this memorial to take down from his dying lips. while his mental faculties were still good, the foregoing outline of a long life. Surely no one more richly than he deserves the name of a worthy pio- neer. Such men lay good foundations as builders of states or counties or neighborhoods; and many such helped to make Lake county as virtuous as still it is. Let their names be honored.
JOHN UNDERWOOD was one of three brothers. Harmon Underwood and Daniel Underwood. the other two, who had farms, one, two, and three miles east from Merrillville. His sisters now living are Mrs. Harper. Mrs. Joy, and Mrs. Palmer. He carried on a farm for many years. He was County Commissioner in 1858, and a debt of gratitude is due to him for preventing by his tact a proposed loss of territory from the county.
Unknown, perhaps, to many of his neighbors, he was decidedly a poet. This writer calls him the poet of Lake county, and he knows of nothing written in Indiana, of the same style of poetic composition, to excel "El Muza" and "Lindenwald" written by the plain farmer. John Underwood. His style of writing is very different from that of James Whitcomb Riley. It is not humorous. It is not pathetic. It may not be called popular. But it shows much historic reading and a vivid fancy, good descriptive powers and a love for beauty in scenery and nobleness and greatness in human action.
"El Muza" is a Spanish tale of love and war in nine cantos, pages 148, and one who can read with interest Sir Walter Scott's "Vision of Don Roderick," ought to read with interest "El Muza."
"Lindenwald" is a larger work, pages 165, also nine cantos, and deals also with war and human love. It is historic. Is called a "Tale of the Siege of Vienna." The author says in his preface, "The year 1683 will ever
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be memorable in Anstrian history as the last invasion by the Turks and the siege of Vienna." That the author had read European history to some pur- pose is evident, and a cultivated mind. interested in historic poetry in which facts are interwoven with poetic fiction. will find interest in this. Lake county has no writer who can equal these poems now.
PRAIRIE WEST PIONEERS.
Among a few very early residents who were considerably advanced in life was one of the settlers on Prairie West in 1836, RICHARD CHURCH. Some of his children, even then, had families of their own. He had lived in Michigan Territory for a time. but before that became a state he made his last home in Lake county. Indiana. He was one of the pioneer Baptists of the county, taking an active part in the organization of the first Baptist church. He had a large family of sons and daughters, nearly all of whom were men and women in 1837. His home, the home of his son. Darling Church. those of his son-in-law, Leonard Cutler, of his near neighbor, W. Rockwell, of Mrs. Owen, a widow woman from Wales, of Mrs. Leland with several sons, of John Bothwell, were the early homes of what was called for a few years Prairie West, all of which prairie is now thickly cov- ered over with the homes of the German settlers who have spread out from the Hack and Schmal center at St. John.
The work of that very worthy citizen, Richard Church, was done more through his children than by himself, as only a few years of active life were assigned to him here.
Another of the early settlers well advanced also in life, was WILLIAM ROCKWELL, a near neiglibor to the Church families of Prairie West, one of whose sons. W. B. ROCKWELL, was born in 1813 or 1814. and the other. T. C. ROCKWELL, in 1817. The Rockwell family orignally came from Con- necticut, residing for a time in New York state, where these sons were born. The Church family came from New York, stopping for a time in Michigan. A son of the Church family, Darling, the father of Edwin Church, had mar- ried a daughter of the Rockwell family. There were other daughters of the 6
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Rockwell family. The father, William Rockwell, was for some time County Commissioner. The date of his election is given as 1840. His date of set- tlement is 1837. He died in 1855. when about seventy-four years of age. He must therefore have been about fifty-six in 1837.
Both the sons left the farm and became citizens of Crown Point. Will- iam B. Rockwell, commonly called by his familiar friends Commodore, was twice married. Both his wives died, one in 1866, the second in 1876, and left no children. He still kept up his interest in life and in the town. He was for some time a town Trustee. Many years ago he bought for two hundred dollars forty acres of land which contained a eranberry marsh. The yield that year proved to be large, the price was high, and he cleared on the one crop fifteen hundred dollars. His own time to die came in 1896.
T. C. Rockwell, the other son, was married in 1845 to Miss Malinda Brown. He bought hotel property in Crown Point which was well known for many years as the Rockwell House. He retired at length to private life. occupying a neat residence on Court street. Two daughters, Mrs. Ward and Mrs. Raasch, reside in Crown Point, and three sons have been in busi- ness life for many years. These all have families, but not so large as was their grandfather's family who had the honor of being one of the last asso- ciate judges of Lake county, elected a little time before the office was abol- ished in 1851.
[ Note .- The name Commodore, so generally given to William B. Rock- well, is said to have been applied to him from Commodore Perry, who in September. 1813. achieved so great a victory on Lake Erie: and as William B. was born in September, it seems much more natural that the title of Com- modore should have been applied to the babe then born, than to one born a whole year after that noted vietory. ]
CHARLES L. TEMPLETON was born December 2, 1816, and became a resident of this county in 1840, and died January 15. 1899. eighty-two years of age. He was an active and useful eitizen in different lines of effort, as a farmer and promoting the Grange movement and interests, as a friend of Sunday-schools, encouraging the early celebrations, and aiding through
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almost sixty active years things that were good. His wife was a daughter of W. Rockwell, of Prairie West, and sister of W. B. Rockwell and T. C. Rockwell, of Crown Point.
A. N. HART, the large land owner and business man of Dyer, came to Lake county from Philadelphia about 1855. He had been interested in book publishing. A large work in four richly bound volumes is in the possession of this writer. It is called "The National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans, with Biographical Sketches." Publishers. D. Rice & A. N. Hart. 1854. It is a grand work, massively bound. richly gilded, with many portraits, and although it is fifty years since these volumes passed from the hands of the binder they look as though just issued from the press. With all the modern improvements of the last fifty years, no better portraits or more substantially bound books can easily be found now. That the man who was engaged in publishing such books should come with his family to the sand ridge of Dyer, and should acquire possession of so much of the wet land eastward included in the original Lake George, is one more of the facts that show how fortunate Lake county was in having among her settlers such capable men as those that came from New England, New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania.
GERMAN PIONEERS.
There began to come, in the early period of the settlement of this county, immigrants from the old kingdom of Prussia, from Hanover, from Wür- temberg, and different principalities now united in the great German Em- pire, to find homes on these then open prairies and to make farms in the then untenanted woodlands.
Since that early period there have followed them families from Sweden and Norway, from Holland and Poland, from Bohemia and Italy, and other European countries, making a mixture of languages and nationalities resen- bling the great mixture in the city of Chicago. Some memorials of German settlers will follow here.
JOHN HACK was born in 1787, in a Rhine province that passed from
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France to Prussia, and came into this county with a quite large family in 1837. He was the first German settler so far as known. He established a home on the western limit of what was called Prairie West.
Receiving the hospitalities of that family one Angust night in 1838, the writer of this memorial made the following record: "In the summer even- ings the family would gather around an out-of-doors fire, the smoke of which would keep off the mosquitoes, and sing the songs of their native Rhine region, presenting a scene at once picturesque and impressive." Their two guests, while ignorant of the language, could enjoy the music of those beautiful evening songs of the "father-land." Those early Germans did much singing in the evening and when out from home in the still night hours. The night music is no longer heard. Another record of John Hack is this: "Tall and dignified in person, patriarchal in manner, clear and keen in intellect, he was well fitted to be a leader and a pioneer." He had large views of government and looked closely into the genius of our institutions."
In 1838 the four families of Joseph Schmal, Peter Orte, Michael Adler, Matthias Reder, came from Germany together and settled near the Hack family, and others soon followed. In 1843 on the Hack land was erected and consecrated a Roman Catholic chapel and regular religious services were held. The founder of the settlement, near whose early home spot is now the town St. John, lived to see great changes in the land of his adoption. Greater ones, of which he never thought, his descendants in Crown Point now behold. Times change.
JOSEPH SCHMAL, one of the four who crossed the ocean in 1838, had quite a family of sons and daughters. He was not a young man and did not become very fully americanized; but one of his sons, ADAM SCHMAL, became prominent in political life, and held for two terms the office of county Treasurer. Another son, bearing his father's name, JOSEPH SCHMAL, became a prominent farmer at Brunswick. One daughter, marrying a son of the Hack family, Mrs. Angelina Hack, was for many years an active, energetic, well known, and much respected woman in the life of Crown
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Point. One of her sons. John Hack, two miles east of Crown Point, is one of the noted dairymen of Lake county. George Schmal, another grand- son of the pioneer of 1838, is a town officer of Crown Point. The descend- ants of good immigrants become in two generations, some even in one, good Americans. The descendants of some foreigners never become good citizens.
HENRY SASSE, Sr .. the pioneer of the Lutheran Germans, came from Michigan in 1838, with a small family, and brought the Cox claim and Chase claim on the northwest of the Red Cedar Lake. He was a man of much native ability, he had much intelligence, and had gained quite a knowledge of our language and of American ways after leaving his native Hanover. He came with means and accumulated property in this country. Circum- stances led him to visit three times his native land, so that at least seven times he crossed the Atlantic. Death was quite a frequent visitor in his home, and few remain to represent his early Hanover township family circle. . \ granddaughter. Mrs. Groman, resides in Crown Point, and she has one son and one daughter and one granddaughter. A son, also living. Herman E. Sasse. is now one of the prominent business men of Crown Point. Unlike the name of HACK, there is little promise for the SASSE name to go into future generations. But the results of the life here for so many yars of Henry Sasse, Sr., and the results of the much shorter life of his oldest son. HENRY SASSE. Junior, will go on into future years.
HENRY VON HOLLEN was another of those very intelligent, energetic Lutheran Germans who came to the lake neighborhood in 1838. He had received in his European home quite a drill in the line of cavalry soldiers and in the care of their equipments. He was a quite tall, strong man, one to make at least a showy soldier.
Unlike his neighbor, H. Sasse, lie came with very little means with which to open and improve a farm. but he soon purchased some wild land on which there had been found a large cranberry marsh, and this investment made him in a few years comparatively rich, so that when he died he left his wife in possession of ample means, and at her death she was able to rank
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as one of the wealthy women of Lake county. She lived for sixty-five years where they two as young housekeepers settled in 1838, and of that small household there is no descendant left. But circumstances will cause the name Von Hollen, or Van Hollen, as more generally called, for some time yet in Hanover township to continue to live.
LEWIS HERLITZ was the third of that little band of Protestant Germans of 1838. He was a native of Pyrmont, a part of the principality of Wal- deck. He bought what was known as the Nordyke claim north of the lake. his wife and Mrs. H. Sasse were sisters. He built a new residence on that early claim, secured a good title from the Government for the land, and a pleasant family home in a few years was his. Three sons and some daughters grew up in that home. a home noted for intelligence and politeness, and in 1869 the father died. In the home and at Crown Point the children and grandchildren yet live.
Another of the well known early German settlers was HERMAN DOESCHER, who came into the west part of Hanover township in 1842, with one son and some more than ordinarily fine-looking and polite young daugh- ters. He died in December, 1886, having lived in the county forty-four years, himself eighty-four years of age, and leaving six children, thirty- seven grandchildren, and twenty-one great-grandchildren.
J. C. SAUERMAN. Coming from Bavaria in 1846. then fourteen years old, J. C. Sauerman had a home in Chicago for three years, he visited his old home in Europe, returned to this country, and. in 1851. became a resi- dent of Crown Point. In 1853, then about twenty-one years of age, he was married to Miss Strochlein, a daughter of John Strochlein, who became a resident in the county in 1852. He opened a harness store and factory in Crown Point, employed workmen in the harness-making business, and was successful as a salesman and manufacturer. Success resulted in the accu- mulation of property. About 1875 lie sold his harness business, was elected county Treasurer, and at length retired from business and public life. In person he was of about medium height, rather slender in form, quick, active
JOHN KROST
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in his movements. In social qualities he was kindly, gentlemanly, gen- erously disposed, urbane. He was a member of the Lutheran church, a useful, worthy citizen, a noble Christian man.
His two children are residents of Crown Point, A. A. Sauerman, Cash- ier of the First National Bank of Crown Point, and Mrs. Henry Pettibone. His grandchildren are in number four, among them one young man to bear and perhaps transmit the Sauerman name and virtues.
JOHN KROST. One more of many citizens of favored Lake county who by means of talent and intelligent effort became prominent was John Krost. Born in Germany in 1828, he became a resident in Hobart in 1853, where for one year he was clerk in a store : then for about six years a clerk at Mer- rillville, and a farmer for two years; and then he made his final home in Crown Point.
He was elected county Treasurer in 1862 and continued in office till 1867. In 1868 he was elected county Auditor and held that office for eight years. He was accommodating and very courteous, he was kind and gen- erous to the poor. the needy, and the unfortunate or the unsuccessful. He was an exemplary member of the Roman Catholic church. He accumulated quite an amount of property, and his home on Main street was one of com- forts, of social advantages, of cultivation and refinement.
His children have been educated. He died in March, 1890, not only one of the wealthy, but one of the most kindly and gentlemanly of Crown Point's many cultured citizens.
One of his sons is a physician in Chicago, and one a medical student at Rush. One is a dentist in Crown Point, gentlemanly and kindly as was his father. One has been county Recorder, and one is in Germany, learning the ways of his father's native land. Three daughters are living, educated and cultivated, and the sixth son is a student at Notre Dame, South Bend.
The names of several carly citizens of Crown Point are placed in this group with only short notices or brief records, as of some their residence here was brief, and of others not much is now fully known.
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HISTORY OF LAKE COUNTY.
MILO ROBINSON, a brother of the founder of Crown Point, joined his brother here in November, 1835. He came from New York city, was with his brother in the first store, he kept the first hotel, was a Justice of the Peace, and, as did his brother Solon, solemnized marriage, but died in 1839.
H. S. PELTON, an early resident, came into possession of the Robinson store about 1840. An active business man in Crown Point for a few years, he died May 26. 1847, and his goods passed into the ownership of Carter & Carter of New York, and soon after into the possession of J. W. Din- widdie, who for a time was a merchant in Crown Point.
JOSEPH P. SMITH came from New York and "settled July 5," 1836, in Crown Point. For several years he was a leading business man, and also the principal military man. He led a company of men to the Mexican war and returned with some of them. He was the second county Clerk holding office from 1843 to 1847. After some years he went into the then wild and yet new West, and was shot at and was killed by those noiseless but often deadly weapons, Indian arrows. Captain once of the Monroe Blues in the city of New York, a man quite fond of military life, it seemed strange that he should fall while at work in his field by the hand of an unseen American Indian.
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