USA > Indiana > Decatur County > History of Decatur County, Indiana: its people, industries and institutions > Part 88
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Benedict Bruns, a well-known farmer of Marion township, this county, was born on July 24. 1860, in Ripley county, Indiana, a son of Herman and Christine (Waben) Bruns. Reared in Ripley county, Benedict Bruns went from there to Cincinnati, where he served as stationary engineer. He learned his trade when a boy of fourteen, and followed it for twenty years in Cin- cinnati, and from there he came to this county, locating in Marion township. Remaining there but a short time, he returned to Cincinnati, where he lived tintil November, 1900, at which time he returned to Marion township and bought his present farm of one hundred and sixty acres, located about one
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and one-half miles west of Millhousen. The place has a brick house, which has been remodeled under Mr. Bruns' ownership, and a barn, forty by sixty feet, which has also been rebuilt. Mr. Bruns devotes a considerable portion of his time to the breeding of horses and cattle, and pure bred white Leghorn chickens. His political views are Democratic, and, in religion, he is a miem- ber of St. Mary's Catholic church at Millhousen.
Herman Bruns, father of Benedict, was born in 1823 and died in 1902, and his wife, Christine, was born in 1829 and died in 1902, about two weeks after the death of her husband. They were natives of Germany. Herman located in Cincinnati, when a young man, and went to work as a laborer. While in Cincinnati, he took unto himself a wife, and saved enough money to buy a farm of one hundred and twenty acres in Ripley county, where he spent the remainder of his life. To this couple were born four children, Henry, Joseph, Benedict and Mary. Henry lives in Cincinnati, and has one child, Herman, who died at the age of three years; Joseph died in 1913, and Mary (Mrs. Koors), lives two miles south of her father's home.
Benedict Bruns was married in 1893, to Bernardine Rottman, daughter of Henry Rottman, of Decatur county, to which union nine children have been born, namely : Lawrence, who died at the age of nine months ; Edward, who is a student at a veterinary college at Indianapolis, from which he will graduate in 1916; Alfred, also a student of the same college, who will gradu- ate in 1917, and Joseph, Marie, Carl, Harry, Bernard and Louis.
THOMAS M. HAMILTON.
The late Thomas M. Hamilton was born on June 17, 1830, and died on December 26, 1892. He was the son of Robert and Polly (Henry) Hamilton, the former of whom was born in 1796, and who died on August II, 1855, and the latter of whom died on August 14, 1855, three days after the death of her husband. Robert Hamilton, a native of Carlisle, Kentucky, was married on April 15, 1819, and migrated in 1821 to Decatur county, Indiana, where he became one of the pioneer settlers. Here he reared a family of six children, namely: Isabelle J., who was born on February 7, 1820, married Warder W. Hamilton on September 26, 1843, and is now deceased ; James D., February 14. 1822, died on July 3, 1824; Harriet N., February 17, 1824, married I. P. Monfort on September 26, 1843, and is now deceased; Lavina G., April 30, 1826, died on July 18, 1835 ; Almira L.,
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May 24, 1828, died on September 13, 1853, the wife of W. W. Bonner, and' Thomas M., the youngest of the family. Robert Hamilton was a very suc- cessful farmer in Washington township, and one of the founders of the Kingston Presbyterian church. He was known as a good man during his generation and did much to improve the country life of Decatur county.
After the marriage of the late Thomas M. Hamilton on November 7, 1854, to Elizabeth Mclaughlin, he and his wife lived one mile north of the old homestead, and on the death of Robert Hamilton moved to the old home- stead, and there were engaged in farming for about twelve years. At the end of this period they removed to Greensburg, and erected their home on North East street, where Mrs. Hamilton still lives. Thomas M. Hamilton looked after his agricultural interests while living in Greensburg, and was more or less active as vice-president of the Third National Bank of that city. He owned altogether four hundred and eighty acres of the old home farm, and Mrs. Hamilton also owned a large farm in her own name.
To Thomas M. and Elizabeth ( McLaughlin) Hamilton were born three children: Luna R., who was born on September 25, 1855, died on January 16, 1875, at the age of nineteen : Mary C., February 11, 1858, died on July 14, 1875, at the age of seventeen, and Mand, May 31, 1863, died on February 15, 1892. Maud had married Samuel L. Baker on May 4, 1887, and by him had one child, Helen Hamilton, who was born on September 2, 1888. Helen married Leonard O. Lumbers. April 23, 1908, and they have two children, Leonard George. born on February 5, 1909, and Elizabeth Helen, June 15, 1911. They live in Toronto, Canada.
Mrs. Elizabeth (McLaughlin) Hamilton, who was born on November 25, 1834. on a farm in Clinton township, three miles from the place where her early married life was spent, is the daughter of George and Sarah (Carter) Mclaughlin, natives of Kentucky, who came to Decatur county in 1827. Her father was born in 1802, and died in 1885. He was a son of George Mclaughlin, a gentleman of Scotch-Irish descent, who lived near Maysville, Kentucky. Her mother, who was born in Kentucky in 1804 and who died in 1873, was the daughter of James and Anna D. Larue (Drake) Carter. The latter was the daughter of the Rev. Mr. Drake, one of the pioneer Baptist ministers of this section and a native of England. He mar- ried a French lady by the name of Larue. Mrs. Hamilton's father, George Mclaughlin, was an extensive farmer and owned a large tract of land in this section. A Republican in politics, he was also a member of the Chris- tian church, and one of the founders of the church of that denomination in Greensburg, he having affiliated with that communion after removing to
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Greensburg in the latter part of his life. Among his children, three of whom died in infancy, may be mentioned the following: Mary Frances, who died at the age of twenty-five years, was the wife of Thompson Riley, a Decatur county farmer who died in 1854. James Carter Mclaughlin, who was born in 1821, and who died in 1892, was a farmer and was married to Louisa Davidson who resides on Franklin street, Greensburg. He was a soldier in the Union army during the Civil War. George, the next born, died at the age of sixteen years. Elizabeth A. married Mr. Hamilton. Caspar, a former merchant at Greensburg, removed to California and died there, after twenty years residence, in 1885. He also served as a Union soldier during the Civil WVar, and was a lieutenant in charge of a battery. Caspar Mclaughlin mar- ried Helen Morrison, of Connersville, and they had four children, three sons and one daughter, namely: Mrs. Alice Williams, a widow who lives in Cincinnati with her mother; George deceased, who was an electrical engineer ; Charles, a dentist in Cincinnati, and Ray, an attorney in Cincinnati, who married a Miss McElfresh.
Abram Carter, who was born in 1800, and who was an uncle of Mrs. Hamilton, was a talented physician and surgeon who settled in Decatur county on a farm and later removed to Greensburg, where he practiced medi- cine and surgery. During his life he was called to many points in the south- eastern part of the state to practice his profession. He married Miss Har- riet Norris, of Mason county, Kentucky, and when in middle life they removed to Iowa. He is now deceased, having died at the age of seventy- five years. He was well known by the early pioneer families of this section. His wife lived to be ninety years old. The family, consisted of two chil- dren, who were born in Kentucky, Adelia and Perlina. Adelia married a Doctor New of Greensburg. They lived in Greensburg for several years and then moved to Indianapolis. Doctor New was a surgeon in the Union army during the Civil War. He died in Indianapolis, leaving one child, Frank, now a resident of that city. Mrs. Perlina Tatham lived in Williams- town for some time, but later removed to Iowa, and died there, leaving two children, Florence and Cora, the latter of whom has become very prominent in the work of the Young Women's Christian Association in New York City. It may be mentioned here that Gen. James B. Foley, of honored memory in this county, was an uncle of Mrs. Hamilton by marriage.
The late Thomas M. Hamilton was an ardent Republican. A member of the Presbyterian church, he had much to do in the work of building up the church in this county. Mrs. Hamilton, however, is a member of the Chris- tian church. She is a remarkably well preserved woman, intelligent, keen
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and mentally alert, despite her age. She has traveled widely, having made several trips to Europe and makes one trip annually to Canada to visit her grandchildren. Mrs. Hamilton is now eighty years old.
HARRY LATHROP.
Among the best-known residents of Greensburg in Decatur county, and one of the most popular citizens of this section of the state is Harry Lathrop, the secretary of the Retail Merchants Association of Greensburg, Indiana, and whose father, James B. Lathrop, the president of the Citizens National Bank of Greensburg, is the oldest living resident of the city, the oldest living graduate of Indiana State University, and the oldest Methodist minister in the state of Indiana. The subject of this sketch, therefore, belongs to one of the oldest and most distinguished families of Decatur county. The his- tory of the Lathrop family is given in the sketch of the venerable James B. Lathrop, to be found elsewhere in this volume. In this place it will suffice to say that the family is of English descent and dates back to Yorkshire, England, where the family was prominent in the fourteenth century. In America the family was founded by the Rev. John Lathrop, a Congregational preacher who, after imprisonment for his non-conformist views on religion, fled to America, and at Plymouth Rock rejoined a considerable number of his old congregation whom he had served as pastor in the mother country. He became a prominent man in the early history of Massachusetts, and his son, Erastus Lathrop, who was born in Connecticut, was a captain of a com- pany of home guards which served during the battle of Lake Champlain in the War of 1812. Erastus, who was by occupation a farmer, became eventu- ally a well known Baptist minister of his day and generation. Ezra Lathrop, the next member of the family in direct line of descent, and the father of the venerable James B. Lathrop, was born in 1803, in Canada, and was reared in the British dominion.
It was Ezra Lathrop, who settled in Decatur county, Indiana, on a farm which he entered from the government, about 1822. His wife, Abbie Pot- ter, was a woman of equally patriotic stock, whose father, Nathaniel Potter, a gentleman of Huguenot descent, emigrated from North Carolina to Ken- tucky, and from Kentucky to Decatur county. Ezra and Abbie ( Potter) Lathrop had only two children, who lived to maturity; Levi, who died in 1884, and James B., the father of Harry. Born on November 24, 1825, in
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a one-story brick house, which his father had built, James B. Lathrop was a minister in the Methodist church from 1847, when he was twenty-two years old, continuously for thirty-one years. Today at the age of ninety years, he is one of the best-known citizens of southern Indiana, and has had, among the pioneers still living, a larger part in the history of this section, perhaps, than any other man.
Descended as he is from such eminent stock and such well-to-do ancestry, it is not surprising that Harry Lathrop achieved a large success in business. Educated in the public schools of Greensburg, and in the Greensburg high school, he spent two years in Northwestern University, at Evanston, Illinois, and after leaving college spent two years as a traveling salesman in the west, with headquarters at Newton, Kansas. During this period of his career there were developed those fine instincts and accurate notions of human nature, and the rules of business, which served him later when engaged in business for himself. Upon returning from Newton, Kansas, he engaged in the steam-laundry business at Greensburg, when laundries of this kind were in the infancy of their development. Here he conducted a laundry for twenty years and three months, all the time in the same building on West North street. Not only did he build up an enormous business, measured by the population of this city, but in that period he accumulated for himself a splendid fortune. In June, 1912, he sold out the business, and for the past year has served as secretary of the Retail Merchants Association. In this position his own personal experiences in business have served him well, since he acts as a kind of clearing house for the information of the members of this association. He is not only an expert judge of credit in Greensburg, but the force of his own personality has created a harmonious and agreeable working relationship between the several members of this association.
In 1894 Mr. Lathrop was married to Lillie Drusilla Browning, of Indi- anapolis, who at the time of her marriage was prominent in the social life of the capital city, and to this union one child has been born, Nelle Browning Lathrop, now a student in the Greensburg high school.
A Republican in politics, the subject of this sketch served as mayor of the city of Greensburg in 1890, and gave to the people of the city a most satisfactory and efficient administration. During the most of his life he has been prominent in the fraternal circles, not only of Greensburg and Decatur county, but of the state as well. As a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows he served on the building committee which erected the Greens- burg hall. He is a member of the Knights of Pythias, the Improved Order of Red Men, the Benevolent Protective Order of Elks, and of the Fraternal
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Order of Eagles. Mr. Lathrop also is a thirty-second degree Mason, a member of the Indianapolis consistory of the Scottish Rite and of Murat Temple. Nobles of the Mystic Shrine.
DANIEL WESLEY HOLCOMB.
In the history of Marion township, Decatur county, Indiana, 110 Repub- lican had ever been elected trustee of the township until 1914, when Daniel Wesley Holcomb, a well-known and prosperous farmer of that township was successful as a candidate for that office. A grandson of a soldier in our second war for independence, he is known as a successful farmer and stock- man, and no better evidence of his standing among his neighbors and fellow citizens can be cited than his election to the office of township trustee. On his paternal side it may be said that the family has been established in southern Indiana for considerably more than three-quarters of a century.
Daniel Wesley Holcomb, who was born on January 11, 1852, in Ripley county, Indiana, is a son of Eli Asa and Emeline ( Hall) Holcomb, the former of whom was born on April 3, 1823, and died in 1898, and the latter of whom was born on March 24, 1826, and died in January, 1865. The former, who was born in Dearborn county, Indiana, was the son of Rufus and Nancy (Gloyd) Holcomb. Rufus Holcomb was a native of Connecticut and probably of English descent. With his family he emigrated to the West early in the nineteenth century, and built one of the first brick houses in Dearborn county, ten miles west of Aurora. There he lived and reared a family of eleven children and died. Before coming west he had served in the War of 1812. The eleven children born to Rufus and Nancy (Gloyd) Holcomb in the order of their birth were as follow: Ethel, Daniel. Luther, Turner, Eli. Rufus, Hulda, Nancy. Elizabeth, Lucinda and Lydia. Eli Holcomb, the fifth child born to his parents, and the father of Daniel Wes- ley, although reared in Dearborn county, lived for a short time in Ripley county, and returned to Dearborn county, and there reared most of his family. After removing to a farm near the Decatur-Jennings county line in 1866, the family disbanded, Eli going to Kansas, where he died at his son's home. Eli Holcomb's wife, who, before her marriage, was Emeline Hall. was born in Ohio, the daughter of Benaiah Hall, a native of New York, who settled in Ripley county, Indiana.
Eli and Emeline ( Ilall) Holcomb had eight children, four of whom
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are deceased. Of these children, Edwin Perry was born on September 16, 1848, and died on July 3. 1850; Louis Philander, August 20, 1850, died, August 9, 1851 ; Daniel Wesley, January 11, 1852, was the third child; Georgia Evangeline. October 15, 1853. died, October 8, 1854; Emeline Celeste, March 14, 1855, married Reid Williams, and lives in Kansas; George Albert, January 25, 1852, also lived in Kansas; Eli Benson, February 3, 1859, lives in Arizona : Caroline Medora, March 6, 1860, married John Old- ham, of Kansas, and both are now deceased.
After Daniel W. Holcomb's marriage in Marion township, he settled on a farm three miles north of his present farm, where he lived for ten years, selling out in 1883, and emigrating to Kansas. But after farming one sea- son in Kansas, he returned and located on a farm three miles south of his first farm. Subsequently he purchased eighty acres of land and has since acquired altogether two hundred and thirty-five acres, two hundred and thirteen acres of which is in Marion township, and twenty-two acres of which is in Jennings county. Altogether Mr. Holcomb has twenty-five acres of timber. He raises live stock and grain, including forty acres of corn, forty acres of wheat, twelve to fifteen .head of cattle, and fifty head of hogs every year. There can be no question that he has made a gratifying success of farming, and that his success is due to his enterprise, foresight, industry and good management.
In May, 1873. Daniel Wesley Holcomb was married to Mary E. Evans, who was born on September 25, 1855, in Decatur county, Indiana, the daugh- ter of John and Nancy ( Robbins) Evans, the former of whom was born in 1841 and died in 1911, and the latter of whom was born in 1844 and died in 1897. John Evans was born in Dearborn county, Indiana, the son of Joseph Evans, a native of Virginia, and an early settler of Indiana, who entered land here and who in the early thirties was numbered among the pioneer settlers of this community. Mrs. Nancy ( Robbins) Evans was the daughter of Micajah Robbins, who was a relative of the Robbins family of Decatur county, Micajah being a brother of John Robbins, a prominent pioneer citizen of the county. Of the children born to John and Nancy (Robbins) Evans five are dead and five are living. Frank, the first born, Sarah Belle, the third born, Mrs. Augusta Hawkersmith, the fourth born, James, the eighth born, and Mrs. Rosa Dell Croucher, the seventh born, are deceased. The living children are Mrs. Mary Holcomb; Thomas, of Hamil- ton, Ohio: Joseph, of Bena, Kentucky; Jacob, of Sand Creek township, this county, and Ida, who married Ed. Sutton, of Marion township.
(58)
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To D. W. and Mary E. (Evans) Holcomb seven children have been born. Of these children, John W., born on February 27, 1874, is the trustee of Sand Creek township. and lives at Westport ; Albert Asa, November 22, 1875, also resides at Westport; Adaline, March 1, 1878, the wife of Henry Mozingo, died on December 20, 1914; Lewis Franklin, November 19, 1897, living in Oklahoma, married Mabel Becker, by whom he has had four sons and two daughters; Nancy Jane, November 7, 1881, the wife of Ed. Mozingo; Margaret Medora, May 25, 1884, the wife of Arch Brown, of North Vernon, has four children, and Joseph Benson, January 28, 1884, residing on his father's farm, married Viola Clements, by whom he has had four children.
A Republican in politics, as heretofore stated, Mr. Holcomb was elected trustee of Marion township in 1914. He was the first Republican to be elected to this office in the history of the township. Mr. and Mrs. Holcomb attend the Methodist Episcopal church, although Mr. Holcomb was reared as a Baptist. Judged from many standpoints, Daniel Wesley Holcomb is a valuable citizen of this great county and a man of wide influence in the town- ship where he lives. He has always enjoyed the confidence of a host of friends, who admire him for his ability and respect him for his rugged integrity.
DANIEL BUCKLEY.
For more than a quarter of a century one of the foremost leaders of the Democratic party in Decatur county and one of the most dependable organization Democrats in Marion township, Daniel Buckley has served several times as a delegate to state conventions of his party and is one of the most widely acquainted citizens of this county, especially among the state leaders of the party. Mr. Buckley's long service in behalf of Democracy has not gone wholly unrewarded, he having served as storekeeper in the revenue service, with headquarters at Lawrenceburg, Indiana, during the last Cleveland administration. For many years the Marion township com- mitteeman for the Democracy of Decatur county, during late years his place has been taken by his son, who is equally capable as a political leader.
Daniel Buckley, who was born on February 14, 1849, in Cincinnati. Ohio, is the son of John and Mary (Glennon) Buckley, the former of whom was born in 1830 and who died in 1890, both being natives of Ireland. He came to America when a young man and, after his marriage in New York
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city, followed the blacksmith trade in Cincinnati. In 1861 he moved from Cincinnati to the farm, where his son, Daniel, now lives, in Marion town- ship, this county, and there built a house, which is still standing. With the able assistance of his son, he cleared the land and developed one of the best farms in the neighborhood. A Democrat in politics, he was also active in the affairs of the Napoleon Catholic church. Of his four children, John, the second born, is deceased. The living children are Daniel, the subject of this sketch; Edward, of Indianapolis, and Mrs. Kate Griffin, who lives south of Millhousen, in this county.
When the Buckley family moved from Cincinnati to Decatur county, Daniel Buckley was twelve years old and had begun his educational course in the Queen City schools, but he completed his education in Decatur county. Here he helped his father on the farm, clearing the land, cutting the timber and grubbing. Daniel Buckley and his son now own all of the old home farm, the son having purchased the interest of his father's brother and sister. The farm consists of one hundred and fifty acres of good level land. upon which a modern home was erected in 1910. Mr. Buckley and his son ordinarily raise seventy-five to eighty head of hogs and keep fifteen to twenty head of cattle on the farm. They specialize in Duroc-Jersey hogs. At the present time they are spending considerable money in various kinds of improvements, principally woven-wire fences.
In 1870 Daniel Buckley was married to Alvina Margaret Lamb, a native of Ohio, and the daughter of Michael Lamb, a native of Ireland. Mrs. Buckley was a good woman and a faithful and loving helpmate. Her death, on February 22, 1912, came as a distinct shock to her husband, with whom shehad lived in comfort and happiness for forty-two years. At the time of her death, she was sixty-two years old. Her only son. Edward .A., who was born on December 12, 1876, is a partner with his father in operating the home farm. No one will ever be able to take the place of this devoted wife and loving mother and today her memory is revered by the loving ones she left behind.
Edward A. Buckley is a well-known dealer in farm implements, hard- ware and buggies. He also is the local agent in his neighborhood for the Continental Fire Insurance Company and also handles lightning insurance. On June 13, 1915, while on a trip to the Pacific coast, Edward A. Buckley was united in marriage, at Fallow, Nevada, to Lillie Fey, of Millhousen. this county.
Daniel Buckley and his son, who are skillful and successful farmers and prominent citizens of Marion township, well merit the high opinion in
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which they are held by their neighbors. If they are leaders in the political circles of their home township, it is because of their genial and cordial manners and their friendly and honorable relations with the people with whom they come into contact. In other words, the recognition accorded them is the reward of true merit.
EBER J. OLDHAM.
Seldon do we find, in searching out the biographical and genealogical annals of a family, one whose ancestors have served more valiantly in our country's wars than have those of Eber J. Oldham, a well-known and pros- perous farmer of Marion township, this county, both of whose grand- fathers were soldiers in the War of 1812, and who also enjoys the honor- able distinction of having had six maternal uncles who served their country during the great Civil War. Moreover, Mr. Oldhani's maternal grand- father married into the Judd family, which was prominent during Revolu- tionary days and which served its country valiantly in the first great war of this country.
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