USA > Michigan > Hillsdale County > Compendium of history and biography of Hillsdale County, Michigan > Part 68
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The father was a prominent man in local af- fairs and had a potential and commanding voice in all the interests of the community. In early life he was a Whig in politics, later was one of the founders of the Republican party, being a member of its first convention held under the oaks at Jack- son, in this state. He was ever afterward active in the councils of the party, a vigorous worker for its principles and candidates, a familiar figure at its county and state conventions. He was the
first Republican to be elected highway commis- sioner of Jefferson township, and he also served seven or eight terms as supervisor and twelve years as under sheriff. During the Civil War he was an efficient U. S. deputy provost-marshal. In every public office which he held he rendered excellent and highly appreciated service to the people, retaining their respect and cordial con- fidence and regard. He was a far-seeing, broad- minded and progressive man, of excellent judg- ment, great liberality and strong personal influ- ence. Working his own way from poverty to af- fluence without any of fortune's favors or adven- titious circumstances, he knew how to appreciate in others the qualities through which he had wrought his success, and was quick to extend aid to merit and firm in standing by real manhood in adversity. Hillsdale county has had no more capable, faithful or serviceable citizen in any pub- lic station or any walk of private life.
JOHN J. RIGGS.
John J. Riggs, of Scipio township, one of the most sucessful and progressive farmers in that portion of the county, was the second born of the eight children of his parents, Joseph and Mary (Smith) Riggs, natives of Lyons, Wayne county, New York, where he was also born, his life beginning on September 14, 1841. His fa- ther who was well educated was a teacher for some years in his native county and subsequently was there engaged in the drug business. In 1842 he brought his wife and two children to Michigan and settled on a tract of land in Scipio township, in this county, where he carried on a farming industry for two years, then moved to Litchfield township where he lived until 1863 en- gaged in farming and teaching. In the year last named he returned to Scipio township, locating at the village of Mosherville, where his death occurred on November 23, 1882. His wife died there on January 20, 1872. They were the par- ents of eight children, two born in New York and six in this state. Two of the sons, Hurlburt and Wesley W., were soldiers in the Union army during the Civil War. The former rose to the
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rank of first lieutenant in the service, and the latter died on a boat en route from the field of Petersburg, Va., to Philadelphia, and rests in a soldier's grave in the latter city.
John J. Riggs was also a Union soldier and rendered efficient service to his country, first as a member of Co. G. Eighteenth Michigan In- fantry, in which he enlisted on August 9, 1862, and from which he was detached after a year's service and assigned to duty at the headquarters of Gen. R. S. Granger, where he remained until the close of his term of enlistment. He was reared on the paternal homestead and educated at the district schools and Hillsdale College. After the war he returned to Scipio township and engaged in farming until 1873. He then purchased a stock of goods and occupied himself in mercantile business at Mosherville for five years, at the end of which time he returned to his former pursuit, in which he is still engaged. He was married first in Litchfield township on February 6, 1866, to Miss Kate E. Mead, who was born at Auburn, N. Y., and who died at her Mosherville home on May 12, 1876. They were the parents of three children, Edmund H., Leroy J. and Harry M. The two last named are de- ceased. Edmund H. is a prosperous farmer of Fayette township. He married Miss Estella Barton and they have three children. On De- cember 18, 1877, Mr. Riggs was married to his second wife, Miss Celina Sturges, a daughter of James Sturges, a prominent and highly respect- ed citizen of Scipio township, where Mrs. Riggs was born on June 28, 1845. They have had three children, Mabel M., Stanley J. and Joseph. The last named is deceased. Mrs. Riggs is a graduate of Hillsdale College. Mr. Riggs is a Republican in political connection and served the township as its supervisor from 1888 to 1893. In 1894 he was elected county treasurer and filled that office for four years. He and his wife are mem- bers of the Methodist Episcopal church at Mosh- erville, of which he is one of the trustees. He belongs to the order of Good Templars and to the Grand Army of the Republic. For more than fifteen years he was a member of the school board, and, with an abiding interest in the prog-
ress and permanent welfare of his county, he is ever found active in the support of all worthy enterprises for their promotion.
GEORGE E. SMITH.
The parents of George E. Smith, of Reading township, one of the prosperous and leading farmers of the county, whose success is wholly the result of his own industry and thrift, were Charles and Rebecca (Higgins) Smith, natives of New Jersey, where they were reared and mar- ried. Soon after their marriage they moved to the state of New York and settled near Lockport, in Niagara county, and there George was born on January 5, 1822, the youngest of the six chil- dren of the family. His mother died in his child- hood, and about 1827 his father married a sec- ond wife, Miss Patience Akins, who became the mother of one child, a daughter. In 1829 the father. step-mother and three of the first wife's children came to Michigan and settled in Lenawee county, on a tract of forty acres of wild land which the father bought on the edge of the ham- let of Adrian, as it was then, its human habita- tions consisting of a country tavern, a grocery store and a few log cabins. The farm is now all within the city limits and covered with substantial buildings. The neighborhood was at the dawn of its civilization. Wolves, bears and other sav- age beasts were plentiful and dangerous, and Indians were numerous, although friendly in the main. All the conditions of life were full of dif- ficulty and hazard, and all the work of develop- ment and improvement was yet to be done.
In 1831 the father took a severe cold while digging a well, and the doctor in the settlement, according to the practice of the time, adminis- tered calomel, and in such quantities that his pa- tient really died from the effects of the drug, be- ing at the time but fifty years old. Immediately after his death his widow sold the farm and all his other property, and, placing her stepson, George, then a boy of nine, in the care of an English couple on a neighboring farm, took her own daughter and left this part of the country, and that was the last he ever saw or heard of her
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or her daughter. He was so badly treated by the Englishman that the neighbors came to his as- sistance and sent him to a brother-in-law in New York. His condition was not much improved by the change, for, although his relative did not treat him badly, the family was so poor that he found it necessary to seek a permanent home for himself, and started out in the world early one morning for the purpose. At sundown he reached a place where he was taken in on condi- tion that he would remain until he was twenty- one, and then be released with $100 and two suits of clothes as compensation for his services, he in the meantime to have his wants provided for and receive such schooling as the circumstances would allow.
The contract was faithfully kept on both sides with the exception of the $100, which he failed to receive, and when he reached his majority he returned to Michigan and again located in Len- awee county, where he secured a situation in a grist mill and was glad to get it as his funds were exhausted. He retained his position three years and thoroughly learned the business of milling. This he followed for twenty years in various places, running mills at Jonesville and Hillsdale at times. In 1861 he bought 100 acres of land in Reading township, which is a part of his pres- ent home, and devoted his attention to farming. About ten acres of this land was cleared and the improvements on it were poor and scant. He began his enterprise under difficulties which, however, slowly disappeared under his deter- mined energy, and in the course of time he had his farm raised to a high state of cultivation and well supplied with good and commodious build- ings. He also bought additional land, at one time owning 200 acres, but he has sold all except I20. Here he has since lived and worked, im- proving his financial condition and rising steadily in the regard and confidence of his fellow men around him. He is now past eighty years of age, and rejoices in the success he has won, and the fruits of his labor, which are abundant and grat- ifying. Retired from active pursuits, and secure in the good will of his neighbors and acquaint- ances, and moreover, safely anchored against the
winds of adversity, he finds all the more com- fort in his present estate because of the hard- ships and toils through which he came to it. He is yet very active and erect, and all his faculties are in full vigor. No one ignorant of the fact would take him to be as old as he is, and among the residents of the township no one is more es- teemed for wisdom in counsel and excellence in example.
On November 10, 1850, he married with Miss Anna Swain, a native of Wyoming county, N. Y., the daughter of John and Anna (Seva) Swain, of that state, where they passed the whole of their lives. Mr. and Mrs. Smith were the parents of three children, Charles W., a farmer of Reading township; Schuyler D., living at the paternal home ; Horatio B., a resident of Reading. Mrs. Smith died on September 15, 1901, aged nearly seventy-five, after nearly fifty years of happy wedded life. Mr. Smith is a consistent and earn- est member of the United Brethren church, and during the last seventeen years he has been the superintendent of its Sunday-school. He is a Re- publican in politics, having been attached to the principles of that party from its formation. Miss Clarissa Swain, a sister of his wife, and for about twenty-six years a missionary to India in a medical capacity, is a member of his house- hold.
JAMES A. STODDARD.
James A. Stoddard is a well known and highly respected farmer of Litchfield township in this county, whose life has so far been wholly passed in the county, except three years which he spent in Virginia. He was born in Litchfield township on July 7, 1845, the son of Henry and Emeline (Andrew) Stoddard, the former a na- tive of Litchfield, Conn., and the latter of Wood- bridge, in the same state. The father was reared and educated in his native place and learned the trade of a hatter at which he worked in Litch- field until 1842, when he came to Hillsdale coun- ty and purchased of his brother, Jesse Stoddard, forty acres of uncultivated and unimproved land, then heavily timbered and involving great and continued labor to bring it to fertility and pro-
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ductiveness. He settled on this land and in time had it cleared and in an advanced state of till- age, and later added to it by purchases until he owned 120 acres, all of which he cleared and cul- tivated, residing on it until his death on March 1, 1875. His wife passed away on March 26, 1891. They had a family of one son and three daughters, all of whom are now deceased except the daughter, Mrs. Susan Mosher, of Mosher- ville, in Scipio township, and their son, James A., who is residing on the home farm. The fa- ther was a Republican in political faith, but he was never an active partisan and never desired or held public office. The grandfather was Gid- eon Stoddard, who was born, lived his life and died in Connecticut, where his family settled in Colonial times. His family consisted of six sons, five of whom became citizens of Michigan, three of Hillsdale county and two of Lenawee, and each in his day and locality added to the produc- tive forces of the state and made substantial con- tributions to her progress.
James A. Stoddard is essentially a product and a representative of Hillsdale county. He grew to man's estate on one of the excellent farms of the county and learned the lessons of thrift, systematic industry and frugality which have distinguished him through life in its useful labors ; the scholastic discipline which he received was administered in her public schools ; his early struggles for a foothold among men were made amid and in company with her people; the du- ties of citizenship, which he has for many years faithfully performed, were taught him by partic- ipation in her government and by contact with her political institutions ; his domestic altar has risen and been maintained on her soil; and the fruits of his labors have helped to swell the vol- ume of her wealth and importance and have been for the most part dispensed among her people. When he left school he became a farmer and he has steadily followed agricultural pursuits ever since, his farm in its improvements and its ad- vanced state of cultivation and its skillful man- agement showing the fidelity and diligence with which he has worked in his chosen vocation.
Mr. Stoddard was married in Hillsdale coun- ty to Miss Mary Deyo, a native of New York state, and a daughter of Hiram and Electa Deyo, who were among the leading and most highly respected citizens of this part of the state. Of the children who have blessed their union there are living three sons and one daughter: Mortimer, a resident of Virginia ; Dorothy, wife of Doctor Frankhouser, of Hillsdale; Henry, living at the parental home ; and Clarence J., like his brother, Mortimer, a resident of Virginia. In politics Mrs. Stoddard is a faithful Democrat, but he is not an office seeker. He belongs to the Knights of the Maccabees, being a charter member of the tent at Litchfield, taking great interest in its af- fairs.
JOHN SPROWLS.
John Sprowls, of near Hillsdale, is one of the few representatives left among us of that fast- fading band of carly pioneers who redeemed this country from the wilderness, made it fruit- ful with the products of systematic industry, blessed it with the advantages of civilization and started it forward on a career of greatness and usefulness that has been among the signal bless- ings of mankind and the subject of song and story in many languages. He is a fine type of the heroic age of the county, in which men, beasts, and Nature herself seemed arrayed in arms against the advance of civilization, and every man was obliged to rely for the most part on his own precautions, acuteness and strength for safe- ty and his own endeavors for the very necessar- ies of life.
John Sprowls was born in Ontario county, New York, on September 2, 1833, the son of Peter and Mahala (Huff) Sprowls, also natives of New York. They were industrious and well-to- do farmers in their native state, but believing there was better opportunity for advancement in the West, in the fall of 1836 they came to Michigan and located in what is now Hillsdale county, first in Moscow and later in Adams town- ship, and here after long lives of usefulness they passed away, the father in 1881, at the age of seventy-five, and the mother in 1886. They had
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three sons and five daughters, and two of the sons and two of the daughters are living. Their son, John, was reared and educated in this coun- ty, and remained at home assisting on the farm until he was twenty-two. He then settled on the farm which he now occupies and which has been his home continuously since that time. It was all dense woods when he took up his resi- dence on a small clearing he made in it, and by the continued application of regular and skillful labor he has made it one of the best and most highly improved farms in the township. In 1870 he erected a good brick house, which is yet one of the most substantial and comfortable farm houses in a circuit of many miles, and added good barns and other outbuildings. All the while he has been improving the land by judicious cultivation, and has added to its extent by timely purchases until he has a tract of over 200 acres, all in excellent condition. When he located here this part of the county was without roads or con- veniences of any kind, and the way to a neigh- bor's house, which was distant and difficult of access at the best, was by an Indian trail or a blazed pathway through the forest. Such con- comitants of modern life as schools, churches and stores at convenient places were among the hopes for a far future.
Mr. Sprowls is a Democrat in political faith, but has never sought office of any kind, prefer- ring to serve his country from the honorable post of private citizenship. He was married in 1855 to Miss Elizabeth Williams, a daughter of John and Mary Williams, natives of Wales and emigrants to the United States and Michigan in 1835. Mr. and Mrs. Sprowls had one child, their daughter, Mary, wife of Mrs. E. L. Wor- den. Mrs. Sprowls died on October II, 1901, universally respected and generally well beloved. Her daughter, Mrs. Worden, has two children, Reno M. and Glen S. Mr. Sprowls is close to the limit of human life as fixed by the sacred writer, and rests calmly in its mild and beauteous evening in peace with all mankind, refreshed by the recollections of a well-spent and serviceable existence, which has been devoted to the good of
his fellow men and the development of the section of country endeared to him by all the struggles and triumphs in which he has participated.
JAMES SPROWLS.
This pioneer of Hillsdale county, who is a brother of John Sprowls, of this. township, whose sketch immediately precedes this, has passed the whole of his life from the time when he was two years old in the county. He was native in Canandaigua, Ontario county, New York, on March 19, 1835, the son of Peter and Mahala (Huff) Sprowls, also natives of New York and prosperous farmers there. In the fall of 1836 they came to Michigan, bringing their young family, and settled in Adams township. On his father's farm he grew to manhood and in the district schools of the neighborhood he re- ceived a limited common school education. Life was then strenuous here and provisions for its necessaries was the first duty of every one in the wilderness, and so all were obliged to bear their part in the general effort for production and in the constant vigilance required for safety.
The Indians were abundant in the region and sometimes bitterly hostile to the whites, and wild beasts and other dangerous concomitants of sav- age life were not wanting. The opportunities for attending school in any regular and system- atic way were not present. But the conditions of their lot made heroes and men of iron nerve of the pioneers, and so nature compensated in one way for what she was obliged to deny in another. Mr. Sprowls remained at home and assisted in clearing up and cultivating the farm until he was twenty years of age, when he took charge on his own account of eighty acres of land his fa- ther had located in Moscow township, but did not take up his residence on the tract. He remained in charge of this land and a farm in Fayette township until 1872, then moved to Woodbridge township, where he now owns 334 acres of fine land, which is well improved and has been brought by systematic skill and industry to a high state of cultivation and transformed from the
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wilderness into one of the most desirable farms in the township.
Mr. Sprowls was married in 1859 to Miss Marguerite Slingland, a daughter of Abraham and Thankful Slingland, of Ontario county, New York. They have two children, Herbert E. and Carrie E., and Mrs. Sprowls died June 23, 1903. This old pioneer is a Republican in politics but has never taken active part in political affairs. He is busily occupied with his farm work and other business operations, and these occupations give ample scope for the exercise of all of his facul- ties, and furnish full satisfaction of all his de- sires, except where the general welfare of the community is involved, when that is the case he has time and service for the cause. For nearly seventy years he has lived in this county and aid- ed in its progress and development, and among its people on all sides he is respected as one of their most forceful factors for good and one of their best types of citizenship.
ROBERT B. SUTTON.
The father of Robert B. Sutton was a native of New Jersey, and his name was Thomas. He belonged to an old Colonial family, distinguished in the early history of the Middle Atlantic states for valor and gallantry in war and for masterful capabilities in the pursuits of peace. Several of his brothers were soldiers in the Revolution and one was on the staff of General Washington and enjoyed the confidence of the great commander in a high degree. During the war he was in- volved in a duel at Albany, N. Y., and later went to Mexico and became famous in the Mexican army, rising to the second place in its command.
ยท Robert B. Sutton was born near Trenton, N. J., on March 29. 1792. When he was eight years old his parents removed to Lyons. Wayne county, N. Y., where he was reared and educat- ed and learned the cooper's trade at which he worked for a number of years during his resi- dence in the state. He joined the Federal army at the commencement of the War of 1812 and was in active service throughout the struggle, re- ceiving a wound in the gallant charge at Lundy's Lane. He was a man of remarkable physical and
mental endowments and development, possessed of an indomitable will. In early life he was a boatman on the Mohawk river, and later became interested in lumbering, becoming the head of an extensive enterprise in this line carrying on trade between Canada and the United States. Some time afterward he became the owner of a valu- able farm near his native place, and was also in- terested in lumbering in the then territory of Michigan. Here he purchased large quantities of pine logs and converted them into lumber, which he sold at a large profit. He also came into possession of extensive tracts of land in Illi- nois and Iowa, which were the only return he could get for a sum of money loaned by him.
In his young manhod he was married in New York state and there reared a large family of children, who also married in that state, where also his wife died. He removed to Michigan in 1859 and here took up his residence in Hillsdale. Here he actively engaged in the lumber business and conducted it on an extensive scale for a num- ber of years. He was interested in the develop- ment and improvement of the town and county, and assisted in all ways looking to this end. He assisted in the organization of the First National Bank, and became and remained a stockholder and a director in the institution until his death in 1876. He also erected the Sutton Opera House block, a handsome and substantial three- story building, accommodating four stores and the auditorium, from which it derives its name. In 1860 he was united in marriage with Miss Anna B. Wragg, who survived him seven years, dying in 1883, leaving one son, John R. Sutton, who is one of the prominent and successful younger business men of the county. The elder Sutton is remembered by the people of Hillsdale as a progressive and broad-minded citizen, one of their capable and enterprising business men.
John R. Sutton, the son of Robert B., was born in Hillsdale, Mich., on February 25. 1868, and was reared and began his education here, but later attended Eastern schools. He then prepared for his profession in the law de- partment of the Michigan University at Ann Ar- bor, graduating there in 1890. He was at once admitted to practice before the Supreme Court
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of the state, and on his return home was admit- ted to the bar of this county. He soon, however, turned to insurance as an occupation, and in this branch of industry has been very successful. He is now state agent and adjuster for the Fireman's Fund Insurance Co., of California. He owns the Sutton black, receiving it from his father's estate. In 1890 he was married to Miss Gertrude L., the only daughter of Colonel and Mrs. E. J. March, of Hillsdale, Mich., and they have one child, a son, John R. Sutton, Jr., born on June 15, 1899. Mr. Sutton is a member of the Ma- sonic order, belonging to lodge, chapter and commandery at Hillsdale. He gives close and careful attention to business, omitting no effort to expand it in volume, increase it in value and keep it up to the highest standard of excellence in every way. He is an observing student of the practical side of insurance in its many phases, and is not only an authority on the subject, but has always' available for his patrons the best features of the business for their advantage; at the same time exercising the most careful guar- dianship over the interests of the companies he represents.
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