USA > New York > Delaware County > Biographical review : this volume contains biographical sketches of the leading citizens of Delaware County, New York > Part 101
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Levi Barnes was born in New Haven, Conn., in 1800, and was there married to Flora Hubbell, the daughter of John and Pris- cilla (Foote) Hubbell, the latter of whom died at the age of sixty-nine years, some four years prior to the decease of her husband,
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The father spent the earlier years of his mar- ried life in the city in which he was born, being the larger part of the time engaged in the manufacture of combs, operating quite a large factory. In 1836 he went South with his brother Merrick, settling in Georgia, where he lived until his removal to this town. His declining years were passed in the home of his eldest son, George Henry, of Franklin, who was born in New Haven, Conn., in 1829. To Levi Barnes and his wife four children were born, as follows: Mary E., who married Alonzo Blish, and died at Hawley, Pa., at the age of twenty-two years, leaving an infant son ; George Henry; John Hubbell, a whole- sale dealer in tea and coffee in Boston, who was killed in a railway wreck in Cambridge, Mass., in 1892, leaving a widow and three children ; and Herbert, a farmer in the town of Bainbridge, Chenango County.
R ICHARD S. HAMMOND, a popular and prominent citizen of Roxbury, was born at Batavia Kill in this town, January 15, 1839. He is of English and Dutch descent, one of his great- grandfathers, named Ferris, having come here from Holland. Mr. Richard S. Hammond can remember going to visit him in his old log house many years ago. Mr. Hammond's paternal grandfather was Jonathan Hammond, who came to Roxbury from Long Island, and settled on a small farm and built a log house. His wife was Polly Jenkins. They had six children - Nathaniel, James, Polly, Phoebe, Margaret, and Litta.
Nathaniel Hammond, the father of the sub- ject of the present sketch, was born at Batavia Kill, and received a common-school educa- tion. At the age of twenty-one he purchased a farm, which is now owned by James Sher- wood, Jr. This farm he sold after improving the land and buildings, and went to work in the carpenter's trade, which he followed the rest of his life. He married Caroline Sears, the daughter of Richard Scars, and had eight children : Richard S .; Nancy; Franklin; Daniel and David, who were twins; James; Herbert; and Hector. After working as a carpenter at Roxbury for a short time, Mr.
Hammond moved to Lexington, Greene County, and from there to Ulster County, where he spent the last years of his life. He was a Whig, and was a prominent citizen, well known and respected. His church pref- erence was Baptist, and he was a prominent member of that church. He died at the age of forty-seven. His wife survived him, and married a second husband. Both are now dead.
Richard, who was named for his grand- father Sears, was educated in the district school. At the age of seventeen he went West to Illinois, where he worked farming, but came back to Roxbury after three years, and continued in the same occupation until a few months after the outbreak of the Civil War. He then took up arms in defence of his country, enlisting in September, 1861, in Company G, Twentieth New York Volunteer Militia, as a private, at the end of a year being promoted to be Corporal. In the battle of Antietam, September 17, 1862, Mr. Ham- mond was wounded in the knee, and disabled so that he had to come home, receiving his discharge. After his return he bought a farm of one hundred and sixty acres at Pine Hill, Ulster County. At the end of two years he sold it, and bought out a grocery business in Pine Hill; but at the end of a few years, deciding to go back to farming, he traded his grocery business for a farm on Birch Creek. Here he remained ten years.
On July 4, 1865, he was married to Louise H. Cure, the daughter of William Cure, of Pine Hill. She died on this farm at Birch Creek; and he sold the place, and accepted a position as travelling salesman. On January 15, 1874, he married Phoebe Gray, daughter of Jonathan and Nancy Gray, of Ulster County. He has two children by his first wife, namely: Elmer F., who was born Jan- uary 13, 1866, married Jennie Haines, has one child, and is now a well-to-do farmer in Lexington, Greene County : and Benjamin F., who lives at home. By his second wife he had four children: James W. and Louise H., both of whom died in childhood; Hermon H. ; and Charles T. The former is thirteen, and the latter seven years old.
Mr. Hammond was Deputy Sheriff for nine
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years, and is now a Constable in the town. He is a member of the John A. Logan Post, No. 477, of the Grand Army in Stamford, and is a respected and popular citizen of Roxbury.
DMOND T. FINCH, a prosperous farmer of Tompkins, Delaware County, N. Y., was born in the adjacent town of Colchester, June 23, 1836. His great- grandfather came from England before the Revolutionary War, and settled in Westches- ter County, New York, where he employed himself in clearing the land and building a log house. His wife accompanied him to this country, and here was born their son, James Finch, who was a minute-man in the Revolu- tion. At the close of the war he married a Miss Finny, of Westchester County. They reared a large family, leasing land on Harden- burgh Patent, which they cleared, erecting a log cabin. James Finch rafted his lumber to Philadelphia, returning on foot with his pur- chases bound to his back, the journey occupy- ing four days. He died at Colchester at the age of eighty years.
Jesse Finch, son of James, was born in Col- chester, and, after leaving the district school, began the business of cutting and rafting lumber with his father. When twenty-four years of age, he married Huldah Malory, daughter of William Malory, who soon after his marriage moved to Hamden, Delaware County, from Connecticut, buying a farin, which he sold ten years later, and then re- turned to Colchester. Mr. and Mrs. Jesse Finch were the parents of eight children; namely, Frank, George, Mary, Amy, Esther, Edmond, Junius, and Cornelia. They moved to Tompkins, and settled on the farm now occupied by their son, Edmond T., where the father died at the age of eighty years. In religion he was a Methodist, and until 1860 voted with the Democrats, after which he adopted the Republican platform.
Edmond T. Finch was educated at the dis- trict schools of Colchester, and assisted his father in farming and lumbering until he reached his twenty-second year, and then went to Kansas. He joined the "Jay Hawkers," a company of Eastern men who banded to-
gether to make Kansas a free State, and par- ticipated in the "Kansas War." At the breaking out of the Civil War he returned to New York, and enlisted in the Second Heavy Artillery, taking an active part in seven of the most important battles of the war, among them the battle of the Wilderness, Spottsyl- vania, and Cold Harbor. In a skirmish at Talpothimie Creek every man in his company was shot and half of them were seriously wounded. His regiment of eighteen hundred men lost thirteen hundred in six weeks before Petersburg. At Weldon Railroad, June 18, 1864, Mr. Finch was shot through the right lung, and for nine months was confined in the hospital at Willets Point, being mustered out of service after Lee's surrender in 1865.
In 1866 Mr. Finch married Miss Clemin- tine Griffin, daughter of Stephen and Amanda Griffin, of Tompkins, and settled on the old homestead, where he still resides. Mrs. Finch's grandfather, Peter Griffin, was a pio- neer of Delaware County, and married Phebe Parks, daughter of the famous "Boswain " Parks, a noted scout and hunter of Revolu- tionary times, who was locked up as a traitor by the inhabitants of Wyoming, whom he had warned of the approaching danger. They, believing his story of the coming massacre to be untrue, had him arrested; but he was re- leased by the interference of friends, and es- caped the dreadful fate of those who did not heed his warning. His daughter, the great- aunt of Mrs. Finch, died in Hancock a short time ago at the extraordinary age of one hun- dred and eight years.
Mr. and Mrs. Finch have five children - Mary, Roy, Leon, Paul, and Edna. Mr. Finch is a successful farmer, and, in addition to his property in Tompkins, owns farm lands in Kansas. He is a liberal-minded, upright man, who enjoys the regard and esteem of his acquaintances.
EORGE F. WOOD, son of Henry W. and Sarah Abell Wood, was born in
Franklin, N. Y., April 7, 1867. In 1868, with his parents, he went to Nebraska; and he lived there till the summer of 1883, when he returned to Franklin, and in Septem-
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ber he entered Delaware Literary Institute as a student.
He remained in the school five years, grad- uating in the class of 1888, and taking a medal for declamation the same year. He entered Hamilton College in the fall of 1888, and at once he was a recognized leader of his class in all matters of a common college inter- est. He graduated with honor June 30, 1892. He entered Union Theological Seminary (New York City) in the fall of 1892, and died at the Presbyterian Hospital in New York, February 3, 1893. His burial-place is in the beautiful Ouleout cemetery at Franklin, near by the village where five years of his school days at the institute so pleasantly and so quickly passed away. He was a young man fully six feet high, of large frame and of noble countenance, a young man of large intellect and larger heart.
His character was of the highest order, and his friends were legion. The ministry was his chosen life-work, and the foreign field his place selected for work. The call to die was sudden, but not a murmur did he utter. A few moments before his death he said, "O Lord Jesus, in thy name I ask full and free entrance into the city of life." He was a natural speaker, and he spoke with an earnest- ness seldom known in a young speaker.
Franklin mourns the loss of George F. Wood.
J ACOB C. HOAGLAND, a retired farmer of the town of Tompkins, Delaware County, N. Y., was born in Gilboa, Schoharie County, April 17, 1827. His grandfather, Christopher Hoagland, was born in New Jersey, and mi- grated to Gilboa, Schoharie County, N. Y., in the latter part of the eighteenth century. Here he bought, at twelve and a half cents an acre, large tracts of land, which he improved and sold at an advanced price to new settlers, who kept coming into the country at that time. He was the first militia Captain in the town, having formed the company which he afterward commanded, and also took an active part in town affairs. He married Eva Van Loan, who, like himself, was descended
from the early Dutch settlers of the State. Captain and Mrs. Hoagland had five children : Jacob, a merchant in Catskill; Abram, a suc- cessful farmer in Gilboa; James, the father of the subject of this sketch; John, who was engaged extensively in business, having a tan- nery, a store at Gilboa, and a large farm at the same place; and Susan, who married Solo- mon Grey, a merchant in Catskill.
James Hoagland received his education in Gilboa, his native town, where at an early age he began to work on a farm. When he started in life for himself, his father gave him a farm fully stocked, where he spent the rest of his days. He married Ellen Decker, daughter of Abram Decker, a hotel-keeper and a represent- ative of one of the oldest families in Gilboa. Eight children were born of this union: Christopher, who was a farmer in Gilboa; Abram, a wholesale and retail dry-goods mer- chant in Albany; Jacob; Nathan, who keeps a dry-goods and grocery store in Schenevus: Margaret ; Eva; Adaline; and Sarah.
Jacob C. Hoagland was educated in his na- tive town. Having grown to manhood, he purchased his present farm of ninety-eight acres, then partly under cultivation. He mar- ried Sarah Beagle, of Hancock, daughter of John and Margaret (Finkle) Beagle. Mr. and Mrs. Hoagland had a family of ten children, seven of whom are living. Their son Chris- topher, who is a farmer of Hancock, married Vesta Alberta, and has two children - Al- berta and Christopher. A daughter, Margaret, married Edward Christian, a farmer of Tomp- kins, and has two children - Claude and Mena. Another daughter, Julia, married John Douglass, a resident of Pennsylvania. and has a family of four children - Della, Herbert, Blanche, and John. Emma Hoag- land married Lawyer Bush, of Hancock. fore- man in the acid factory, and has one child, Ervin. Mary married Charles Bush, a mason in Hancock, and has three children -- Frank, Christie, and Arthur. Effie married Peter Summers, a foreman in the acid works of Hancock, and has one child, Mina. Orlando Hoagland lives at home with his parents.
Mrs. Hoagland is a much respected mem- ber of the Methodist church. Mr. Hoagland, who has been foreman for a number of years
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in the acid works of Hancock, now lives prac- tically retired on his farm, assisted in the work by his son Orlando. He is held in favor by his fellow-citizens, and has made many firm friends.
AVID G. McDONALD is now liv- ing, retired from the active cares of life, on a portion of his farm on the East Brook road, about five and one- half miles from the village of Walton. He is a native of North Carolina, born of Scotch parentage, August 3, 1822, in Fayetteville, Cumberland County. His father, Archibald R. McDonald, son of Roderick McDonald, was born and grew to maturity in Scotland. While in the vigor of young manhood, Archi- bald McDonald emigrated to America, and, going directly to North Carolina, purchased a farm near Fayetteville, and resumed the occupation to which he had been reared. Selling that estate, he at length came to Wal- ton, and, after looking about for a little, bought the farm where his daughter, Mrs. Howland, now lives, and carried it on with success until a short time prior to his decease, when he sold it to his son-in-law, Edwin R. Howland. Very soon after the transfer of his property he was thrown from a wagon, meet- ing with such injuries that his death occurred three hours afterward, he being then eighty- four years old. His wife, Jeanette Smith, was also a native of Scotland, and the daugh- ter of John and Jane Smith. She reared seven children: Robert; Catherine; Jane, who married John Henderson; John; Mary, the wife of Amos Ensign; David; and Roderick.
The subject of this sketch spent the early years of his life in the place where he was born, until twelve years old being a regular attendant at the district school; but after that time he made himself useful in farm work, re- maining with his parents until attaining his majority. After the family removed to Wal- ton, he began his independent career by securing work on a farm by the month. His first purchase of, land was near the place where he now lives. He ran in debt for the farm, but managed it so well that it paid for
itself in a few years. He subsequently sold the property to his son; and, buying the onc hundred and sixty acres that constitute his present homestead, he carried on a good busi- ness in general farming and dairying, usually keeping about twenty-seven cows. This es- tate he has very recently sold to his son- in-law, Almon Launt, keeping a portion of it for his own use; and here he and his good wife are passing their sunset years in com- fort.
Mr. McDonald was married in 1845 to Jane Chambers, a daughter of David and Jane (Smith) Chambers. She is a native of Scot- land, and was about eight years old when her parents came to this country. Their family circle has been completed by the birth of these children: Maria, who died at the age of twenty-three years, married Calvin McAl- lister, formerly of Sullivan County, but now a butter merchant in Walton. Eliza, who mar- ried George Seymour, a farmer of Cannons- ville, has two children - Ethel and David. John, who married Hattie McFarland, has two children: Earle, a carpenter, residing in California; and Margie. Archie is a miner in California. David, a farmer and the su- perintendent of a ranch in California, is mar- ried, and has one child, Lucy. Jane, who married Almon Launt, son of Louis Launt, of Hamden, has two children - Louis and Jane. Sloane, a farmer in Masonville, married Han- nah Terry.
Mr. McDonald has achieved his success in life by diligent toil, directed by sound busi- ness principles. He is a man who thinks for himself, and in politics does not confine him- self to any party, but votes for the best men and measures. Both he and his wife are con- sistent members of the United Presbyterian church of Walton.
AMUEL B. KEATOR, the owner of a productive farm on the Beatty Brook road in Kortright, is a suc- cessful dairyman and a good citizen of the town in which he resides. He was born on the farm which he now occupies, on March 7, 1831, a son of Matthew S. and Polly (Dennison) Keator, Matthew Keator was
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born in Ulster County, but removed to Dela- ware County and settled at his present home about the year 1820. This farm was im- proved land; but by his unceasing toil and patience he did much to make it more produc- tive. He was a member of the Methodist Episcopal church, politically a Republican, and died in Jordan, Onondaga County, at the age of seventy-nine years. His wife was a native of Delaware County, and died at the age of ninety years. They were the parents of ten children, eight of whom are now living, namely: James, in Louisiana; Catherine Bar- low, of Syracuse; David, in California; Henry, in Minnesota; Samuel B., the subject of this sketch; Julia Doolittle, of Margarett- ville, N.Y .; Harriet Chadwick, in Jordan, Onondaga County; and Matthew S., in Ten- nessee. A daughter Mary died, aged fifty years; and Jerman, at the age of sixty-eight years.
Samuel B., the fourth son, grew to manhood on his father's farm, receiving the best educa- tion afforded by the district school at that time. He gave his attention to farming, and purchased the old home about thirty-five years ago. He is the possessor of one hundred and ninety acres of excellent land, superior farm buildings, with twenty-five head of the graded Jersey cattle, and furnishes dairy products for market.
In 1860 he married Miss Jane Ann Mc- Murdy, a native of Kortright, and a daughter of Jonathan B. and Abigail McMurdy. Mr. McMurdy was a successful farmer. Hc died at the age of eighty-six, his wife's death oc- curring when she was seventy-nine years old. Mr. and Mrs. Keator are the parents of two children: Helen, wife of A. T. Dunn, a resi- dent of Kortright; and George W. The lat- ter married Miss Mary E. Smith; and they reside with his parents, assisting in the carc of the farm and dairy. Mr. and Mrs. Keator are members of the United Presbyterian church at Almeda; and the Republican party has an ardent supporter in Mr. Keator, who has been Assessor for three years. He is an industrious, progressive, public-spirited citi- zen, who has won well-deserved success by his strict attention to business and honorable dealings with his fellow-men,
J OSEPH SCHAUFLER was born May 25, 1851. His father, George Schauf- ler, was a German, who came to Colum- bia County, and married there a Miss Catherine Loos, a daughter of Frederic and Elizabeth Loos. In the Loos family there were four children: George R .; John H .; Joseph; and Melissa, now Mrs. Wilson. George Schaufler was something of a wan- derer, working at his trade in Hamden, Col- chester, DeLancey, Holiday Bridge, Gregory Hollow, Downsville, Oneonta, and Croton. At Gregory Hollow he farmed for a short time, but returned to his trade. At Croton, the last named in the list of his abiding- places, he remained until his death.
Joseph Schaufler was born at Oneonta Plains, Columbia County. There is a pa- thetic interest surrounding the childhood of a man who at the age of ten years went to work out on a farm for his board and clothes, in the stern school of necessity learning the lessons of patient toil and endurance. His first wages were four dollars for three months, from which they were increased to forty-eight dollars for eight months. He continued working on various farms in the neighborhood until he was twenty-four years old, when he was married to Miss Amelia Tasey, by whom he had five children: Lelia E., born October 5, 1877, who died May 17, 1883; Jane C., born July 14, 1879; Maud S., born October 17, 1882; Henry, March 3, 1885; and Grace, born April 17, 1890.
Joseph Schaufler began working at black- smithing after his marriage, setting up his forge in the old Charles Wilson shop in Downsville in the fall of 1877.
Here hc plied his trade for two years, after which he sold out and worked for seven years for Mr. William Holmes. Later on he bought out the business of R. Liddle, and built a shop of forty by twenty-four feet in Bogart Avenue. Here he has the largest horse-shoeing business in Downsville. Mr. Schaufler's house is one of the first houses erected in Downsville, having been built about fifty years ago.
He is a Democrat, and has held the office of Overseer of the Poor for two years. Mrs. Schaufler is a Methodist in faith. The suc-
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cess that has attended the life-long toil and effort of this man should surely be an incen- tive to others who have their own exertions only to depend upon, and who need an exam- ple to cheer and encourage.
Mrs. Schaufler's lineage is worthy of record here. Her maternal grandfather, A. Wilson, was born November 14, 1793, and married Elizabeth Teed on the 14th of October, 1824. They had four children: Catherine, born No- vember 28, 1825; Charles, born May 15, 1827; John T., born January 14, 1832; Emily, born July 30, 1833. On the Tasey side she is a descendant of Henry Tasey, of Washington County, who married Elizabeth Taylor, and raised a family of nine children - Hugh, John, Elizabeth, Mary, George, Henry, Nancy, Martha, and Margaret. Henry Tasey, the ancestor, served in the Revolution- ary War. Hugh married Nancy Steward, and had six children, as follows: Mary, Henry, Alexander, John, George, Archibald, and Sarah Jane. Hugh was a shoemaker and farmer, and was a Whig. Henry, Jr., born July 13, 1822, married Catherine Wilson. Mrs. Schaufler, the wife of the original of the biographical sketch, was one of their children.
INDLEY E. HOYT, senior member of the firm of L. E. Hoyt & Co., pro- prietors of the Walton foundry and machine works, was born in this town June 26, 1853. He comes of stanch New England stock, being the only son of the late Edwin and Eliza Ann (St. John) Hoyt, both natives of Walton, and a great-grandson of Thaddeus Hoyt, one of the original settlers of this section of Delaware County, who came to Walton in 1790 from New Canaan, Conn., bringing with him his young wife, Jemima ยท (Benedict) Hoyt, and one son. Of the five children of their household all but the eldest were born in Walton. One, Matthew, died in early youth, the names of the others being Thaddeus, John B., Amasa, and Chauncey. Amasa Hoyt, who was the fourth son born to his parents, was the grandfather of the subject of this sketch. He was a farmer, and suc- ceeded his father in the ownership of the homestead, which was about four miles north
of the village of Walton, and on which he spent his entire seventy-eight years of life, his body being there now interred. He mar- ried Elizabeth Hyatt Seymour, a daughter of Samuel Seymour, of Walton, who bore him nine children, seven of whom are now living, as follows: Lewis, who resides in Walton; Thaddeus S., a farmer on West Brook; Fred- erick, in Walton; Edward, owning a farm adjoining the old homestead, a twin brother of Edwin, deceased; William S., residing in Unadilla, Otsego County; Julia, who is the wife of Stephen Lyon; and Whitney, who lives in Binghamton. The oldest of these children is now seventy-eight years of age, and the youngest fifty-three years, their com- bined ages aggregating four hundred and seventy years.
Edwin Hoyt lived but a few years after his marriage with Miss St. John, dying in No- vember, 1855, when but twenty-eight years of age. Mrs. Eliza A. Hoyt still lives in Wal- ton, and is now enjoying the comforts to which her earlier years of toil have richly entitled her. Being left a widow when quite young, with little of this world's goods, and with a young child to care for, she labored diligently with her needle, working at the tailoress's trade, and made a good living for herself and son. She is a daughter of the late Cyrus and Lydia (Andrews) St. John, and one of their seven surviving children, all of whom, with the exception of one daughter, who resides in Ohio, are residents of Walton. Her father, who was a prominent farmer of this town, rounded out a long life of ninety- three years, retaining until the last in a degree his great mental and physical vigor, dying very suddenly, February 27, 1892. He was a very devoted and exemplary member of the Methodist Episcopal church, in which he had been for many years an officer. He was a son of Peter St. John, Jr., and a grandson of Peter St. John, Sr., who came to Walton from Norwalk, Conn., in 1803.
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