A history of Adams County, Ohio, from its earliest settlement to the present time, including character sketches of the prominent persons identified with the first century of the country's growth, Part 66

Author: Evans, Nelson Wiley, 1842-1913; Stivers, Emmons Buchanan
Publication date: 1900
Publisher: West Union, O., E.B. Stivers
Number of Pages: 1101

USA > Ohio > Adams County > A history of Adams County, Ohio, from its earliest settlement to the present time, including character sketches of the prominent persons identified with the first century of the country's growth > Part 66

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

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Hamilton Dunbar.

Andrew Dunbar, father of the subject of our sketch, was born in Winchester, Virginia. His wife was Deborah Mitchell, of the same place. They were married in Winchester, Virginia, about 1779, and several of their children were born there. They emigrated to Lewis County, Kentucky, in 1794, when their son, Hamilton, born August 28, 1782, was twelve years old. Here Andrew Dunbar adopted the business of trading along the river with a large canoe between Alexandria, Ohio, and Maysville, Kentucky. One night his boat capsized, and he was lost, leaving a widow, four sons and three daughters. At the time of his father's death, Hamilton was living on the home farm near Concord, Kentucky. Not long after the family moved to Adams County, Ohio. As it was a custom in those days that every boy should learn a trade, Hamilton selected that of a carpenter and followed it in Adams and ad- joining counties. He entered the land east of West Union, on the Ports- mouth road, where John Spohn formerly resided. He was married Jan- uary 14, 1808, at West Union, Ohio, to Delilah Sparks, born January 1, 1792, in western Pennsylvania, a daughter of Salathiel Sparks. Mrs. Dunbar died at West Union, Ohio, August 14, 1828, and is interred in Lovejoy Cemetery. They were married at the residence of the bride's father in the property east of West Union where Thomas Huston for- merly resided and afterwards owned by Hon. J. W. Eylar. Soon after their marriage, Hamilton Dunbar purchased the lot just opposite and west of the stone Presbyterian Church and built the residence thereon in which he continued to reside until his death. The house is now occupied by Vene Edgington. Mrs. Dunbar's brother, John Sparks, was a banker in West Union, and died there in July, 1847. His wife was a sister of David Sinton, of Cincinnati, Ohio, the well known philanthropist.

George Sparks, her brother, died in West Union in 1842, leaving two sons, Salathiel and George. The children of Hamilton Dunbar are as follows: John Collins, born December 2, 1808, and died the following year; Ann, born November 21, 1809, and became the wife of Peter Bryant, of Kentucky, July 16, 1837, and died July 19, 1894; Grace, born December 6, 1812, became the wife of David Murray, April 22, 1829, and died in Georgetown, Ky., April 18, 1833; Agnes, born August 27, 1815, married April 3, 1838, John L. Cox, and is now living in Abilene, Kan- sas; L. William Willson, born November 16, 1817, and now resides at Locust Grove, Ohio; David Dunbar, born February 4, 1820; George Franklin, born August 3, 1822, and died at Ripley, Ohio, June 13, 1872; Johanna, born July 4, 1824, married Jesse Fristoe in 1843, and died at Manchester, Ohio, May 10, 1866; John Sparks, born December 6, 1827, died at Sigonney, Iowa, June 14, 1866. In those days people believed in the old scripture command to multiply and replenish the earth and practiced it.

Mrs. Hamilton Dunbar married at the age of sixteen and became the mother of nine children in the succeeding twenty years. She was a pattern of all domestic virtues known at that time, and died at the age of thirty-six. Her husband survived her seven years, but did not re- marry. Hamilton Dunbar did work for Judge Byrd, while the latter was a resident at West Union. He built the manager's house at Union Fur- nace in Lawrence County. He built a dwelling house at Union Landing for

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Thomas W. Means, and another dwelling house at Hanging Rock for Andrew Ellison. In West Union, he built a house for Peter Schultz, being the home where Auditor Shinn died in 1851, of cholera, and after- wards, used by J. W. Lafferty for a carding mill. He also built the house now occupied by W. V. Lafferty on Main Street, opposite the old Brad- ford Tavern. At the time he worked in West Union, carpenters went into the woods, cut down the timbers for cross-beams, sills and upright posts and hewed them with broad axes, got out the studding and rafters and roofed with lap shingles. As to all of the houses built by him, the work was done in this manner.

He also built the forge house for Sparks and Means, at Brush Creek-Forge Furnace. He also did the carpenter work on the home for Col. John Means, below Bentonville, and now owned by A. V. Hut- son. But every carpenter has his last contract and Mr. Dunbar had his in the Hollingsworth House on Main Street in West Union, Ohio. He began work on that in June, 1835, and had begun on the excavation. John Seaman had taken the contract for the excavation and had worked all day on Saturday, June 27, 1835. He lived east of the village some two miles and had gone home that evening. He was in the prime of life and vigor. He had made all arrangements to go forward with the work on' the following Monday, but that night he was taken with the cholera and died on Sunday, the 28th. He was the father of Franklin Seaman. Hamilton Dunbar had overseen the work on the Hollingsworth contract on Saturday, as usual, and had attended the Methodist Quarterly meeting on that day. He retired to bed in good health. Later in the evening, he was attacked by the dread Asiatic cholera and died Sunday morning at four o'clock. He went out with the rising sun. At that time it was customary to bury a cholera patient in a few hours after death. He was buried that afternoon at the Lovejoy graveyard. In those days there were no hearses, and the body of the deceased was taken out in a road wagon. The few mourners who attended the interment followed the wagon afoot. Nelson Barrere, of Hillsboro, was in West Union at that time and attended the funeral.

Hamilton Dunbar was the first victim of the scourge that year. He died in the house built by him directly opposite the old stone Presbyterian Church.

He was six feet high, of a large frame, weighed 180 pounds, had blue eyes and a fair complexion. He joined the Methodist Church a few years before his decease and was zealously attached to it. He was a man of great firmness of character and his family loved and respected him. With them his word was law. He was a Whig in politics and de- votedly attached to his party, as earnest in politics as he was in all other things. His political guide was the Liberty Hall and Cincinnati Gazette.

His sudden taking off was a great blow and loss to the young com- munity then only thirty-one years old, which has not been entirely for- gotten after a lapse of sixty-three years.

Rev. Robert Dobbins,

a pioneer of Adams County, was born in Northampton County, Pa., April 20, 1768. His father was William Dobbins, a native of Ireland. Young Robert was reared among the Friends in Pennsylvania, but in

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1793 he united with the M. E. Church in which organization he became a noted divine. In his early manhood he worked on a farm and flatboated on the Ohio River. In 1791, he married Miss Jane Boyce, a native of Cannonsburg, Washington County, Pa., and in 1804 he removed with his family to the East Fork of Eagle Creek in Adams County, Ohio, where he purchased a farm now known as the Early farm. There he reared a family of ten children among whom was a son, William Dobbins, who was a noted school teacher in early days in Adams County. During his residence in Adams County, our subject rode the old Scioto Circuit and preached to the pioneer Methodist Societies in Brown, Adams, Scioto. and Highland Counties. He was an associate of the Rev. James Quinn and Henry Bascom under Bishops Asbury and McKendree. It was Rev. Dobbins who successfully prevailed upon David Beckett to make a full confession at West Union on the morning of the day of his execution for the murder of Lightfoot, after Lorenzo Dow had exhausted his pur- suasive powers on the condemned and had failed to elicit from him a confession of the crime with which he was charged.

Rev. Dobbins was a preacher of great force, and his magnetic powers in the pulpit were most wonderful. In the pioneer days of Methodism in Adams County, he and the Rev. John Meek conducted camp meetings on East Fork of Eagle Creek on the Richard Noleman farm where thousands gathered to drink in the word of God from the lips of those eminent divines.

In the year 1818, the wife of Rev. Dobbins died at Horse Shoe Bottoms on White Oak Creek in what is now Brown County, where he had removed after disposing of his farm on Eagle Creek, and on June 24, 1819, he married Miss Jennie Creed, a daughter of Mathew Creed, of Rocky Fork, Highland County, and soon thereafter removed to Greene County, Ohio. While a resident of that county he represented it in the Legislature from 1826 to 1829. In 1830, Rev. Dobbins associated him- self with the Methodist Protestant Church because the office of Bishop in the M. E. Church had become repulsive to his democratic ideas of gov- ernment.

In 1829, he removed to Sugar Creek, Fayette County, where he owned a large farm and where he spent the remainder of his eventful life.

In 1844 he was elected by the Whigs in the Fayette-Clinton district to a seat in the General Assembly of Ohio where he served with great distinction in those troublesome times in Ohio State affairs. He was then in his seventy-seventh year.

He is described as being of a stocky, heavy build, head very large, with blue eyes, a prominent nose, and pleasing countenance. He died January 13, 1860.

Andrew Barr Ellison

was born in Manchester, December 19, 1808, the son of John Ellison, Jr., then Sheriff of Adams County, and Anna Barr, his wife. He was the eldest of a numerous family, and grew up and was trained as boys usually were at that time. From accounts we have, we believe that he, as a boy, and his boy companions had more enjoyment than boys now do. At any rate, he had more sport in hunting. When he was about sixteen or seventeen years of age, he clerked in two different stores in West Union

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for Thomas McCague & Company, and for Wesley Lee. At that time, it was customary to set out a bottle of good old corn whisky and treat each customer. Young Ellison set out the bottles and glasses many a time, but did not drink himself. His father died a few months before he be- came of age, and in 1830 he went to Cincinnati and into the employment of Barr & Lodwick, who had a store there and one in Portsmouth. In 1832, he was engaged for a short time in their employment in Portsmouth, and while there witnessed the great flood of 1832. Those of 1847, 1833 and 1884 he witnessed in Manchester. October 20, 1833, he was married to Miss Rachael A. M. Ennes, daughter of Judge Ennes, of Cincinnati.

In 1834, he took up his residence at Lawrence Furnace in Lawrence County and was store-keeper and manager until 1840, when he removed ta Manchester, where he resided thereafter during his life. In Man- chester he bought out the merchandising business of Henry Coppel and continued it until he went out of business in 1880, forty years. His store in Manchester, during its continuance, was one of the institutions of the county. It was known far and wide. Mr. Ellison kept all kinds of merchandise. If one could think of any article he wanted and could not find it in any other store in Adams County, he was almost certain to find it at A. B. Ellison's. He was the principal merchant in the county, and while in his time department stores were unthought of and unheard of, yet he practically kept a department store. During the early period of his merchandising in Manchester, he and Thomas W. Means went East together to buy their goods every year. During his business career no one ever visited Manchester without having his attention called to A. B. Ellison's store and without visiting it. People went from all parts of the county to deal with him. His store stood on Front Street facing the river, and to all passing boats he and his store were familiar figures.

One of his most notable characteristics was his rugged integrity. He was plain and frank in manner even to brusqueness, yet he had an un- derlying vein of great kindness. His generosity was large, but without display.

'His dress was always of the same style, black in color, low crowned soft hat, low cut vest and small pleated bosom shirt. His marked in- dividuality caused him to be regarded as eccentric. He had but one price for his goods. If he could not sell any article at the price he marked on it, it remained unsold.

No one acquainted with his character ever attempted to jew him down, but if a strager tried it, he was at once told, "This is my price, if you do not want the article, let it alone." After this lesson, the same person never tried it a second time. He had a great flow of spirits and a keen sense of humor. The anecdotes floating about Manchester, illustrative of his peculiarities, are legion, but one which will illustrate him well, is given: A customer owed him a note for merchandise long past due and which he had failed to pay after repeated duns. One day when this person was in the store, Mr. Ellison took him to one side and said to him in his peculiar brusque way, "If you don't settle with me, I swear I will tear that note of yours up. I won't have it." The manner in which this was done so impressed the customer with its awfulness that he actually paid the note at once.

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Mr. Ellison was a prominent Mason and took a great interest in the order. In sentiment, he was a Presbyterian, but was not connected with the church. He was always one of its most liberal supporters.

No sketch of Mr. Ellison would be complete without mention of his loyalty to the Union during the Civil War. He never missed an op- portunity to show a kindness to a Union soldier going to or returning from the war to their families at home. He watched the struggle with the most intense sympathy for the Union cause and with an unfaltering faith in the result. He had three daughters, Ann Eliza Herron, wife of Rev. R. B. Herron, a Presbyterian minister, but both now deceased; Mrs. Susan Barr Drennan, wife of Samuel Drennan, Esq., residing in Man- chester, and Mrs. Rachael Shiras, wife of Peter Shiras, banker, of Ottawa, Kansas. Mrs. Herron left a son and daughter grown and the latter married. Mrs. Shiras has six children grown up, and some of them married. Mr. Ellison's wife died March 10, 1875, and thereafter he made his home with his daughter, Mrs. Drennan, in Manchester. He retired from business in 1880, and from that until his death on the fifteenth of April, 1888, he enjoyed the society of his daughter's family and his old friends, without any cares, till the end came, with peace.

He was a unique character, noted and talked of everywhere in Adams County, but highly respected by everyone for the most excellent qualities in his rugged character. He had the business qualities of his grandfather, Andrew, with the sterling virtues of his mother. All of Anna Barr's children were noted men and women, as a careful perusal of this book will show.

Cyrus Ellison

was born in Adams County, August 16, 1816, the son of Robert Ellison, the third son of John Ellison, who emigrated from Ireland in 1785. Robert Ellison was married to Rebecca Lockhart. He was a soldier in the War of 1812. He had a family of ten children, his son Cyrus being the fourth son and the youngest child but one. The children were reared as all children of pioneer families were, and our subject had only such advantages as the schools of that day offered. He was, however, a great reader and student, so far as he could obtain books. His ideas of wisdom were those of the illustrious King Solomon. He believed "that out of wisdom came the issues of life." He began the world for himself at the age of seventeen years as- a clerk in West Union, where he remained until the age of twenty-four at a salary of five dollars a month and his board. He saved his money which he invested in Indiana Scrip, which was then known as "wild-cat money.". The failure of the banks which issued the scrip depreciated his capital and gave him a severe blow, but his brother, John Ellison, loaned him $1,100 and he invested it in the mercantile business at Manchester, and he managed to make and save a considerable amount of money.

On September 11, 1845, he was married to Miss Elizabeth Steven- son, daughter of Charles Stevenson, one of the prominent pioneers of Adams County, who had emigrated from County Donegal, Ireland. He maintained his home in Adams County until 1853 when he removed to Ironton, in Lawrence County, and became associated with the firm of Dempsey, Rogers & Ellison, the latter being John Ellison, his brother. This partnership owned Aetna and Vesuvius Furnaces and he became

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their general agent until 1857, when he became a partner, the name of the firm being Ellison, Dempsey & Ellison. When the Lawrence Iron Works Company began business in 1852, Mr. Ellison was its manager, and when that company was incorporated in 1862, he became its president, and remained such until he retired from active business.

In 1857, he was one of the stockholders in the Ohio Iron & Coal Company, by which the town of Ironton was laid out. In 1872, he was .one of the organizers of the famous Aetna Iron Works, at that time, the largest iron furnaces in the United States. Mr. Ellison was a director in this company, and, at one time, its president. It purchased from the Ellison, Dempsey & Ellison Company, the old Aetna and Vesuvius furnaces and seventeen thousand acres of valuable timber and mineral land in Lawrence County. Mr. Ellison was one of the original stock- holders of the Ironton Gas Company, and its president from January 25, 1876, to January 25, 1881. 'He was also at one time a stockholder in the First National Bank at Ironton, Ohio. With his brother, John Ellison, he was one of the builders of the Iron Railroad which connected the rich mineral fields of Lawrence County with the Ohio River, at Ironton. He was president of this road from 1859 to 1879.

In 1872, ten gentlemen, including Mr. Ellison and his brother John Ellison, met in the former's home and organized the First Congregational Church of Ironton, and built the present handsome structure. This church was dedicated without debt, owing to the liberality of the men who organized it.

Mr. Ellison, from the habit of extensive reading, kept up during his entire life, was a well-read man. He was a most entertaining con- versationalist, and always, even in his last days, interested in current events. He was fond of traveling, and until the infirmities of age disabled him, he traveled a great deal.

From the time he came of age until the organization of the Re- publican party, he was a Whig. While he was never ambitious for, or sought office, he took a great interest in political matters. He was a leader in all enterprises which were for the benefit or development of his city and county, and was prominently indentified with all the iron in- terests of Lawrence County. His superior executive ability, excellent judgment and natural discernment were the conditions of his success. In all the positions of trust which he occupied, and they were many, he discharged his duties with great ability and to the satisfaction of all those who had business connections with him.

He was a man of fine personal presence, about six feet, two inches tall, and well proportioned. He had fine regular features, light hair and flowing beard, ruddy complexion and deep blue eyes. In his associations with his fellow men, he evinced great natural dignity, and his presence impressed strangers on sight that he was a man of importance, which was strictly true. Socially, he was much liked by all who knew him, of genial manners and a gentleman of the old school.

From his first marriage, there were three daughters, Frances, who died in infancy ; Mary Adelaide, who married John Thornton Scott, son of Robert Scott. She has two sons, young men, who distinguished them- selves in the late Spanish War. His third daughter, Rosa, is the wife of Charles Brunell McQuigg, son of the late Colonel McQuigg, of Ironton.

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He was an officer in the Ironton Regiment, 8th O. V. I., during the Spanish War.

Cyrus Ellison's first wife died in 1864, and 1870, he was married to Miss Josephine Glidden, who survived him.

Mr. Ellison was, at one time, the possessor of great wealth, but owing to the shrinkage of iron, his investments were lost, and at the time of his death, only his life insurance was left of all he had accumulated. He died on the sixteenth of February, 1897, at the ripe age of eighty years .. He left behind him the memory of a life full of wonderful energy, a long vista of useful, happy years, and his bright and cheerful old age was crowned with his good work fully completed. His last years were cheered by the presence and companionship of his greatful and devoted daughters. He was interred at Woodlawn, near Ironton, but his memory will remain green, sweet and precious in the hearts of all those who knew him and who resepcted. and loved him for his virtues.

William Ellison

was born in Manchester, Ohio, June 19, 1796. His father, John Ellison, was born in Ireland in 1752, the son of John Ellison, born in Ireland in 1730. John Ellison, father of our subject, located at Manchester and purchased land extensively. His wife was Mary Bratton, born in Ire- land, September 28, 1767 and died in Manchester in her one hundreth year.

John Ellison and Mary Bratton were married in Ireland. They had eight children who grew to maturity and eight who died in infancy. He died February 21, 1826, at the age of seventy-four years. He made a will drawn by a clergyman, and after he was dead thiry years there was ex- tensive and expensive litigation to construe it and determine its meaning. Moral: Never have a will drawn by any other than a lawyer. From the time he came of age until 1831, our subject was engaged in the com- mission, shipping and forwarding business at Manchester, Ohio, in con- nection with his brother, David Ellison. At that time he went to Lawrence County as the manager of Mt. Vernon Furnace and became a member of the firm of Campbell, Ellison & Company, known all over south- ern Ohio. He retained his interest in that firm until his death. He returned to Manchester in 1835 and from that time was practically retired from business. He was married to Mary Patton, of Ross County, in 1827. She died in 1828, leaving no surviving child.

Mr. Ellison was married to Mary Keys Ellison, whose father, John Ellison, Junior, was a full cousin to William Ellison, on June 19, 1833. She was born January 25, 1812. They had the following children: Mary Ann, who married Rev. D. M. Moore; Sarah Jane, married Archibald Means; Robert Hamilton, who has a separate sketch herein, and Julia, who married John A. Murray. William Ellison died November 1, 1865, and his wife, May 14, 1888.

William Ellison was six feet, three inches in height, thin and spare. He possessed great natural dignity and equipose of character. He thought much and said little. He was a man of the strongest convictions. Nothing could swerve him from a course he believed to be right. In politics, he was first a Whig, and then an Abolitionist. He was a Republican from the organization of that party and from that time, until 1864, took

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an active interest in politics. In 1855, he and E. P. Evans were the delegates from Adams County to the State Republican Convention. He attended the National Republican Convention at Philadelphia in 1856. He also attended the Republican State Convention in 1857 and was a member of the Committee on Resolutions. He was a delegate to the Re- publican National Convention at Baltimore in 1864. He kept up all the activities of life as long as his health permitted. He joined the Pres- byterian Church at the age of twenty and lived up to its teachings faith- fully and conscientiously all his life. He was a superintendent of the Sabbath school for over thirty years and a ruling elder in the church for over forty years. He was never absent from Sabbath school, the church or the weekly prayer meeting unless he was sick or absent from home. It was a fixed principle of his life never to allow any secular business to interfere with his social or private Christian duties. He often contributed one-third of the minister's salary in cash and donated food, etc., equal to one-half more. The incidental expenses of the church, when not paid in full, were made up by him. For many years prior to his death, he was regarded as the wealthiest man in Adams County, and he devoted much time to public and private charity. He was constantly looking after the poor and contributing to benevolent objects, but it was all done quietly and unostentatiously. He daily visited the poor, the sick and the afflicted and administered to their wants, temporal and spiritual. He was much given to hospitality and was a most kind and generous friend. He had some grave financial troubles and some of the most harrassing social troubles, but he bore them all with the greatest equanimity and fortitude. In them all, he was like Job-he sinned not nor charged God foolishly.

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A history of Adams County, Ohio, from its earliest settlement to the present time, including character sketches of the prominent persons identified with the first century of the country's growth, Part 66

Author: Evans, Nelson Wiley, 1842-1913; Stivers, Emmons Buchanan Publication date: 1900 Publisher: West Union, O., E.B. Stivers Number of Pages: 1101

Author: Evans, Nelson Wiley, 1842-1913; Stivers, Emmons Buchanan
Publication date: 1900
Publisher: West Union, O., E.B. Stivers
Number of Pages: 1101