County of Williams, Ohio, Historical and Biographical, Part 67

Author: Weston A. Goodspeed, Charles Blanchard
Publication date: 1882
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 885

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JOHN H. KUNKEL, & native of Perry County, Penn., was born January 26, 1826, and was the second of the six children of Henry H. and Catherine (Stone) Kunkel, both natives of Reading, Penn. Henry H. was a soldier in the war of 1812, and his father, Jacob Kunkel, served seven years as a soldier in the Revolutionary war. In 1852, Henry H. came to Williams County, and here made his home with his children until his death in 1876. John H. Kunkel learned the trade of a tailor, and also acquired a knowledge of farming in his youth, and at the age of seventeen located in Shelby, Ohio, and then went to Mansfield, where he learned the carpenter's trade. In 1841, he came to Brady Township, where he bought eighty acres of unimproved land, cleared up, and built a cabin, and by degrees increased his farm to 255 acres, eighty of which he has deeded to his son. In 1844, he returned to Shelby and married Sarah Blocker, a daughter of Jonas and Catharine (Oler) Blocker, and born near Shelby. This lady died in 1845, leaving one child. In 1848, Mr. Kunkel married Lavinia Bargahiser, a native of Virginia, and daughter of Levi Bargahiser, of the same State. To this union have been born five children-George, Susan (now Mrs. Samuel Swisher), Lavinia (now Mrs. Jacob Denen), Hattie and Levi. For several years Mr. Kunkel served as Township Trustee of Brady, and in politics has always been a Democrat. He is a member of the Presbyterian Church, while his wife adheres to the Universalists.

GEORGE L. MARTIN was born in Beaver County, Penn., Decem- ber 11, 1818, and was the sixth in a family of nine children born to James and Mary (Leasure) Martin, natives of Westmoreland County, Penn. George L. Martin's early days were passed on his father's farm and in attending subscription schools, until, at the age of twenty, he apprenticed himself to a cabinet-maker for three years. For two or three years he followed the business at Darlington, in Beaver County, and then, in the fall of 1843, he came with his wife to this township, where he bought 160 acres of unimproved land, cleared up, and improved his place, so that now it is one of the best in the township, containing probably the finest fountain in the county. Mr. Martin was married, September 11, 1843, to Miss Mary A. Mahan, a native of Washington County, Penn., and daughter of John B. and Mary (Brown) Mahan, natives of the same county. Mr. and Mrs. Martin have had born unto them seven children,

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viz., Anna (now Mrs. Webster H. Bailey), James E., Robert M., Clark- son F., Mary, Cassius C. and Jessie B. (who died August 31, 1878, in her sixteenth year). Mr. Martin, who is one of the old pioneers, is a stanch Republican, and is and has been for the past nineteen years, Trustee of Brady Township. His grandfather was a soldier in the war of the Revolution.

WILLIAM HENDRICKS McGREW, son of Finley and Mary McGrew, was born February 22, 1796, in Adams County, Penn., where he received a very fair education. In 1828, his father, a native of En- gland, with his family came West, halting at Columbiana County, Ohio, where, on the 2d day of March, 1831, William H. married Miss Mary Smith, daughter of Benjamin and Deborah (Yates) Smith, and born August 25, 1810, her parents being native Virginians. In Columbiana County, Finley McGrew died in 1830 ; his wife died in Franklin County, Penn., some years before. W. Hendricks McGrew is the only survivor of a family of six children, of whom he was the youngest. He came to Williams County with his wife and children in 1836, and settled about two miles south of West Unity. Not a stick had been cut by way of clearing the land. He put up a cabin, into which he moved before doors or windows had been put in, and here, surrounded by wolves and other wild animals, he resided until he had cleared up 140 acres. Mr. McGrew has served nine years as Justice of the Peace of Brady, and as Township Trustee fifteen consecutive years, and has always been a public-spirited man. There have been born to him ten children, of whom Finley died in infancy, and Mary at the age of nine ; Nathan and Abraham are living in Iowa, and William in Minnesota; John and George are in the drug trade at West Unity, which they began in 1871, and still continue with increasing patronage. In October, 1865, Mr. McGrew retired from his farm to West Unity, where he enjoys reasonably good health and the repose that comes of well-doing.

WILLIAM C. MILLER was born in Richland County, Ohio, November 10, 1834, next to the oldest of a family of nine children born to John and Rebecca (Carl) Miller, natives of Pennsylvania and Ohio. John Miller settled in Brady Township when William. C. was but six months old, and entered 160 acres of wild land, which he rescued from the wilderness ; sold thirty years later, and moved to Pulaski Township, where he resided till 1876 ; sold out again and moved to Waterloo, Ind .; resided there till 1881, and then came to Edgerton, this county, where he now lives. William C. Miller worked with his father till twenty-one years of age, and then began to work out on his own account. He made a trip to California in 1859, and visited Oregon, Washington Territory and Idaho. In the fall of 1863, he returned to Brady Township via

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Panama and New York, and bought 175 acres of land, on which he has ever since resided, increasing it to 255 acres, and bringing it up to the highest standard of cultivation. March 10, 1864, he married Miss Mar- garet L. Rowles, a daughter of Alfred M. and Matilda (Green) Rowles, and a native of Ashland County, Ohio. Mr. and Mrs. Miller are mem- bers of the Universalist Church, and are the parents of five children- Edwin U., Carrie B., John, Otis R. and Hernando C. Mr. Miller, when a boy of thirteen, was the first to suggest to Mr. Schamp that his child had been murdered by Heckerthorn and Tyler, a detailed account of which crime will be found in the historical department of this volume.

GEORGE WESLEY MONEY was born on the 16th of March, 1824, in Fairfax County, Va. His father was descended from an intermixture of Irish and English blood; he was a man of upright character, dis- tinguished for his zeal and fidelity in his religious life, and his patri- otic devotion to the perpetuity of the Government and Union of the States, voting against secession in his native State; he soon after for- feited his life, having been shot dead in his own dooryard by a rebel gun. His mother's maiden name was Johnson, descended from an old English family-a familiar name in English history. His maternal grandmother was descended from an intermixture of English and Indian blood. Thus the subject of our sketch is distinctly connected with the "first families of Virginia." In early life Mr. Money, imbibing a hatred for the insti- tution of slavery, left his native State and sought a home in Ohio, living for awhile in Richland County. On the 18th of October, 1849, he was united in marriage to Miss Mary E. Cook, in the village of Waterford, Knox Co., Ohio; and, in April, 1850, he came to West Unity, living there some eighteen months ; he then removed on the land on which he now resides, then a unbroken forest. His early education was confined to the log schoolhouse of his day, with the addition thereto of a five- months' term at the Martinsburg Academy, in Knox County, under the tutorage of Charles Martin in the winter of 1846 and 1847, his room-mate being William Windom, now in the United States Senate from Minnesota, whose friendship has been abiding ever since. Soon after his removal to West Unity, he was elected to the office of Township Clerk, which office he filled for several years until, in 1854, he was elected Justice of the Peace of Brady Township (his commission being signed by Gov. Medill and Secretary William Trevitt), which office he has held nearly twenty-one years. He now holds a Justice's commission signed by Charles Foster, Governor of Ohio. On the 19th of June, 1875, the Republican party placed Mr. Money at the head of their county ticket as a candidate for Representative in the State Legislature. He was elected at the following October election, carrying the full Republican vote of the county. At the

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end of his official service in the Legislature, the Bryan Press, in an editorial article relative to the work of the Sixty-second General Assembly, closed by saying : " Our own Representative, Hon. George W. Money, has been a most attentive and conscientious member. He has always been in his seat, and has voted right in every instance, so far as we have been able to judge. He has been somewhat of a silent member, but an active one nevertheless-and this is the highest order of usefulness. If we are always as well represented, we shall never have much reason to complain." In 1875, Mr. Money assisted in organizing the Mutual Brady Fire Insur- ance Company, which is still in a prosperous condition. He was elected its first Treasurer, and has hold that office ever since. While a member of the Legislature he drafted the law under which it and all similar com- panies in the State have received their charters, and by the active co-oper- ation of the Hon. John Fenton of Fulton County, who introduced the bill, secured its passage, and no Legislature has since sought to amend its pro- visions. In 1880, he also assisted in o: ganizing at Wauseon, Fulton Co., Ohio, the Tri-State Cattle-Breeders' Association for the improvement of stock in general, by encouraging the introduction and raising of thorough- bred cattle, and has been one of its Directors and also its Treasurer since its organization. Mr. Money ranks among the most industrious and en- terprising farmers of Williams County. Of him, the late John Rings, of West Unity, said " it was a pity that such men as Money should ever grow old in this world, he loves to work so well, while we have so many that do not like to work at all." On the 19th of January, 1870, Mr. Money lost by death the wife and companion of his early manhood, who left two children-a daughter and sun, the daughter dying May 17, 1876. On the 18th of October, 1870, he was married to Miss Elizabeth Thrap, of Putnam County, Ohio, a lady near his own age. But this biograph- ical sketch will be but an imperfect record of Mr. Money's lite-work with- out some allusion to his moral worth and religious life and character, for these are the essential elements of every true and noble record. And it is but a just tribute to his sainted mother to say that to no human instru- mentality is he so much indebted for that moral and religious manhood he has attained in life as to the vivid and ever living presence of a mother's fidelity to the moral and religious law of her being-her prayers have been like an ever-present altar of burning incense all along the pathway of his life-that has kept burning as an inspiration for a better life in heaven, and a rejoicing together with that mother over victories won on the battle- fields of earth. From his earliest recollection both his parents were mem- bers of the M. E. Church, so that it may be said, that, according to prim- itive Methodistic usage, he was baptized and born in that church; and, at the age of nineteen, by voluntary choice he became a communicant in

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the church in which his parents had found a religious home. Yet in all his religious life he never has cultivated any very strong affiliations for any one religious body or organization, but, wherever in the wide brother- hood of man he has been able to see Christ's image and likeness, there his heart has responded to the Christian brotherhood of a universal Christian Church. Of his religious life, a Brother minister has thus written : "Brother G. W. Money, by an earnest and devoted life to the cause of the Master, and the manifestation of powers sufficient in the eyes of the Church to mark him as one fit for the sacred duties of the ministry, she licensed him as a local preacher February 29, 1852, which relation he sustained for four years, when, in the fall of 1856, he entered the travel- ing connection, and, for five years, performed the arduous duties incidental to large circuits, preaching at private dwellings and in log schoolhouses in Northwestern Ohio. And through the labors and exposures confronting him in his path of duty, bronchitis seized him in a very acute form for its victim, compelling him to quit the active work for a season until health would be restored ; and, in the meantime, he gave up his chosen voca- tion-the active ministry. But while he has not been subject to the call of the Conference and the appointing power, he listened and gave heed to the voice of the people; and, at their call, he has and is still going over a large ' circuit,' to speak words of consolation and hope to those bereft of their loved ones; and, in this relation, he is indeed the servant of the people-especially the non-church-going people. And it will fall within the bounds of truth to say that, for the last twenty years, Brother Money has attended as a minister more funerals than any other man in the county." And now, in the fifty-ninth year of his age, the active powers of his mind and body have been able to meet the varied responsibilities of life, and discharge them in a way that has met the voice of an approving conscience and the general approbation of the public mind. And now his highest aspiration is to so fill up the residue of his earthly life as to leave an untarnished record and character to all his fellow-citizens that shall survive him. Of the membership of the church, with whom he united in April, 1850, in West Unity, all have either died or removed away, so that he only now lives as a representative of the organization of that date.

GEORGE H. MORE, born in Bavaria, July 12, 1830, was the second son of a family of six children, five boys and one girl. His father, George More, died December 22. 1862, aged sixty-four years, and his mother in 1868, aged sixty-seven. . At the age of fifteen, George H. be- gan working out in his native land. May 12, 1848, he took a steamer at Bingen on the Rhine, and at Rotterdam embarked for London; there he took passage on a sailing vessel, and after a boisterous voyage reached

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New York June 24, 1848 ; thence he went by rail to Buffalo; thence by way of the lakes to Toledo, and from the latter point came to West Unity on foot, arriving here July 5. October 31, 1852, he married Miss Catha- rine Bohner, whose father, Jacob Bohner, was one of the first settlers of Williams County. She was born in Pennsylvania January 31, 1830. To this marriage nine children have been born as follows : Jacob Ell- wood, June 2, 1854 ; George W., November 12, 1856 ; Frank Emerson, January 22, 1859 ; Charles Plemon, July 22, 1861; Wilson Ellsworth, February 15, 1864 ; William B., May 16, 1866; Cora Bell, August 31, 1868; Nors Alice, November 5, 1872; Wilford Clement, January 23, 1874. Of these, Charles Plemon came to his death August 22, 1866, by a kick from his horse ; George W. died February 8, 1882. Their re- mains lie interred in the German Grove Cemetery, two miles south of West Unity. Mr. More, in conjunction with his son Ellsworth, carries on a foundry and machine shop. The son is admitted to be one of the best machinists in the State, and is the inventor of several useful ma- chines. Both father and son are musicians and members of the West Unity Band.

LOUIS E. NEIL was born in Wayne County, Ohio, November 28, 1844, and is one of the six children of James and Mary (Noggle) Neil, both natives of Pennsylvania. James Neil, when eight years old, was brought to Wayne County by his parents; here he was married, and shortly after moved to Richland County and became an itinerant preacher in the Church of God ; in 1857, he came with his wife and family to Jefferson Township, this county ; bought 100 acres of wild land, which he cleared and improved, and recently sold for $7,000. He is still living in the county. Louis E. Neil worked with his father till September, 1863, when he enlisted in Company H, Thirty-eighth Ohio Volunteer Infantry ; served through the war, and was mustered out at Cleveland in July, 1865. He was in the battle of Kenesaw Mountain, in the Atlanta campaign, and with Sherman in his great "march to the sea." At Chat- tanooga, he contracted a lung fever, from which he has never fully re- covered. On his return home, he worked on his father's farm, and at carpentering and painting for several years ; in 1876, he came to Bridge- water Township, this county, where he bought a farm of eighty acres, on which he lived till 1878, when he sold out and went to Cloud County, Kan .; bought forty acres of wild land, on which he built a house, raised a crop, and then, eight months later, moved to St. Clair County, Mo .; worked awhile at his tradeand farmed on shares, and in December, 1879, returned to his father's, in Williams County, January 1, 1881; he bought one-third interest in a saw-mill, planing-mill and oar factory at West Unity, and is doing a thriving business under the firm name of Grindle & Neil.

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Mr. Neil was married, March 23, 1876, to Julia Cutshaw, a native of Cook County, Ill., and daughter of Jesse and Polly (Peach) Cutshaw, natives of Pennsylvania. The two children born to Mr. Neil are named Norman E. and Morton J. Mr. Neil is a member of Royer Post, No. 109, G. A. R., and he and wife are members of the Church of God.

ELWOOD ALBERT PIFER, son of Michael and Caroline E. Pifer, was born in Williams County March 9, 1854. His parents came from Pennsylvania and settled in Richland County, Ohio, about the year 1830. In 1850, they came to West Unity, where Mr. Pifer opened & harness shop, which he conducted till his death, November 10, 1881. He was born February 7, 1829, and his wife was born April 24 of the same year. Elwood A. Pifer was married March 30, 1875, to Mary E. Zeig- ler, whose father came from Pennsylvania, and mother from Germany. Three children are the result of this union-Somerton, born February 14, 1876 ; Clara, December 12, 1877, and Bertha Belle, August 20, 1879. Mr. Pifer learned harness making with his father, and followed that business until May 20, 1882, when he went into the hotel business at the Kenyon House, West Unity, where he remained three months, then purchased the McIntire House and its appurtenances, and is now conducting that famous establishment in a most successful and popular manner.

JAPHETH L. PRICKITT was born in Burlington County, N. J., twenty miles east of Philadelphia, Penn., August 5, 1815, and his ances- tors, as far back as he can trace them, were also natives of New Jersey. He was reared a farmer, and came on foot nearly all the way to Clinton County, Ohio, in April, 1838. He was married to Miss Phebe Bor- ton in Wilmington Ohio, December 27, 1838. For four years he worked at cabinet-making in Lumberton, and then moved to a farm he had purchased in Lucas County. Four and a half years later, he came to West Unity, where he had bought the first saw-mill erected in the place, and ran it about twelve years; he then bought a portable mill, which he ran two years, and then moved on his farm on Section No. 4, where he still resides. Mrs. Prickitt was born in Clinton County, Ohio, on the same day with her husband, August 5, 1815, and her parents also came from New Jersey. She has reared to maturity six children, and has lost three. Two of the sons, Daniel J. and James H., served in Company H, Third Ohio Cavalry, four years, lacking sixteen days, during the late war. James H. sustained such injuries by falling from his horse while on duty as to almost incapacitate him for work since, but otherwise the brothers were uninjured, although always at the post of danger.

REV. JOHN POUCHER was born in Lincolnshire, England, De- cember 10, 1824. His ancestors were English farmers, with the excep-

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tion of his maternal grandmother, who was of French descent, and whose father was a celebrated Baptist minister, and died about the year 1818. Grandfather John Poucher died at Digby, Eng., about 1840; father John Poucher died at Cunningsby, Lincolnshire, in 1876. Mother Poucher died in 1854. Rev. John Poucher has been twice married. First to Mary Colton, daughter of Peter and Elizabeth Colton, of Lincolnshire, November 8, 1842, and to this marriage five children were born-Eliza- beth, John Colton, Mary Ann, Sarah Ann and Laura. Mrs. Poucher died in Bowling Green, Wood Co., Ohio, July 19, 1868. His second marriage was with Mrs. John Poe, March 30, 1869. She was born in Massachusetts December 15, 1836; her first husband died during the late war, a prisoner in the hands of the enemy. To this union there were five children born-Frank Carver, Edward Thompson, Nellie Nao- mah, George Wesley and Robert Colton. Mr. Poucher came to Ameri- ca in the fall of 1854, and passed the winter following in Shanesville, Tuscarawas County, Ohio. In the spring of 1855, he engaged in mill- ing at Bridgewater, this county, and has ever since continued the busi- ness, and is now one of the proprietors of Unity Mills, West Unity. He joined the Central Ohio Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1857, and is still an honored member, and has charge of the Montpelier Circuit. At the outbreak of the recent war, Mr. Poucher was elected by his regiment, and commissioned by Gov. Tod, Chaplain of the Thirty-eighth Ohio Volunteer Infantry, in which capacity he served till the close of the war. While acting as Post Chaplain at Nash- ville, Tenn., he received a severe internal injury while assisting a wounded soldier to the cars, and is still a sufferer therefrom ; otherwise he escaped unscathed.

J. C. POUCHER, son of Rev. J. and Mary (Colton) Poucher, was born in Lancashire, England, March 23, 1847. Previous to coming to America, his father was engaged in keeping a bakery and confectionery in Manchester, England. Business reverses, consequent upon the Anglo- Russian war in 1854, caused him to emigrate to our country. On the voyage he experienced a shipwreck, the passengers and crew being res- cued by a passing vessel, and carried back to England. He made a second attempt, and arrived in safety in New York, when he moved West, living in portions of Ohio and Indiana until 1868, when he came to Will- iams County. He has been engaged in the ministry for many years. Our subject came to America the same year as his father, but not with him. Previous to coming to Williams County, he had attended school and acted as book-keeper. On coming into the county he settled at West Unity, engaging as book-keeper and salesman for the late G. H. Pearce during eight years, afterward opening a store, which he still continues, in

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West Unity, having one of the leading dry goods and notion trades in the place. During the present year, he has charge of the late G. H. Pearce's store in Columbia, Ohio. On May 7, 1872, he was married to Clara Stephens, daughter of C. A. Stephens. They have three children- James L., Clara and Pansy. Mr. Poucher is a member of Superior Lodge, 179, A., F. & A. M., West Unity Lodge, 638, I. O. O. F. and of Brady Lodge, 1676, K. of H .; also of the Uniformed Camp, of Bryan.

JASON F. RICHARDSON was born in Columbiana County, Ohio, March 15, 1824, the second of the seven children of Richard G. and Anna (Hendrix) Richardson, natives of Virginia and Pennsylvania. Richard G. Richardson was left without a father at the age of fifteen, when he, the eldest child, assumed the care of his widowed mother and three younger brothers and sisters. He bought the interest of the younger children in the homestead of sixty acres, to which he added until he was possessor of 201 acres of well-improved land. This he sold in 1850, and came to this township with his wife, whom he had married in Columbiana County. Here he bought 160 acres, known as the Ridenour farm, on which he resided till his death in 1880. He and wife were members of the Society of Friends, and he had filled the office of Justice of the Peace in Columbiana County for fifteen years. His widow survives him at eighty-three, and resides with her daughter, Mrs. Webb, near West Unity. Jason F. Richardson came, with his parents, to this township, and bought 160 acres of land in its wild condition, on which he erected a small frame house, and has continued to improve the farm down to the present time. In March, 1847, he married Miss Hannah, daughter of John and Elizabeth (Miller) Hester, and a native of Columbiana County, Ohio, and to this union there were born four children-Giddings L., Byron H., Olive B. and Ida M. April 5, 1879, Mrs. Richardson died, a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. June 20, 1880, Mr. Richardson married Mrs. Virginia, widow of Dr. Wheeler, and daughter of Thomas and Celeste (Vermilion) Tulley, of Loudoun County, Va. Mr. Richardson was Justice of the Peace for Brady Township for three years, Trustee for several terms, and for a number of years has been a member of the Board of Education. In politics, he is a Republican.

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County of Williams, Ohio, Historical and Biographical, Part 67

Author: Weston A. Goodspeed, Charles Blanchard Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Number of Pages: 885

Author: Weston A. Goodspeed, Charles Blanchard
Publication date: 1882
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 885