History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio, Part 50

Author: Williams Brothers
Publication date: 1879
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 443

USA > Ohio > Lake County > History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio > Part 50
USA > Ohio > Geauga County > History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio > Part 50

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Sidney Metcalf was born in Enfield, Connecticut, March 16, 1804. She also was one of twelve children. Her father's name was Thomas, and her mother's Sybil. Thomas and Eben Metcalf, of Chardon, and Orrin Metcalf, of Natchez, Mississippi, are brothers. Mrs. Elizabeth Chandler, of Seneca county, Ohio, is a sister, as was Mrs. Samuel Smith, of Chardon, also Mrs. Doctor Ludlow, of Auburn. One would like to know more of the Metcalfs. They were a strong- fibered race, coming from New Hampshire granite. Governor Metcalf, of New Hampshire (and probably Governor Metcalf, of Kentucky, also, as the Metcalfs are supposed to have had a common origin), was of that blood, and so is Honor- able Charles E. Glidden, of Warren. Thomas Metcalf was a strong, positive- minded man, of exceptional force of character and intelligence, as is Thomas, Jr., of Chardon. Orrin, a younger son, is a leading man in his region, and for many years sheriff of Adams, his county of residence, in Mississippi. Another son, Doctor Asa B., early became a resident also of that State, and after many years of successful practice there, removed to California, where he died, and where his widow and two accomplished daughters, Mrs. Ellen J. McHenry and Mrs. Emma

M. Hay, still reside. The mother, Sybil, was said to be one of the most amiable of women, which I can believe.

I knew nothing of the girlhood of Sidney. I thought the name a funny one for a girl; somehow it always seemed appropriate for Mrs. Converse. She accompanied the Smiths to Chardon in 1817, when she was thirteen, and grew and ripened in the richness and freedom of those years. Such a nature and mind as hers will educate themselves, and secure all there is of the best within their reach. At the age of twenty she formed her first marriage, becoming the second wife of Dr. Evert Denton, of Chardon, and assumed the care of his four children. Dr. Denton was one of the most famous physicians of his day, in a very wide circuit; a man not of striking personal appearance, but of great learn- ing and brilliant parts; a sayer of things to be repeated, many of which remain. After a happy union of six years, Sidney became a widow. This was in 1830. She now went through one of the sorest tests of a woman's life,-twenty-six, very attractive, a widow. In 1832 she formed what one might fancy her more real marriage, with Jude Converse. Quite certain I am that the conditions favorable to a happy union quite abundantly attended this last. The first husband was a man to be admired, honored, revered, and doubtless loved. The second was a man more to be loved. The gifted never seek the same gifts. The beautiful wed the plain, and genius mates with the moderately endowed, and is proud of the acquisition. The heart does not always find its own, but seldom fails to recognize it when it does. The dark, cynical, witty, original man of genius, inferior presence, and forty years, might not successfully rival the handsome, gay-hearted, high-spirited youth of twenty-six. Sidney had intellect and courage enough for half a dozen. However it may have been, the marriage was one of rare unity and happiness. The home realized the ideal conception of that word. The bright days of prosperity without found answering light within. When the outside world darkened it was illuminated by the radiance from the hearthstone. There heart, soul, love, tenderness, warmth, courage, and hope never diminished ; surrounding darkness only made them appear more conspicuous, steady, and enduring. With children and grandchildren idolizing and clinging to her, the woman, when she reached her second and real widowhood, pined. On the first anniversary of her husband's death she was smitten with illness, and five days after, February 9, 1875, she followed him.

It has been said that no woman attains all her best until motherhood. Mrs. Converse was the mother of six children. Of the four by her first husband, Richard E. and Sybil reached maturity. Richard is a man of singular gifts and fine acquirements, which for some inscrutable reason have never been utilized, and, though possessing many excellences, many men with none of his genius make a larger figure in the world. Sybil also had rare intellectual qualities, marked with a dreaminess that rendered her peculiar,-a beautiful, gentle girl, of brilliant intellect. She died when twenty-five, at her uncle's, in Natchez, of yellow fever. Of the two of the last marriage, Julius O. will be the subject of the following sketch. The others died in childhood ; the last, Mary Ellen, at the age of two and one-half years. A rare, precocious child, her gifts provoked the fatal favor of the gods, as in classic ages.

The mental qualities of Mrs. Converse were practical, of the cast we call mas- culine, because of their rarity among women. Her mind was enriched by wide and varied reading, her perceptions quick, and her judgment of men and things of singular accuracy. Few detected the tendency of the times with greater sagacity, or were more fertile in suggesting expedients. Force and strength were the leading features of her character. The religious element was large and well developed in her nature; her views of the order called advanced. Self-poised, clear-seeing, strong, and masterful, though always womanly, she was necessarily a centre. Tender woman, wife, and mother, the law of her household was love. Generous and sympathetic, her heart was a refuge to the stricken, and her hand a ready helper to the needy. In her neighborhood she was a resource of strength, wise counsel and charity ; in her circle she led without seeming to, and ruled by appearing to serve. When one contemplates her completed life, he may perhaps cease to regret that no broader and higher career was opened to her.

JULIUS ORRIN CONVERSE.

This gentleman bears the names of his two uncles, the governor of Vermont, and Metcalf, of Natchez. The only son and surviving child of the subjects of the two preceding sketches, he was born at Chardon, May 1, 1834, and is now forty- four years of age. He is what the English call " personable," stands six feet high, with more the complexion and look of the Converses than of the Metcalfs. With the kindly amiability of his father he unites the fine sense, good judgment, and many of the mental characteristics of the mother. The born pet of his parents through infancy and early childhood, he came as near being spoiled by over-tenderness as falls to the lot of the children of the most devoted. From the day that he was able to walk he was the perpetual companion of his father, who

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never relinquished his hand unless engaged in some act requiring both of his own. In his walks to and from the " Red Brick Store" to the post-office, to make calls or for recreation, Jude was invariably attended by Julius. What the result of continued prosperity in business would have been to the junior may not be known. The child, so tenderly cherished by the father, had early to learn the bitter-sweet lesson of persistent, fruitful labor. He was not placed early at school, nor did he ever at any time enjoy any but the commonest advantages. It is believed that after his thirteenth year his attendance at school was of the scantiest. A child of Sidney Converse would hardly be entirely dependent upon outside facilities for education. Julius could at no time, in the constant presence of his father, have been a harum-scarum, rollicking boy.

At sixteen he entered upon his novitiate in a life-long service of the press. It was in the office of a village newspaper that he grew, developed, and ripened, as strong-minded men do. It was there that he received his real outside education. He is a favorable specimen of what it may do for a boy of pure New England descent. I cannot imagine the faintest touch of the Bohemian type, which is found distributed in all printing establishments, on the character or habits of Julius. A boy might run away from such a father as Jude Converse; a tramp- ing jour. printer never had a mother who greatly resembled Sidney. Her provi- dence must have been too wise, wide, and warm to permit the birth of a wish to wander out of its circle. His first work, beginning in 1850, was under the young Bruces, William W. and Eli, on the Geauga Republic. He then served under the late Hon. J. F. Asper, afterward member of Congress from Missouri, who conducted the Free Democrat. He was succeeded by the late J. S. Wright in 1852, who subsequently changed the name of the paper to Jeffersonian Democrat. Young Converse followed the press in this change of owners, and continued in a subordinate position until he became the proprietor aud editor, in January, 1859. These useful, fruitful years were mostly spent in the same office, when, at the early age of twenty-five, he assumed the responsibilities of the head and owner of the establishment. The Converses were without exception pronounced Whigs. Julius had breathed no other air; indeed, there was scarcely enough of any other for a single breath. This came to them early impregnated with decided anti- slavery sentiment, and ere young Converse graduated to full citizenship the Whig party had disappeared. During this period he studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1858. He has a good mind for the law, where, in the long run, the solid wins against the brilliant. He took the paper, then free from local rivalries, with all the patronage of the county, and at once met the requisitions of his position. His predecessor was a cautious, prudent manager of the journal. From the young editor it at once took a sharper and more advanced position upon the one topic of slavery.

The next year saw the election of Mr. Lincoln and the secession of the States, followed by the awful war, which fought itself, dictated its own policy, fashioned all policy, and formed all individual opinion. The whole nation was at war, and all men, women, and children were more or less warriors, soldiers, auxiliaries, victims, sufferers, and mourners. During all those years, the young editor, ever stanch, contributed his full quota to the one cause. The Jeffersonian Democrat was finally changed to the more significant Republican. The paper has steadily grown, broadened, and deepened; keeping fully abreast of the intelligent commu- nity who sustain and are in some sort sustained by it. Reared and living nearly all his days in the village of Chardon, the centre of a purely agricultural community, whose character and habits of thought are his, trained to the constant calling of understanding and supplying their intellectual needs, when the nar- row limits of the means at his command are remembered, contrasted with the expensive pages of the city dailies and weeklies with which it competes, the Geauga Republican must be esteemed quite the model country newspaper. With its staff of good writers in each township, it certainly meets one of the demands of the city editor : it furnishes to his scissors all the happenings within the limits of its circulation. Mr. Converse is a good writer. He occasionally grapples with a point or problem, and, in a half-dozen clear, well-considered, compact, vig- orous paragraphs, disposes of it. The fault I find with him is, he writes too little. Then, when I estimate the space at his command, and mark the disposition he makes of it, and see that quite the whole of it is filled with original matter, in short, pithy articles and paragraphs, I excuse his forbearance. Really, the amount of skill and ability expended by one man on a successful country paper would quite well furnish forth a lawyer, a doctor, two or three preachers, and half a dozen lecturers.

Early in Mr. Lincoln's administration he appointed Mr. Converse postmaster at Chardon, and renewed it. This is the only office Mr. Converse has ever held. I have never heard that he sought any office. He has most of the time, for years, been chairman of the Republican central committee of his county, and serves constantly on the district committees, judicial, senatorial, and congressional, giving the best of a ripened experience and rare judgment to the Republican cause, with-

out other reward than the unstinted confidence and esteem which have always attended him. Singularly unambitious and modest, always underestimating himself, and never claiming anything, frank-natured, generous, of integrity un- doubted, the blue-eyed, slender, silent boy who, a few years since, was the docile companion of his father's footsteps, has silently and unconsciously matured into one of the first men of a community of unusual intelligence, critical, and exacting in the qualities of its trusted men. Certainly, this is much.

On the 24th of December, 1862, he was united in marriage with Julia P. Wright, daughter of Daniel H. and Susan P. Wright, of Freedom, Portage county. The Wrights were of vigorous Massachusetts stock, coming from the neighborhood of Northampton, inheriting and transmitting to their children the virtues and characteristics of the New England race. They were the parents of five children, one dying in infancy. Of the two sons, Daniel fell in the mur- derous battle of Cedar Mountain. He carried the colors of his regiment, the gallant Seventh Ohio, and met the usual fate of the standard-bearer. Our army suffered a severe repulse there, and the hands which slew buried him.

Arthur, less fortunate, contracted disease of the camp, march, and exposure, and died in hospital. Less favored in death, parents and sisters had the solace of seeing his grave made by kindred hands near his home. The parents survive in honored age.

Mrs. Converse, a niece of the former proprietor of the Republican, was born in Huntsburg, March 5, 1836, was carried to Freedom at seven, and grew to womanhood with the intelligence and culture which came almost naturally to the children of the favored Reserve. A brunette, with a good face and fine eyes, accomplished, with womanly ways and manners, winning the love and confidence of Sidney Converse,-a sure test of many excellences,-she succeeds her in the love, confidence, and respect of family, friends, and neighbors. She, too, gradu- ated early in the school of adverse fortune, was herself a teacher of children, and derived the strength of character, independence, and completeness of devel- opment which the women of hor race receive from such training. Of this marriage a daughter, Mary, fourteen years of age, is the offspring,-Converse, as one sees, in face and form, in disposition and ways also, I may imagine her going around much with her father, watching his eyes, and hearing his words. Later, the mother traits will appear. Daughters inherit from fathers and sons from mothers. The German common folk have a pleasant superstition that to be born in the month of May, a " May child," is to secure happy fortunes. Mary Converse shares with her father this pleasant omen. The children of such parents as they were born of are surrounded by more fortunate influences and providences. The family circle is complete with the presence of Sarah N. Wright, the attractive younger sister of Mrs. Converse.

When last in dear old Geauga (summer of 1878), I was several times in the present Converse mansion,-the new and beautiful residence. It seemed per- vaded with the warmth and spirit of the old life, whose memories were to be perpetual, and whose legends and traditions would live in perennial freshness.

SAMUEL SQUIRE

was born October 16, 1799. His wife, Sophia A. Hurd, was born six months earlier, April 29 of the same year, and they were married at Woodbury, Connect- icut, in February, 1823. They moved to Chardon in the same year, Mrs. Squire going first to Carlisle, Lorain county, Ohio, with her parents, and making the entire journey from Connecticut with ox-teams. Mr. Squire stopped at Paines- ville and plied his trade, which was that of a tanner, and while there he deter- mined to settle in Chardon. He purchased land east of the square, and com- menced the tanning business, which he carried on until 1834. From that time until 1840 he carried on his business successfully, and finally adopted merchandise.

In 1840 and '41 he was county treasurer. June 9, 1848, his wife died. In 1850 his son, Samuel, Jr., became his partner in trade; and he died November 9, 1854.

Mr. Squire was a man of pleasant personal address, much intelligence, and sagacity.

Of the several sons, Samuel, the eldest, a man of much shrewdness and intelli- gence, succeeded his father in business, which he successfully prosecuted in Chardon for several years, when he removed to Oberlin, where he now resides. His wife, a sister of Mrs. Joel F. Asper, is a lady highly esteemed. None of the sons now reside in Geauga County.

CHARLES H. FOOTE

was born in Newtown, Connecticut, May 18, 1812 ; was the son of Heber and Lucy Foote, direct lineage of Nathaniel Foote, who settled in Wethersfield, Connecticut, about the year 1615. Mr. Foote came to Chardon in the year 1829,

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a boy seventeen years of age, in company with Mr. G. J. Ackley, from the State of New York, who then commenced the mercantile business in this place.

In the spring of 1834 Mr. Ackley left Chardon, and Mr. Foote remained to settle up the business. He then went into partnership with Mr. Wm. Wilber in the mercantile business; afterwards sold out to Mr. Samuel Squire. He was then engaged for many years as deputy in Mr. D. D. Aikens' county clerk's office. Afterwards was elected county treasurer, and from that he was elected sheriff of the county, holding that office as long as the law allows; after that he engaged in various kinds of business until his death, which occurred October 15, 1874.

Mr. Foote was a man of much enterprise and activity and always identified with Chardon, where he was among the first settlers.

September 17, 1835, he was married to Mary French, daughter of Joseph and Mary French, and a niece of Governor Converse, of Vermont, Jude Converse, and Mrs. S. N. Hoyt; a very intelligent and attractive woman. They became the parents of three children, of whom the eldest, Mary, resides with her mother in Chardon. Julia, a beautiful accomplished girl, excelling in musical studies, and a general favorite, died at the age of twenty-one. The other they lost in infancy.

JOHN FRENCH

belongs on one side to the Vermont and Chardon Converses. His mother was sister of Governor Julius Converse, of Vermont, and Jude Converse and Mrs. Eleanor Hoyt. On the father's side, equally reputable. He was born at Randolph, Vermont, December 1, 1817. He received a good academical education for that time and place, and went West to Chardon in 1835. He there entered the store of his brother-in-law, Charles H. Foot, where he remained until 1837, and was then in the service of the engineers of the old Ohio railroad company. He was next in the service of D. D. Aiken, clerk of the county, and mastered the forms and be- came an adept in the business of that and the various county offices, and formed acquaintances useful to him in after-life. In 1844 he was elected recorder of the county, and re-elected till his period of office covered four full terms. In 1851 he became a law-student in the office of Riddle & Thrasher, but was not admitted till 1858. He then formed a copartnership with Judge D. W. Canfield, and continued in the practice of the law till his death, October 20, 1861, in the forty- fourth year of his age.

Mr. French's long and intimate acquaintance with every form of business, his strong, native good sense, clear judgment, and poise of mind made him one of the safest of counselors and most accurate lawyers within the range of his practice. In the conduct of his business and cases he relied on the perfection of his prepara- tion, the thoroughness of his study, rather than on any special gift of oratory or skill. His mind was characterized by that uncommon thing in this world, com- mon sense. He was, in the good use of terms, one of the truest and best of men, -frank, generous, loyal, pursuing none but the most honorable ends by none but the most honorable means.

If success in life is measured by acquisition of property, Mr. French's life was not a failure. If estimated by the position he gained and held in the regards and judgments of honorable men,-by the confidence and esteem he won from the world of all classes,-there was his success eminent. His death was un- timely. The world can never well spare such men. To take them off at forty- four is in a way robbing the community. It was his fortune, with perfect frank- ness of manner, and a character with none but firm and manly lines in it, to win none but friends. No man of Chardon was ever more generally and deeply deplored.

In the autumn of 1846, Mr. French was united with Miss Martha J. Smith in marriage, a lady of pleasing person, vivacious and sparkling manners, highly esteemed, and who survives him. Though childless, the union was one of rare felicity.

JAMES HATHAWAY.

Of the men who emigrated to the Reserve in youth with the limited advantages for education of an castern boy of that day, and who sought to make his way by the literal labor of his own hands, quite the first place should be accorded to him whose fine head and striking face are here illustrated.

Mr. Hathaway arrived in Geauga County in 1813 or 1814, and went into the employment of Lott Hathaway, a distant relative, in east, or rather northeast, Claridon, where he remained about a year in that hardest and healthiest work, chopping and clearing land. From there he became employed about the old Higby mill, so often spoken of as in the south part of Hambden, but which really was in the north part of Claridon.

He soon became interested as an owner, and when, from the cutting away of the forest, the upper Cuyahoga branch began to fail, he set up what was known as the " Bull-mill," driven by ox-power, at first intended to grind for the still, but which was resorted to by the surrounding settlers for grinding for their fami- lies. This business he came to control, and pushed it with great ardor. These were in the old times when faith in whisky was not only universal, but ortho- dox ; when the builder of a still was a twofold benefactor, as furnishing a market for grain and supplying the great demand for whisky.

James Hathaway.

Afterwards he became the owner of a steam-mill in Humbden, which he ran with his usual enterprise and success, and to which he added a still.

Mr. Hathaway, to a shrewd, strong mind of unusual vigor, added that cultiva- tion which may be acquired by a very busy man from books and newspapers and in a wide intercourse with men and the active world, and early became one of the best informed men of the county, as he was one of the foremost men of business in it. These qualities, joined with his acknowledged integrity of character, early indicated him as one of the fittest for the offices of the township, many of which he held. He was for many years a justice of the peace, and his admirable judg- ment, practical good sense, and the general respect of the people secured confi- dence in his decisions.

In 1842 he was a candidate before the county Whig convention for the office of sheriff, with every prospect of a nomination, when an enemy circulated a slander with such adroit und malignant industry as to defeat him. It was at once seen and felt to be a malicious falsehood; but the temporary mischief was done, though it as speedily recoiled on the head of its propagator.

This wrong was afterward repaired by a nomination and election, followed by a re-election to this office. The law made a man ineligible to a third term. Mr. Hathaway had already made himself familiar with the pension laws, and became one of the most sagacious and successful prosecutors of claims,-a business which he conducted for some years at Chardon, of which place he became a resident when elected sheriff.

He subsequently became a large purchaser of pine lands in the northwest, and a dealer in western lands. Ultimately he removed West, and died there several years ago.

Our artist's sketch represents him as late in life, after his robust constitution was broken by severe illness and his full habit had yielded. He was of medium height, fine head, and handsome, manly face and features. He was a man of great vigor and activity of mind; a thorough business man, employing none but honorable expedients. He was one of the kindest of men, generous and liberal in his dealings. He was widely known and generally respected and esteemed. The duties of sheriff were performed with ability, fidelity, and promptitude.

He married and reared a family of sons and daughters. Of these the well- known Hon. I. N. Hathaway is the oldest.

Mrs. Hathaway survives her husband,-a lady greatly esteemed for her virtues and excellences.

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History of Geauga and Lake Counties, Ohio, Part 50

Author: Williams Brothers Publication date: 1879 Publisher: Number of Pages: 443

Author: Williams Brothers
Publication date: 1879
Publisher:
Number of Pages: 443