USA > Ohio > Preble County > History of Preble County, Ohio, with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches > Part 19
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Mr. Stephens was employed for many years as deputy recorder, under his brother Isaac, and also did a large amount of writing for the clerk of the court. Many of the old books in these offices attest the excellency of his penmanship. During most of the period from 1825 to 1837, he served, under appointment of the the court of common pleas, as commissioner of insolvents.
In the year 1830 Mr. Stephens was married to Miss Eliza A. Brown, of Hamilton county. One child, a daughter, was born of this marriage, who died with chol- era in the year 1849, at the age of about sixteen years. In the year 1842 Mr. Stephens removed to the city of Cincinnati, and was there admitted to the bar, as an attorney and cousellor at law, having previously studied the profession pretty thoroughly under different practi- tioners here, and attended a course of lectures in the law department of Cincinnati college. He remained some two or three years in the city, in the practice of his profession, and then returned to Eaton, in 1844 or 1845.
Very soon after the beginning of the Mexican war, Mr. Stephens received a captain's commission in the United States army, from President Polk, and was assigned to duty in the quartermaster's department of General Taylor's army. He served in this capacity until the close of the war, honorably and satisfactorily to his superior officers. After the close of the war, he engaged in the practice of his profession again, and so continued until he was appointed secretary of the Eaton & Hamil- ton railroad company, in which position he was retained until the office was removed from this place.
Captain Stephens' law practice being so frequently alternated with other business and employments, he never attained any great eminence in his profession as an attorney. His practice was mostly confined to ex
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parte and probate business. He was a man of fair capac- ity, diligent and careful in business, and of good moral character.
At the second meeting or "communication" of Bolivar Lodge No. 82, Free and Accepted Masons, the petition of Jesse B. Stephens was presented to the lodge, and at the second meeting thereafter, October 14, 1826, he was admitted to membership in the order. Shortly afterwards he was selected as secretary of the lodge, which office he filled for many successive years; and was constantly, almost, during his membership, entrusted by his brethren with prominent and responsible positions and duties in the lodge. He died on the fourteenth day of August, 1870, of disease of the liver, and was buried with the honors of Masonry.
GEORGE W. THOMPSON .- The subject of this sketch, George Waddy Thompson, was born in Bennington, Ver- mont, on the twenty-first of October, 1818. When young Thompson was three years of age, his parents re- moved to Columbus, Ohio, and remained there for a period of five years, at which time the mother of Mr. Thompson dying, his father moved to Fremont, Ohio, where he continued to reside for several years.
Being a bright and intelligent boy, young Thompson, at the age of fifteen, was appointed to a cadetship at West Point by General Winfield Scott. He made satis- factory progress in his studies, but owing to an affair of honor occurring with a cadet from the south, young Thompson took his departure from the Military academy. He proceeded to Tiffin, Ohio, where he en- tered the dry goods business, and successfully remained in the same for a period of several years.
For some time he had contemplated the studying of law, and at last, having decided upon this step, proceeded to Columbus, Ohio, and entered the law office of Noah Swayne, afterward Judge Swayne, of the Supreme Court of the United States, between whom and his student a warm friendship existed up to the time of Mr. Thomp- son's death. In due course of time Mr. Thompson was admitted to the bar, and at once "slung his shingle to the breezes" in the Capital city, where he practiced for several months. The city being full of young disciples of Blackstone, Mr. Thompson came to Eaton in the year 1840, and opened an office.
Being a stranger among strangers, business did not come in as rapidly as the exigencies of life demanded, and so our young lawyer was forced to teach school, which he did in Dixon township, and afterward on the "West road" immediately west of Eaton.
Having the tact about him of making friends and be- ing withal a well read young lawyer, he soon came to be favorably known. In 1845 he was elected prosecuting attorney of Preble county, and filled the office to the full satisfaction of the law-abiding citizens of Preble county. When his term of office expired, he received an appointment in the land bureau of the Interior depart- ment at Washington city, where he remained for a period of three or four years. He also acted as editor of the (Eaton) Register for a period of some six years-from 1844 to 1850, a position which he likewise filled with ability.
In 1853 he returned to the practice of his profession in Eaton, in partnership with Joel W. Harris, and suc- ceeded in building up a good practice. He was elected to the office of probate judge in the year 1863, and oc- cupied the same with honor to himself and credit to his constituents for six years. At different periods dur- ing the years last, Judge Thompson served as director of the Eaton schools, and safely can it be said that the pres- ent good standing of the schools is largely due to the early tireless labors of the judge. Having lots of latent fun about him, he was always welcomed by the scholars. It was his habit to deliver a short, little speech to the pupils in each room, and these were always looked for- ward to by the young students with pleasure.
It was in the conducting of the office of probate judge in which Judge Thompson displayed his good qualities and his philanthropic feelings, for as all well know, the duties of the office are those where the in- cumbent is called upon to protect and guard the right of widows and orphans. The possessor of a kind heart and just mind, safely can it be said that Judge Thompson at all times guarded with scrupulous fidelity the interests of the widow and orphan. His decisions and books speak, however, more eloquently than anything that can be written.
In the later years of his life he was afflicted with "hay fever," which, during certain months in the years caused him much suffering and inconvenience. Toward the last the disease grew more painful until it took the form of something resembling paralysis of the brain. Never of a very robust constitution, the decline of Judge Thomp- son became plainly perceptible. Having business in Lincoln, Nebraska, and thinking that, perhaps a change of climate would give him surcease from the awful pain he was suffering, he took his departure for the above mentioned town on the eighth of October, 1872.
For a couple of weeks he kept his family advised of his condition. Then came a silence of two weeks. On the fourth of November a dispatch came from Lincoln, summoning his wife at once to his beside. She took the next train, but a delayed dispatch came the following morning informing the family that the husband and father was no more. He died of typhoid or climatic fever superinduced, no doubt, by the dreaded "hay fever."
The Masonic fraternity of Lincoln, of which order Judge Thompson was a member in excellent standing, took entire charge of the remains.
During his sickness they tended him with that devotion and tenderness for which this noble order is noted. He was a member of Bolivar Lodge, No. 82, Free and Ac- cepted Masons, which organization published fitting re- solutions of respect, as did also the members of the Eaton bar. The funeral services took place from the Methodist Episcopal church, and were conducted by Rev. Mr. Haigh,t assisted by Rev. Mr. Cassatt. The funeral cortege was very lengthy and quite imposing, and was a becoming tribute to the man and his character.
Judge Thompson left a wife, two daughters and a son, who is a young lawyer of considerable ability. The de- ceased was a kind husband, an indulgent parent and an
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honest man-three of the most essential requisites for a good citizen and the highest praise that can be written of the dead.
JOEL W. HARRIS was born in Milford township, Butler county, Ohio, on the seventh day of February, 1815, and died in Eaton, Ohio, on the thirtieth day of March, 1866. His father, Joseph Harris, was a native of Ireland, came to the United States in 1797, and lived for some time in the State of Pennsylvania, then moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, and finally settled on a small farm in Butler county, Ohio. He was married three times and was the father of thirteen children, the subject of this sketch being the second son of his second wife, Rachel (Hornaday) Harris. He worked on his father's farm in summer and attended school in winter until he was about seventeen years old, when he was sent by his father to learn the tailor's trade. After finishing his trade he began teaching school and continued in that occupation until 1838, when he entered Miami university, at Oxford, Ohio, and pursued his studies there about three years, when, for want of means, he was compelled to leave college and resume his former occupation, teach- ing school. In 1844, he was engaged in selling dry goods in Darrtown, in his native township, and soon after he was elected justice of the peace. While acting as justice he concluded to read law, and in 1850 he sold his stock of goods and began a regular course of reading. In October, 1851, he entered the Cincinnati law school, where he graduated in April, 1852, along with the Hon. O. P. Morton, of Indiana. In the fall of 1852, he opened a law office in Eaton, and in July, 1853, he and George W. Thompson, esq., formed a partnership and the firm of Thompson & Harris soon became one of the leading law firms of the county, commanding a large and lucrative practice, and was interested in nearly all the leading law-suits of the county. In January 1864, Judge Thompson having been elected probate judge, the firm was dissolved and Mr. Harris continued in the practice until his death. His disease was fistula in ano and for months before his death his sufferings were intense, which caused him in a great degree to abandon his office and seek relief in solitude. As a lawyer, he had no superior at the Preble county bar. He was not an eloquent speaker, but his arguments either to the court or jury, were always a clear, logical and concise statement of the law and the fact on which he rested his cause. He was one of the best pleaders under the code of any lawyer that practiced at the bar. He stood high in the estimation of his professional brethren as a man of honor and integrity. He was always fair and generous to his adversary, and would rather lose his case than gain it by unfair and unprofessional means. He was kind and indulgent to the young and inexperienced members of the profession and was always ready to give them a helping hand and words of encouragement. The follow- ing extract taken from the Eaton Register in giving notice of his death may properly be given here as it sets forth in few words the high estimation in which he was held : " In his profession he held a high place among those who knew him best. Very few of his compeers
excelled him in legal attainments, being acknowledged as one of the best judges of law in this part of the State. He was a man of extraordinary ability, strictly upright and moral in all his intercourse and dealing with men. He was a man of unobtrusive manners and of the kindest disposition."
He was a great reader and had a very retentive memory, making him one of the best informed men in the county. He died unmarried.
BENJAMIN HUBBARD, ESQ., was born in Princeton, New Jersey, September 16, 1809. His father, Benjamin Hub- bard, was a native of the same city, and a pioneer to Hamilton county, Ohio, in 1811. In the year 1832 he came to Preble county, where he died in the year 1848, aged seventy-eight years. His mother was Mary McIn- tyre, born in Philadelphia, and died in Eaton, January 14, 1878, at the advanced age of ninety-nine years and eleven months. Young Hubbard's grandfather was John Hubbard, who was a native of Holland, and came to America previous to the Revolutionary war, and was a soldier in that conflict.
Young Hubbard enjoyed no other opportunities for an education in his youth than those afforded by the com- mon (very common) schools of that early day. By his own energy and efforts to satisfy the innate craving for knowledge, he was enabled to supplement the meagre fa- cilities of the common school and gain an advanced edu- cation beyond the general average of his time. At the age of seventeen he was apprenticed to the trade of car- riage making in Cincinnati, and followed the same until 1840. Whilst plying his trade in the village of Somer- ville, Butler county, he commenced reading law under the preceptorship of the late Judge A. Haines, of Eaton, and was admitted to the bar as an attorney and counsel- lor on the thirtieth day of June, 1844. Directly after his admission he removed his family to Eaton, and com- menced the practice of his profession; and with the ex- ception of about two years time which he lived in Green- ville, he has been here ever since. Every attorney that was living in Eaton at the time Lawyer Hubbard was called to the bar has since died, which leaves him now the oldest practitioner at the Preble county bar-or the "father of the bar."
Mr. Hubbard was formerly connected with the Eaton & Hamilton railroad company (now the Cincinnati, Rich- mond & Chicago company) as its first secretary. In the year 1853 he was elected to represent Preble county in the legislature of Ohio, serving but a single term of two years, declining a re-election. He also was mayor of the village of Eaton for a time.
On the tenth day of June, 1830, he was married to Miss Minerva Morey, of Butler county, Ohio, and of a family of ten children born to this union only one sur- vives, viz .: Albert Edgar Hubbard, now a justice of the peace in Eaton. Mrs. Hubbard died October 24, 1872. Lawyer Hubbard was formerly a Whig, then for many years acted and voted with the Republican party, but of late years has voted independently; but now is a stal- wart Prohibitionist.
HAMPTON HALL, ESQ., was born at the village of Milton-
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ville, Butler county Ohio, on the eighth day of October, A. D. 1822. He was the son of the late Judge William Hall, one of the associate judges of the court of com- mon pleas for Preble county. When Hampton was but six years old his father moved to Camden-then called Dover-in this county, where they resided some seven years, and then went onto a farm immediately south of and adjoining Camden. During the minority of the sub- ject of the present sketch he attended the common schools of the time, during portions of the year, inter- mitting his school attendance with work on the farm and other occupations, as occasion required. He in this way succeeded in qualifying himself to take charge of a school.
When no more than eighteen years of age he com- menced teaching, which he continued for some two or three years. By diligent study at home, and close and careful application at school, and under the instruction of educators at hand, he had attained a higher degree of scholarship than was common at that day, or even at this time, by young men of his age having no greater advan- tages than he had.
About the time of his attainment of majority Mr. Hall commenced the study of law with the late Judge Haines of Eaton. On his admission to the bar, in the year 1844, he opened an office for the practice of his profession at Celina, Mercer county, Ohio. Here, alternately wrest- ling with the ague and attending to his professional du- ties, he continued until the fall of 1845, when he left Celina, and returned to Preble county.
He next opened an office in Eaton, where he continued about three years, and then removed to Camden and en- gaged in other business. In the fall of 1848 (November 13th), he was married to Miss Mary Jamieson. In the year 1849 he and his father bought the mill property on Seven-mile creek, about five miles below Eaton, built and formerly owned by Caspar Potterf, sr. Mr. Hall now gave up the practice of the law and continued to run and manage the mill until the year 1862, when he removed to Richmond, Indiana, and engaged in the milling busi- ness there. In the spring of 1865 he removed to Day- ton, Ohio, where he at present resides.
WILLIAM JAMES GILMORE, ESQ., was born in Liberty, Bedford county, Virginia, April 2, A. D. 1821, His par- ents, both natives of Virginia, were Dr. Eli Gilmore, a physician of distinction in the county of his residence, and Clara Mosby Clayton, a sister of Alexander Clayton, who for many years was presiding judge of the high court of errors and appeals of the State of Mississippi. Dr. Gilmore, with his family, settled in Israel township, Preble county, in the year 1825, and the subject of this sketch, after obtaining such rudimentary education as was at that early day afforded by the pioneer teachers in the log cabin school-house, attended Westfield and Hope- well academies-the latter being then in charge of the Rev. Samuel W. McCracken, who had previously been professor of mathematics in Miami university at Oxford.
Mr. Gilmore commenced the study of law in the office of Thomas Millikin, of Hamilton, and completed his preparatory course in the office of J. S. and A. J. Haw- kins, esqs., of Eaton, and was admitted to the bar at
Columbus in the year 1847. After his admission he formed a partnership with Colonel Thomas Moore, and commenced the practice of his profession in Hamilton, Butler county. A year later, this partnership being dis- solved, he removed to Eaton, and there opened an office, and in 1849 formed a partnership with Captain J. S. Hawkins, which continued until that gentleman's death in 1852. In that year he was elected prosecuting attor- ney of Preble county, and was re-elected to the same office in 1854.
In the year 1857, Judge James Clark, of Hamilton, having resigned the office of judge of the court of com- mon pleas, for the first subdivision of the second judicial district, Mr. Gilmore was appointed to fill the vacancy. Having served out the term, he resumed the practice of his profession in partnership with Judge J. V. Campbell, which arrangement continued until 1866, when Judge Gilmore was elected to the common pleas bench, and re- elected in 1871. In 1874 he was elected a judge of the supreme court of Ohio. To a clear judgment, quick per- ception, and great caution, he is mainly indebted for the eminent success which has attended his legal career.
On the seventh of September, 1848, Judge Gilmore was married to Miss Sallie A. Rossman, daughter of William Rossman, of Eaton, and two sons have been the issue of this union. Jackson H., the elder of the two, was educated at Miami university, studied law in the university of Virginia under Professor Miner, and gradu- ated at the Cincinnati law school. Upon the certificate of the latter institution he was admitted to the bar in the district court of Cincinnati in 1875, and commenced practice in that city with Messrs. Jordan, Jordan & Will- iams; but owing to failing health he was soon compelled to relinquish business and go to Colorado, where he spent a couple of years, and then returned to his home in Eaton, very much improved in physical health. The younger son, Clement R. Gilmore, is a student in Woos- ter university, Ohio.
After the expiration of Judge Gilmore's term of office on the supreme bench he established himself in the city of Columbus, in company with his son Jackson H. Gil- more, in the practice of the law. [Since this was written, the young man has died. ]
WILLIAM A. BLOOMFIELD, esq., was born on the four- teenth day of November, 1820, on a farm about two miles southwest from Eaton. Whilst yet an infant he was taken to Montgomery county, a few miles east of Dayton, where some six years of his childhood were passed. His mother, having married Josiah Grace for her second husband, when our subject was some six or seven years old, the family removed to the, then, village (now city) of Indianapolis. His childhood, under the treatment of his stepfather, was most unhappy, and whilst yet almost a helpless infant, being only between seven and eight years of age, and whilst his mother was sick abed, he was literally driven from home, to become a helpless wanderer, without home or friends. He soon, however, found a kind lady by the name of Hawkins, who gave him food and shelter, and he remained under her protection for a few months, when he was so fortu-
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nate as to be again brought to Eaton, under the care and protection of his uncle, Joseph Wilson.
When he was but ten years old, and when he had been in Eaton a couple of years, he commenced to learn the trade of a cabinet-maker, in the shop of his uncle, and continued to work at that business until he had attained his eighteenth year. Meantime, whilst working at the bench, having his book before him, and diligently apply- ing all his leisure time in the pursuit of knowledge, al- most without the advantages of schools, he had qualified himself for the business of teaching. For several years he was actively engaged in teaching during the "school season," and occasionally working at his trade of cabinet- making. Meanwhile, as leisure would permit, he read law, under the preceptorship of Judge Haines, primarily, and subsequently in the office of Felix Marsh, esq.
He was admitted to the bar on the nineteenth day of June, 1848, and soon thereafter opened an office for the practice of his profession. His success in gaining a lucrative business not meeting his expectations or de- sires, in the spring of 1852 he went to California, by the way of New Orleans, the musquito kingdom, and Nica- ragua. The trips at that time, and by that route, occu- pied some three or four months. He remained in Cali- fornia some three years, one year employed in mining, in the northern part of that State, and some two years en- gaged in the lumber trade, in the southern peninsula.
After returning from California Mr. Bloomfield con- ducted the cabinet business in Eaton for a number of years. On the first day of January, 1861, he was mar- ried to Miss Sarah J. Sherer, of Somers township, this county. He has been engaged in the family grocery trade for several years.
WILLIAM ALLEN, ESQ., was born in Butler county, Ohio, August 13, 1827. His father, John Allen, was born in Ireland, January 26, 1800, and came to America in 1812. After residing six years in the State of New York, he came to Ohio in 1818, and located in Butler county. In February, 1838, he removed his family into the sparsely settled forests of Darke county, and there erected for their residence a round-log cabin, with puncheon floor and mud-and-stick chimney. He died on the third day of October, 1858, a very much respected citizen. He possessed fine conversational powers, and in the lat- ter years of his life was a preacher of the United Breth- ren persuasion.
The subject of our present sketch was favored with the advantages of the common district school only, yet by earnest personal application he qualified himself to teach the common English branches at the age of fifteen years, and in this way employed his winters for several years. At the age of nineteen he entered the office of General Felix Marsh, of Eaton, as a student of law, and was admitted to the bar by the supreme court of Preble county, on the fourteenth day of June, 1849, and in the month of October, following, opened an office at Green- ville for the practice of his profession. In the fall of 1850 he was elected prosecuting attorney of Darke county, and re-elected in 1852.
In the fall of 1858 Mr. Allen was elected a Represen-
tative in Congress from the Fourth Congressional dis- trict of Ohio, comprising the counties of Darke, Miami, Shelby, Mercer, Auglaize, and Allen, and re-elected in 1860-thus serving in the Thirty-sixth and Thirty-seventh Congresses. In the winter of 1865 he was appointed by Governor Cox as judge of the court of common pleas of the first sub-division of the second judicial district of Ohio, composed of the counties of Butler, Preble, and Darke, to fill an unexpired term in the place of Judge David L. Meeker, resigned.
In 1872 Judge Allen was a member of the Grant electoral college, and in 1878 was again nominated as a candidate for Congress on the Republican ticket, from the Fifth Congressional district, but declined on account of ill health.
On the thirtieth day of September, 1851, Mr. Allen was married to Miss Priscilla Wallace, daughter of John Wallace, a native of Pennsylvania, and an early pioneer of Butler county, who had settled in Darke county in 1834, and died in the summer of 1863, at the age of about eighty years-esteemed by all as an upright man and excellent citizen. The issue of this marriage was four sons and as many daughters, of whom but one son survives. Four of these children died of diptheria under the most afflicting circumstances, and in the brief space of two months. This occurred in the winter of 1861, when Mr. Allen was summoned home from Wash- ington city to the scene of bereavement.
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