History of Sandusky County Ohio with Illustrations 1882, Part 83

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solemn dirge for their lost friend: The band and a large procession of sympathizers stopped under the window of the mayor, and after closing the solemn dirge were silent, as if expecting some remarks.

Mayor Everett advanced to an open window and delivered them a .short ad- dress, alluding in touching terms to the bravery of their lost friend, and urging all to support the cause in which he had so gloriously died. All present were affected and departed in a significant and touching silence. The members of the band were too deeply affected to even play another dirge then for Michael Wegstein.

The other incident Mr. Everett says was that which occurred at the news of the death of Abraham Lincoln, in 1865. On coming to his office about 7 o'clock in the morning, he found the telegraphic, dispatches announced the assassination of the President by Booth, and that he was dead. Mayor Everett threw the black signal of public mourning from his office window and repaired to the printing office with a notice of the great National bereavement.

Mr. Everett was sheriff of the county two terms, county auditor two terms, and, to finish up his public services, was elected to represent the Thirtieth Ohio Senatorial District, composed of Huron, Erie, San- dusky, and Ottawa counties, at the fall election of 1867, and re-elected in 1869, being nominated by acclamation. During his service in the Ohio Senate he was a member of the. judiciary committee, committee on finance, and other committees, But his chief labor was on a select committee with Charles Scribner and D. B. Lynn, to certify the laws relating to municipal corporations, which was the first municipal code enacted in the State of Ohio.

Of Hon. Homer Everett's family nothing need be said, as they are set, forth in

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the history of Jeremiah Everett and family, to which reference is made for the particulars.

JOHN P. MOORE AND FAMILY.

This enterprising and esteemed citizen of Fremont was born on the 1st day of December, 1829, at Hampton, Adams county, State of Pennsylvania. His father was John Moore, who was born July 10, 1795. His mother, Mary Picking, was born February 19, 1794. Their family consisted of twelve children, of whom John P. was the ninth. Ten of the children are now living, the oldest sixty-six and the youngest fifty years of age.

In May, 1834, Mr. Moore moved his family from Hampton, Pennsylvania, to Woodville township, in Sandusky county, about eleven and a half miles west of Lower Sandusky, on the Maumee and Western Reserve road. Here young John P. spent his boyhood in hard work, with little .schooling and little amusement, excepting hunting raccoon at night. He helped to clear and. improve hi's father's farm, burn lime and haul stone for the improvement and macadamizing of the road. The great subject of anxious calculation during the summer was to raise provisions to keep the family supplied through the winter and until another crop could be produced, and hurry the fall work and be ready for two or three months attendance at school during the winter.

On the 3d of April, 1848, John P. Moore came to Fremont and apprenticed himself to the blacksmithing trade, in a shop established by Ira Camfield, who had died and left the shop to be managed by his widow. That good and capable lady is now living and keeping a boarding-house in Fremont. In the fall of 1850 young Moore, having learned his trade, returned to his former home in Woodville, and

built a small shop on the corner of his father's farm, adjoining the Maumee and Western Reserve road, and engaged in general blacksmithing. But in that day there were stage coaches, and the young smith made a specialty of shoeing horses there for the Ohio Stage Company, for whom Mr. John T. Simpkins, now an aged and esteemed citizen of Fremont, was agent at the time.

Mr. Moore worked in this shop about a year, and then bought a lot on the corner of Water and Garrison streets, in Fremont, where he built a shop, and where he has since added a large carriage factory, which he is still carrying on with marked success.

DAVID GALLAGHER.

This very worthy man and early settler in Lower Sandusky was born at Pitts-burgh, Pennsylvania, November 12, 1790. He came from Chillicothe to Lower San-dusky in the year 1810. He performed picket duty in the army at Fort Meigs at the time of the fight there. He was also commissary at Fort Stephenson in the year 1814. In 1818 he was in business with George G. Olmsted in the dry goods trade, most of which was with the Indians. Their store was located a little below the present gas works in Fremont, and was subsequently moved to the corner now on the east end of Front street, and opposite to Buckland's old block. This store is said to be the second frame structure in the town. In 1830 he was a very large property owner, chiefly in real estate. For some years he carried on a woollen-mill.

In 1823, March 1o, he married Miss M. Claghorn, by whom he had four children.

Mr. David Gallagher died on the 21st day of February, 1860, and as a mark of

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respect, the Court of Common Pleas, then holding a session in Fremont, adjourned upon the day of his funeral. The Methodist Episcopal church, of which he was a member, the order to which he had been attached for nearly half a century, and the citizens, almost unanimously attended and participated in the impressive burial ser- vices, thus testifying how much he was respected and beloved as a citizen, a man, a Mason, and a Christian. He was one of the fathers and faithful members of the Masonic order in Lower Sandusky, and few there were who better practiced the precepts of the order in daily life than did David Gallagher.

His aged widow and four sons are still living, and are residing in Fremont, where the husband passed so large a portion of his life.

In the historical lecture referred to Hon. Homer Everett thus alludes to the subject of this sketch:

He came here a young man, and, as my information goes, his first employment here was as assistant commissary at Fort Stephenson in the year 1814, and ever since that time he has been a resident of our town. It need scarcely be said that one who settled here at that early day, married, and reared a worthy family, had many trials and experienced various turns of fortune. He had seen this country a wilderness, inhabited by wild beasts, and still wilder men, transformed into what it now is, and could look upon its progress for more than fifty years, as we can upon a passing panorama. He has left this earthly stage! How busy is death! Let us be admonished. With Holy Bible, square and compass near his heart, David Gallagher has gone up to the mercy-seat of Christ. Let us rejoice in the belief that it is well with him.

FRANCIS JOSEPH GIEBEL, JR.

was born in Fremont, Ohio, March 14, 1851. His parents were Francis J. Giebel, and Maria S. (Duerr) Giebel. The father was a native of Hesse Cassel, and the mother of Bavaria, Germany. Mr. Giebel sr., emigrated in 1847; Mrs. Giebel, in 1839.

The subject of this sketch was educated in Fremont, having attended both the parochial and common schools of the city. He married Miss Clara Ochs, at Fremont, on the 27th of January, 1874. He learned the shoemaker's trade with his father. In December, 1868, at the age of seventeen years and a half, he, with several other citizens of Fremont, caught the gold fever, and started from home to seek gold in Montana. In the month of October, 1869, he left Montana on his return, and reached home in the month of November following. He immediately went into the treasurer's office as clerk, under J. P. Elderkin, then county treasurer. Here he continued working through the collection of the December installment of taxes for 1869. He was then employed as clerk in the county auditor's office, under George W. Gurst. In this employment Mr. Giebel continued until his election to that office in the fall of 1874. At this time Mr. Giebel was found to be the youngest county auditor in the State of Ohio, being then only twenty-three years old. He was re-elected in 1876, and served until 1878, when Adam Hodes, present incumbent, was elected to succeed him. But for the custom of his party to let no county officer remain more than two terms, Mr. Giebel would no doubt have been retained in that office. Upon the election of Mr. Hodes, he retained Mr. Giebel as his clerk and deputy, on account of his thorough knowledge of the office and its duties, which position he still holds, and is by all acknowledged to be a man fit for the place. Meantime, Mr. Giebel has been clerk of the city of Fremont, a member of the city council, in which he is now sitting a second term, and was for one year president of that body. He is also a member and stockholder in the Fremont Brick and Tile Company. As a business man in general, and as a county auditor,

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he stands high in the estimation of the people of the county. As a citizen of correct walk and deportment, he is highly esteemed. His career thus far promises well for the future, and demonstrates what German emigrants may gain for their children by emigrating to free America.

JESSE S. OLMSTED.

In writing the biographies of pioneers and prominent men of Sandusky county, a link would be missing and the chain in-complete should we omit a sketch of the life and services of the gentleman whose family and personal history we give in the following narrative: Jesse S. Olmsted was born in Ridgefield, Connecticut, December 24, 1792. When he was quite young his father removed to Albany, New York, where young Olmsted was placed for awhile under the instruction of Dr. Knott. When quite a young man he was employed as bookkeeper in a large mercantile establishment. Here he became a thorough accountant, and took his first lessons in mercantile transactions. In the fall of 1817 Mr. Olmsted, in company with his brother George G., brought from Albany, New York, to Lower Sandusky, the first stock of goods that rose to the dignity of a mercantile transaction. It consisted of a general assortment of dry goods, groceries, hardware, crockery, liquors, and wines, and amounted, upon the invoices at Albany, to the handsome sum of twenty-seven thousand dollars. This firm of brothers also brought with them carpenters to build a store, and coopers to make barrels to be used at the fisheries here, which trade was then, and has since been, very considerable. The workmen, eleven in all, together with the nails, glass, and the hardware necessary for their intended building, were trans-

ported from Albany to Buffalo by land, thence by water to this place. The pine lumber was brought from Buffalo by water. The amount paid for transportation on this stock of merchandise was four thousand four hundred dollars. Immediately upon their arrival they commenced the erection of their store. It was the second frame structure built here. It was located near Doncyson's brewery. Its dimensions were sixty by thirty feet, two stories high, with dormer-windows and projecting beams, with pulley blocks attached in front for raising goods. It presented a front of sixty feet towards the river, and the lower story was divided into two apartments-one a salesroom or store, and the other a warehouse.

This was considered a mammoth building, and for many years it was a kind of commercial emporium, the stock of goods in it being greater than in any other between Detroit and Cleveland, and Urbana and the lake. Mr. Olmsted's first trade was chiefly with the Indians of the Wyandot, Seneca, and Ottawa tribes. Soon after Mr. Olmsted and his brother opened business, they received in trade and shipped in one season twenty thousand muskrat skins, worth twenty-five cents each; eight thou-sand coon skins, worth fifty cents each; two thousand deer skins, at fifty cents; one hundred and fifty otter skins, at five dollars each; and two hundred bear skins, at five dollars each. In 1820 the Olmsted Brothers sent the first pork from this place eastward, It consisted of one hundred and fifty barrels, and was marketed at Montreal. The cost here was two thousand dollars for the lot, but it was sold for considerable less.

About the year 1825 the firm dissolved, and Mr. Jesse S. Olmsted went into business at Tymochtee; but in two or three years he returned to Lower Sandusky, where he remained the rest of his life.

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The first wheat shipped East from this point a lot of six hundred bushels was sent by Mr. Olmsted in the year 1839. It cost him forty cents per bushel in Lower Sandusky, and sold in Buffalo for sixty cents. Transportation was then so high that this advance of twenty cents per bushel was consumed in expenses. He made nothing, therefore, by the operation. On the 1st of January, 1821, he was married to Miss Azuba Forgerson, of Lower Sandusky, though a native of Orange county, New York. The marriage license on this occasion was the second issued after the organization of the county. The family comprised three children-Dorcas Ann, the first daughter, born September 12, 1824, died August 25, 1826; Ann M., now Mrs. Charles Foster, of Fostoria, Ohio, and Charles, now partner in the large mercantile firm of Foster, Olmsted & Co:, of the same place. Mr. Olmsted died in Fremont on the 9th of November, 1860, at the age of sixty-eight. He was always held in high esteem for

his integrity, and discernment, and he held for, a time the position of county treasurer; also that of associate judge of the court of common pleas; all the duties of which offices, as well as those of other official stations, he performed to the entire satisfaction of the people. Humbug found no victim, hollow, heartless formality no advocate in him. For the unfortunate he always had an open and helping hand, and in early times here many in distress were relieved by his generous donations. As an officer, he was prompt and reliable; as a business man, he was ever strictly honest. His goods had only one price, and his book entries told the truth. Fair profits and unflinching frankness and honesty in all transactions were the cardinal principles of his life, and when newly- arrived merchants came into the place and adopted the usual tactics of cheapening some leading articles

of merchandise, with the price of which the people. were familiar, to attract custom, and then make up the loss on articles of which the customer was ignorant of the value, Judge Olmsted's indignation knew no bounds. He denounced such a system of merchandising as knavery and robbery.

The fact that Judge Olmsted was the. pioneer merchant of the place, that he came to Lower Sandusky when the whole country was a sickly wilderness, that he was an eye- witness to the birth of the town and of every step of progress in its early history that he had seen the country a wilderness inhabited by wild beasts and still wilder men. transformed into a peaceful garden, of civilization and beauty, all conspire to rank him as the leading pioneer man and merchant of Lower San-dusky, alias Fremont.

In a lecture at Birchard Hall delivered in February, 1860, Homer Everett, esq., who had been many years a clerk for Judge Olmsted, and a member of his family, the judge being then alive and present at the meeting, thus alluded to his marriage:

Forty years a faithful, loving, married pair! For forty years the same familiar step upon the threshold of a happy home to meet warm comforts and a loving welcome; forty years' hand in hand along life's road, eye to eye reading the inmost thoughts; and loving more and more; faithful, true, confiding, with heart to heart through all the trials and changes, of mortal life from youth to age. I have been an inmate of that home, and claim the right to say there is not in our town a more interesting and beautiful social spectacle than the every day, life of, this aged pair! Surely such are blest.

Judge Olmsted departed this life on. the 9th of November, 1860. Mrs. Olmsted still survives, and is now in her eighty-seventh year, is still vigorous, and retains her mental faculties in a remarkable degree.

Azuba Olmsted was born in Orange county, State of New York, March, 1795 Her parents were Richard Forgerson and, Julia (Davis) Forgerson. They came to

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Lower Sandusky with Aaron Forgerson in the year 1817.

ELISHA W. HOWLAND.

Elisha W. Howland has been dead many years. He was never married and left no relative in this State, and it is now impracticable to obtain facts concerning his early life. It is known that he, came to Lower Sandusky as early as 1821. He resided there continually from that date until the time of his death, about the year 1854. He worked at the carpenter business and framed and finished most of the frame houses in the place built previous to that time .. At the time of his death he owned considerable property, including the hotel on the northeast corner of Front and State streets. He was for term one of the associate judges of the county, and was afterwards called judge Howland. In the early days of Lower Sandusky he opened a cabinet-making shop, and for many years his shop furnished all the coffins used in Lower Sandusky and vicinity. He also made bureaus, bedsteads, chests, and tables for the settlers, and his work was both tasteful and substantial.

In a lecture delivered by Homer Everett at Birchard Hall in 1850, in tracing characteristics of the early settlers at Lower Sandusky, he gave the following sketch of Judge Howland:

He was a man of good sense, sound judgment, independent, skeptical, of strong intellect and pithy expression. Many of his center-shot witticisms and eccentric speeches are well, remembered, one or two of which will give an idea of the man.

About the year 1838 our town contained two young and aspiring politicians by the names of Bishop Eddy and .Homer Everett. They were Democrats, and for some time had been very active in every canvass, organizing the party, controlling the nominations, and advocating the necessity of voting the regular unscratched ticket. Their efforts were attended with some success, and they became quite conspicuous, and got some offices filled by men who were not fit

for the place, "Judge" Howland, as he was called, hated the Democratic party and all belonging to it. About this time a young man named Harmon, also a Democrat, purchased and brought to our town one of those long- eared animals known as cousin of the horse and father of the mules-such an animal as Frank Leslie would have us believe is the high priest of the Sons of Malta. Harmon considered this animal a speculation, and being the first in our town, it attracted considerable attention. One morning he went to the stable. The halter was in the stall, but the jack had stepped out. The door was open, and Harmon supposed his favorite was stolen. The news of the loss soon spread over the town; scouts were sent out in every direction, and everybody was inquiring and narrating these events, and speculation was rife as to where the chattel had gone.

About 11 o'clock A. M. a loud braying in the loft of the stable announced that the missing property had been raised to an elevation above that commonly assigned to it. Harmon heard the musical note and hastened with eagerness to assure himself that the sound had not deceived him. Upon approaching the stable the head and ears projecting from an upper opening of the stable assured him that all was safe. But how did he get there? That was the question. There was no stairs nor ladder, and how could such a creature climb on pegs driven into the wall? He must have been elevated to the haymow by human aid, and who had done it became the great question. Whoever had perpetrated this sell on Harmon might expect to suffer. Just then Howland and some others had been discussing politics in a barroom, and Eddy and Everett had undergone some of the judge's handling, especially in regard to the bad officers they had been instrumental in hoisting into place, when in came Harmon saying, excitedly, that he would give twenty dollars to know who put his jack up into the loft and left his stable door open. Howland quietly replied, "I can tell who it was."

"Well, who was it ?"

"Homer Everett and Bish Eddy."

"Why judge, what makes you think so?"

"Because it's their trade, and has been since they took hold of the Democratic party. They have been engaged in elevating jackasses for the past three years!"

During his sickness and while confined to his room he sent his landlord, Ira Smith, esq., one evening about 7 o'clock, for a bottle of medicine, with directions to hurry. Smith was detained until about 10 o'clock, when he arrived at the door of the Judge's room and found it fastened. He had been a little alarmed for fear the Judge might die suddenly and alone. He rapped and no reply came; rapped again, louder and longer; waited a moment or so, and no sound .. He was troubled, and he began to think the Judge had locked himself in and become speechless, perhaps dead. He took hold of the

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door handle and rapped and shook it as if he would tear it down. As quick as the rattle of the door subsided, a well-known powerful voice, hot with anger, roared out: "I've been dead these two hours; go way and don't bother me ! "

There was some contention about the location of the Cleveland and Toledo Railroad through our town. Judge Howland's opinion was that it should cross the river north of town; others contended that it should go through on the south side, and the latter was finally chosen as the route. This line through Bellevue ran near a distillery, and at this place, excepting the curve at the west side of the river, ran pretty direct towards the old cemetery. After the location and line had been fixed the judge was asked if he did not think it was the best, after all. His reply was: "Well, may be 'tis; they have made two points in the road which will ensure a lasting business. It runs from . . distillery to our grave-yard. I suppose the road can carry off the dead as fast as he can kill."

One Anderson, by cunning management, was appointed collector of customs in our town, by the proper authorities at Washington city, and the appointment was not satisfactory to the faithful. Howland disliked Anderson. In course of time, at the solicitation of the people, John R. Pease obtained the removal of Anderson, and secured the office in his stead. On hearing of this change, Howland would say to his friends: "It is a fine sight to see a wicked man repent and do penance for his sins. Anderson is going about with a face as long as your arm, and has peas (Pease) in his shoes."

JACOB MILLIOUS.

This pioneer of the county was born in Rensselaer county, New York, in 1794. At an early age he learned the trade of painting, and in 1818 started westward. After living in various places in Ohio, painting and doing odd jobs, in 1821, with a load of whiskey and flour, drawn by two yoke of oxen, he started from Cincinnati for Lower Sandusky, where he opened a grocery store and bakery. He suffered for several months after arriving from malarial fever, which greatly discouraged him. As soon as he had sufficiently recovered strength he packed his gripsack and started for Lancaster, Pennsylvania and did not return until 1822. He was for many years employed in trade, and be-

longed to that coterie of friends who did so much to enliven village life.

Jacob Millious, a small, wiry man in stature, was three times married, and left a number of children to perpetuate his honorable name, several of whom, and his worthy widow, reside at Fremont, Ohio.

Mr. Millious died at Fremont in 1880, at the age of nearly eighty-seven years. As a citizen he was enterprising, and in business no man questioned the integrity of Jacob Millious.

JAMES JUSTICE AND FAMILY.

Among the pioneers of Fremont who deserve a notice in this history, few are more deserving a place than the subject of this sketch and his family. James Justice was born in Bedford county, Pennsylvania, on the 18th day of August, 1794 His father was William Justice and his mother was Eleanor Umsted. The father of Mr. Justice was of English and his mother of German ancestry. At about the age of nine years he removed with his parents from Bedford county to Ross county, Ohio, about six miles from the old State capital, Chillicothe. There he received a rudimentary education, such as that early date in the history of Ohio afforded, which was indeed limited compared with the grand system of education now to be found in every part of the State. In early life he manifested an uncommon inclination to activity, a good share of which was wasted in the prosecution of innocent mischief and resistance to authority. However, as he grew to manhood, business activity took the place of mischief, and he engaged at about the date of 1817 or 1818 in the flat-boat trade with New Orleans. The early settlers along the Ohio river and navigable tributaries all looked to this trade as a market for the bacon, dour and

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History of Sandusky County Ohio with Illustrations 1882, Part 83

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