USA > Ohio > Wayne County > History of Wayne county, Ohio, from the days of the pioneers and the first settlers to the present time > Part 35
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In the summer of 1834, Mr. Woodland and his family, in com- pany with Bishop McIlvaine, formerly Rector of St. Ann's church, Brooklyn, arrived at Gambier, Knox county, Ohio, the Bishop coming to assume the Presidency of that college. At the close of a few years residence in Gambier, he concluded upon a change, when a visit to Wooster was made, which resulted in the perma- nent settlement in our midst of him and his family, in June, 1838. Priest Jones was the minister of the Baptist church at that time, with which he immediately became identified, retaining his mem- bership to the present hour. He first found employment with Joseph Larwill, after his arrival in Wooster.
For many years he has been an extensive manufacturer of brick, for which he always found a ready market, but being now far ad- vanced on the declivitous slope of life, has partially abandoned the eager and active pursuits of the world. He was married to Mar- tha Woodward, of London, in November, 1824.
Mr. Woodland has many deserving and salient points of char-
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acter. He has long been an advocate of the present school sys- tem, and a champion of popular education and reform. In his more vigorous days he bore a conspicuous part in the public lyce- um, and was a fair and honorable antagonist in the debating club. He has been a member of the church for over forty years, has strong religious convictions, a firm faith in the Bible and the great promise it embodies to the enlightened and believing soul. The external testimony and practice of religion will avail little, when "Wisdom shall be justified of her children," and when human na- ture must appear cleansed, unsullied and purified. Sincerity and plainness, a generous integrity of purpose and honesty of disposi- tion, are the components of the man.
To him are we indebted for the inception and organiza- tion of the Wayne County Historical Society, and Dr. Fire- stone has appropiately named him, "the Father of the So- ciety." He first agitated the movement through the papers, talked it up on the streets, urged it in the public offices, and final- ly succeeded in getting an organization. When members grew disheartened at the prospect, and prognosticated failures and de- lays, he clung to his fancied project, with rare old English pluck ; and when the work was in progress, when the battle was being fought, he did not hide in his tent until it was over, or shrink at the call of the muster roll, but performed his part like a hero.
SAMUEL NORTON BISSELL, M. D.
Samuel N. Bissell was born, January 22, 1809, in the village of Vernon, Oneida county, State of New York. He was a nephew of Hezekiah Bissell, M. D., and a son of Eliphaz Bissell, a native of the old English borough of Torringford, Litchfield county, twenty-five miles north-west of Hartford, Connecticut, who sub- sequently removed to Oneida county, New York, where he be- came an excellent medical practitioner, and where in the discharge of professional duties he unfortunately met death by drowning.
The subject of this sketch, Dr. Samuel Norton Bissell, was named after his grandfather, Samuel Norton, an old citizen of Goshen, Connecticut, with whom he spent a considerable portion of his early life. Under the careful guidance and management of his father and grandfather, and withal being a bright, promising, intellectual young man, ever ready to embrace opportunities of mental culture and development, and appropriate them to the best
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possible uses, he succeeded in procuring a more than ordinarily fair education. To this emphatic mental achievement of S. N. Bissell is due, not simply the liberal interposition of parental con- cern, but the quick, energetic seizure of opportunity which too many allow to escape, but which, in his case, was perseveringly util- ized. He was a student and investigator from the beginning, and herein consisted the basis of his future, unfolding life. The idea sought to be advanced is not that he was precocious, although he was brilliant, but that he seemed to possess, in a remarkable de- gree, a responsible consciousness, even when a young man, of his relations to the world, and of what the world in after years would exact from him.
With this vivid realization of things was it possible for him to do anything else than to fortify himself for a conflict with men and the forces which men set up against each other?
Happy is he who, at the earliest moment, discovers this mighty secret, for, in the end, the discovery will be made, and then too often with disappointment, vexation and disaster. For, conceal it as you will, the whole path of life is beset with foes who compass your downfall and oppose your elevation.
He, too, found that there were other
" Serpents in the world
Than those which slide along the grassy sod, And sting the luckless foot that presses them."
Of this Samuel N. Bissell had early foresight, and wisely prepared for the approaching struggle. While his grandfather, with true New England shrewdness, endeavored to impress him with the necessity of education, he found an apt and appreciating pupil in his nephew. So that, we affirm, Samuel N. Bissell embarked upon life a good scholar and signally qualified to explore the domain of physic. Feeling that the wide universe was his, and that "no pent up Utica confines our powers," he adopted the rational and intelligent conception of "going West," which determination, pushed to an issue, introduced him in Wooster, the field and scene of his future professional labor.
Arriving hither, he at once entered the office of his uncle, Hezekiah Bissell, then a successful practicing physician of the vil- lage. With him he remained, pressing his studies with indefatiga- ble courage, "scorning delights and living laborious days." Here he remained until he had completed his elementary and college
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course, when he entered upon the active duties of his profession, flinging out the banner of the healing art.
He was married September 25, 1832, to Eliza, daughter of Hon. John Sloane. He pursued the practice of medicine in Woos- ter, until his death, which occurred June 13, 1848. The circum- stances and occasion of his death are both painful and affecting. His youngest sister, Mrs. Eunice C., wife of Harvey Howard, then residing in Tiffin, Ohio, was seriously sick. A courier was dis- patched to Dr. Bissell, summoning him immediately to her bed- side. With characteristic promptness he obeyed the request. There being no railroad direct to the point, he had to cross the country, from which exposure he was prostrated with pneumonia, from the effects of which, absent from his own home, and in the house of his suffering sister, he suddenly died. Verily, indeed, was he a martyr to his friends, his profession, to which he was de- voted, and the behests of duty. While he had rescued many a sufferer from the darkness of the camps of death, his arm was powerless, as was that of his friends, to save himself. He conse- crated himself to a glorious work, but in the mingling splendors of a growing fame he fell beside the altar he had built.
His remains were conveyed to Wooster, and deposited in the old Presbyterian graveyard, but were subsequently transferred to the Wooster cemetery. By his marriage with Eliza Sloane, there resulted two sons, J. S. and H. H. Bissell, both of whom are liv- ing. His wife survived him until June 14, 1871. She was a faith- ful member of the Presbyterian church, and a pious, exemplary woman. The unexpected and sudden death of Dr. Samuel N. Bissell, to the people of Wooster and Wayne county, fell like a thunder-burst from a clear sky. All remembered him that knew him, as a hale, vigorous and robust man, with an undoubted lease of three score and ten upon his life. His hight was not impos- ing, but he was a fine specimen of physical manhood, built up squarely and firmly as granite rock, and weighing about two hundred pounds.
Our rapid and hasty review of Dr. Bissell presents him as a man of marked character and distinctive cast of mind. He quali- fied himself for his profession before he entered upon it. There was no superficial learning or pedantry about him. In the ways of conceit or audacious assumption he was poorly gifted ; for in his temper and disposition vanity and self-confidence had no place whatever. He was not, we dare say, unconscious of his power,
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but naturally modest and retiring, and altogether devoid of popu- lar art, he could not advance himself by practices which, when adroitly played, seldom fail to promote the fortune of inferior minds. He did not, however, have to wait long for the public to appreciate or patronize him, but soon established his reputation by the united and irreversible judgment of his compeers.
In our worldly affairs it sometimes pleases Fortune to lend a capricious smile where neither true merit, nor wisdom, nor indus- try entitle an unworthy object to the grateful concession. But less fickle in her gifts and good will than the sportive goddess is famed to be, that poetic deity seldom fails to add her grace and blessing wherever virtue, constancy and qualification unite to aid the good man in a heroic struggle for honest promotion. The truth of this reflection was powerfully and handsomely illustrated in the career and progress of Dr. Bissell. His armor consisted of courage and fairness, integrity and intelligence.
Great, indeed, was his triumph-not greater than the measure of his high and indisputable claims do justly challenge. He was practical and observant from the very outstart of his studies. He did not contemplate the human frame from the vital standpoint, but simply as a grand mechanism; a complex structure, whose builder must have been none less than God. Hence to understand this mechanism-its essential and perfect action-the harmonious unison and melody of all its parts, or to be able to detect its dis- cords, or to adjust its derangements, was, with him, the objective purpose of his investigations.
The mystery and origin of life were not comprised in his mo- tive; simply the perfection and healthy, symmetrical preservation of that life. It matters not to Blind Tom who makes his musical instruments ; his mission is to elicit its harmonies, correct its dis- cords, and make it perform a perfect work. With this interpreta- tion of his duties, Dr. Bissell practiced medicine, and in the vari- ous walks of his profession distinguished himself as one of the most popular and scientific physicians and surgeons of Northern Ohio. He was a man of strong attachments and of amiable and benevolent disposition ; of kind heart and strong brain.
In politics he was a Whig, and had he taken to it would have made a skillful manager. He served in the capacity of Associate Judge of Common Pleas Court in 1845. In his general manner and bearing he was quiet and unobtrusive. While he was practical and business-like, those who knew him best testify to his warm
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feelings, his generous and noble disposition, and to the happy and interesting fervor which, in a circle of cherished and confiding friends, oftentimes turned his natural gravity into echoes of joyous mirth, or accents of animated and excited hilarity.
Such is the short history of the subject of this memoir ; such his virtues and his skill and learning ; such the traits of his attractive, un- blemished character. Some may equal-all should emulate, but few will rival or excel his sterling worth, either as a citizen or a professional man.
John Sloane Bissell, his oldest son, named in memory of his worthy and illustrious grandfather, Colonel Sloane, reproduces some of the characteristics of his father, and gives promise of demonstrating the possibilities to be attained by devotion to busi- ness, and the promotion to be achieved by adhesion to a single pursuit. He was born in the city of Wooster, and is a Buckeye to the manner born. When but a lad of tender years he was dispossessed of the paternal guardianship, and had for his guide and counselor only the kind and gentle admonitions of his mother. With her he remained during the years of his minority, and in fact until her death, a constant witness of her dutiful and exemplary life, daily receiving the benefits of her instruction and the inspiration of her affectionate attentions. Opportunity was furnished him early of going to the village schools, and subsequently the Academy of Professor Hill, all of which he cordially embraced, so that by the time he was ready to engage in business he was quite proficient in his studies.
His first introduction to business was in the capacity of clerk, in the house of Plumer & King, in which relation he continu- ously served until his embarkation in business enterprises upon his own account. It will be observed from what is written that Mr. Bissell has deviated from the traditional tendency of his father and uncle toward the profession of medicine, and has seen proper to launch his life-vessel upon the waters of mercantile speculation. In this respect he has been the arbiter of his own occupation.
He is now at the head of one of the largest, best appointed and most judiciously arranged mercantile establishments in the city, of which himself and brother are proprietors.
In his commercial transactions he has, as far as possible, adopted the cash basis-the true principle underlying all business, whereby the purchaser receives a greater equivalent for his money
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and the seller a more rapid realization of his profits. He buys his goods himself; pays little attention to valise-bummers, sample men and commercial tramps, who subsist by recognized frauds, and who fizzle or fatten, as the case may be, by duplicity and mis- representation.
He is his own accountant and book-keeper; foots up the col- umns and knows they are right without further inquiry, and works behind the counter when there is a rush. In short, Mr. Bissell is an enterprising, accommodating business man.
He has keen perceptions, is a quick thinker and a vigorous worker. After sleeping six or eight hours his eyes are open the remainder of the twenty-four. If he makes a bad bargain to-day, it will teach him a lesson, and he will make none to-morrow. To sum it all up, he understands the mental arithmetic of calico, mus- lin and silk. His experiences, all of them, whether good or bad, are a decided advantage to him. He is a man of nerve and force, somewhat excitable, but with confidence enough in himself to be his own master. He is kind hearted and liberal where he is justi- fied in it. He knows how to appear free and open without danger of intrusion, and to be cautious without seeming reserved ; is a warm and generous friend; an honest man, and an incorruptible citizen.
SAMUEL HEMPHILL.
The citizens of Wooster were shocked on Thursday morning, March 3, 1853, on the reception of a letter announcing the death of Samuel Hemphill, Esq., a distinguished member of the Wooster bar, which took place in Hartcounty, Kentucky, on the 22d day of February, 1853. On the 15th of March, and soon after the in- telligence of his sad fate, the members of the bar convened at the office of McSweeney & Jones, Hon. Edward Avery being appointed to the Chair, and J. H. Harris Secretary, to draft resolutions ex- pressive of the sense of the meeting upon the sudden and melan- choly death of their brother. Levi Cox, Ezra Dean, William Given, John McSweeney and Enos Foreman were appointed the committee, with the further authority to adopt suitable measures in reference to attending his funeral. This committee reported on Thursday evening, March 17, from which we extract a single resolution :
Resolved, I. That in this unexpected death of Mr. Hemphill, we have lost
27
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an intelligent, talented and honorable member of the legal profession, and that we deeply regret and deplore the loss of his society, individually and professionally, of which, by this melancholy dispensation, we have been so early and suddenly deprived.
On Monday, March 28, 1853, Hon. Levi Cox moved the Court, Hon. Martin Walker on the bench, to order the proceedings and resolutions of the Wooster bar concerning the death of Mr. Hemp- hill, to be entered upon the journal of the Court.
Mr. Hemphill was born in Bedford county, Pa., on the 26th of April, 1817. When about ten years old-in 1827-he removed with his father to Wayne county, Ohio. At about seventeen years of age he was sent to college at Athens, Ohio, where he entered the Sophomore class. He spent two years at college, and then commenced reading law with Hon. Levi Cox, of Wooster, with whom he was associated as partner after his admission to the bar. He was about nineteen years old when he commenced the study of law, reading two years prior to his admission.
On the 5th of November, 1844, he was united in marriage, by Rev. William McCandlish, to Miss Mary S. Bentley, daughter of Benjamin Bentley, Esq. He died in the thirty-sixth year of his age. His remains reached the family residence in Wooster on the 10th of March, and on the 13th they were committed to the grave in the old Seceder church burial-ground, by the Masonic Order, brethren of the bar, and a vast concourse of the citizens. In November, 1858, he was removed from this place of rest, and buried in the Masonic lot in the cemetery, the second person buried there.
Had Mr. Hemphill lived, he would have greatly distinguished himself as a lawyer. He was a man of noble personal mien ; had a grand, generous nature, an original and superior order of genius, great tenacity of purpose, and was a brilliant and magnetic orator. With general and universal lamentation he was prematurely con- signed to the grave. "There let his majestic, noble form and nature repose in peace, far beyond the reach of the ills and storms of this life, until he shall be called away to a higher, better and happier home. He has gone from us forever; his tongue is motionless in death, and that voice which so much pleased and delighted men with its powerful argumentation and elocution is now mute and hushed in the silence of the tomb. It will no more respond to the calls of another earthly court. It will no more resound in anecdote or joke, social converse, bleeding satire or
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forensic strifes, but respond in joy to the calls of the peaceful, glo- rious heavenly courts on high."
WOOSTER CEMETERY.
The patriarchal language of four thousand years ago remains unchanged. We are "strangers and sojourners " here, in need of "a possession of a burying-place, that we may bury our dead out of sight."
It is the duty of the living thus to provide for the dead. It is not a mere office of pious regard for others ; but it comes home to our own bosoms, as those who are soon to enter upon the common inheritance. " If there are any feelings of our nature not bounded by earth, and yet stopping short of the skies, which are more strong and more universal than all others, they will be found in our solici- tude as to the time and place and manner of our death; in the de- sire to die in the arms of friends; to have the last sad offices to our remains performed by their affection ; to repose in the land of our nativity; to be gathered to the sepulchres of our fathers." Gray, in his Elegy-the most incomparably beautiful of all human poems-enforced this solemn truth when he wrote-
"For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey, This pleasing, anxious being e'er resigned, Left the warm precincts of the cheerful clay, Nor cast one longing, ling'ring look behind ?
On some fond breast the parting soul relies ; Some pious drops the closing eye requires ; E'en from the tomb the voice of nature cries ; E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires."
That we are dust, and shall to dust return, does not suggest indifference to the place of burial of the dead, or that it matters not where the lifeless body is deposited. The dead have not been without their preferences, and the living must know where their kindred are laid away, "that the spot where they shall lie will be remembered with a fond and soothing reverence; that their chil- dren may visit it in the midst of their sorrows, and their kindred in remote generations feel that a local inspiration hovers around it."
Said the patriarch Jacob, "Bury me not, I pray thee, bury me not in Egypt : but I will lie with my fathers. And thou shalt
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carry me out of Egypt; and bury me in their burying-place. There they buried Abraham and Sarah, his wife; there they bur- ied Isaac and Rebecca, his wife; and there I buried Leah."
Prior to 1852 the dead of the village of Wooster and its vicinity were promiscuously buried in the different church-yards of the town, and here the "fathers of the hamlet sleep." On the 12th of July, 1852, a number of the citizens of Wooster, prominent among whom were Hon. Levi Cox, John Larwill, Cyrus Spink, E. Quinby, Jr., Constant Lake, R. B. Stibbs, K. Porter, James Johnson, Harvey Howard, and others, agreed to form themselves into a cemetery association, to be known by the name of " The Wooster Cemetery Association," and for that purpose signed and published a notice. In pursuance of the publication of the notice, and at the time specified therein, a majority of the members of the Association con- vened at the Court House, and there resolved to elect, by ballot, from their number five persons to serve as Trustees and one as Clerk of the Association, and otherwise consummate the organization as provided by law. The Trustees chosen were Henry Lehman, James Johnson, Constant Lake, R. B. Stibbs and E. Quinby, Jr.
The original grounds, thirty-two acres, were purchased of Joseph H. Larwill, the price to be paid being $100 per acre. Five promissory notes were executed to Mr. Larwill, and in the event of a sufficient number of lots not being sold to indemnify the executors of the five promissory notes, the following persons agreed to assume their respective proportions of the notes the same as if they had been original signers to them :
Samuel Woods,
Samuel L. Lorah,
J. S. Spink,
John H. Harris,
Thomas Stibbs,
J. H. Kauke,
J. M. Robison,
William Spear, William Belnap,
E. Avery, William Henry, Benj. Eason,
J. A. Anderson,
John P. Jeffries, Enos Foreman,
E. Quinby, Jr.,
J. N. Jones,
E. Dean,
John McSweeney.
The first meeting of the Trustees of the Association, after its formation, occurred November 6, 1852. Superintendents being appointed, the grounds were surveyed and graded. November 13, 1853, it was ordered that a public sale of lots be had in the ceme- tery on the 25th of said month, commencing at ten o'clock. The officers of the Association consist of a board of five Trustees, a Clerk and Treasurer.
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R. R. DONNELLY. *
R. R. Donnelly was born in Northumberland county, Pa., October 29, 1820. His parents soon afterwards removed to the neighborhood of Wooster, Wayne county, in which city, and on the same corner of the public square, the greater part of his life was spent in the vigorous prosecution of business pursuits. He died February 20, 1874, of cancer of the head, from which he had suffered for many years.
ISAAC NEWTON JONES. 1
Isaac Newton Jones, second son of Benjamin Jones, was born in Wooster, December 7, 1818. Having regularly attended the Wooster schools, and being an apt and eager learner, at the age of twelve years he first entered upon business life by accepting a clerkship from William Childs, in a dry goods store in the village. His father engaging in mercantile business with a Mr. Hatch, at Old Hickory, Canaan township, the subject of this sketch was transferred thither, but in a short time removed to Petersburg, Ashland county, where his father had made a similar investment, and in the prosecution of which he desired his son to take part.
In 1836 Benjamin Jones having withdrawn his commercial in- terests, removed to his farm, two miles west of Wooster (yet known as the old Jones homestead), taking with him his whole family. The farm, however, was not Newton's field of activity, and probably 110 one better knew this than his father. The bent of his mind was emphatically in a mercantile direction. In the same year (1836) he returned to Wooster and entered the store of Joseph S. and Constant Lake, in the capacity of clerk. In this relation he served until 1840, when he and Theodore Loomis pur- chased the goods of the firm and for a period conducted the busi- ness. Several changes occurred in the management up to 1860, when Constant Lake again entered into partnership with Mr. Jones. But from 1836 to 1870 Mr. Jones, with the exception of four years, was a member of the firm.
For thirty-four years-a period longer than the average life of man-he met the whirl and bustle of business in the same town
* We had a full sketch of Mr. Donnelly prepared for publication, but his pres- ent wife objecting to any notice of him, we insert only the above lines.
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