USA > Pennsylvania > Beaver County > Genealogical and personal history of Beaver County, Pennsylvania, Volume I > Part 51
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(II) John Eaton, son of Henry and Jane (Gibbs) Eaton, was born
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in Clinton, Allegheny county, Pennsylvania, May 24, 1820, died in Beaver county, Pennsylvania, December 2, 1872. For many years he was em- ployed on boats plying the rivers of the Mississippi system carrying freight, in 1870 abandoning the life of a riverman and purchasing a farm of one hundred and one acres in Beaver county, there living until his death, hav- ing established a lucrative coal business. He married Nancy, daughter of Andrew and Mary (Maloney) Morton of Clinton, Allegheny county, Pennsylvania. Andrew Morton was born in county Antrim, Ireland, and when a young man came to the United States, Pittsburgh being the scene of his early endeavors. He was at first engaged in the hotel business, later dealt in lumber, and finally retired from both in favor of real estate dealing, having invested his savings in that form of security. He pros- pered in his operations and at his death, in 1862, left his wife a com- fortable fortune. She was a woman of rare sweetness of character, de- lighting in good works and when she died, twenty-four years after her husband's demise, left a generous portion of her estate for the main- tenance of a number of free beds in the hospitals of Pittsburgh, where the poor and needy of the city have since received medical attention that has doubtless saved many lives. Hers was not a case where the good work she had done was "interred with her bones," but one in which the blessings that she showered while living increased and multiplied after her death. Children of Andrew and Mary (Maloney) Morton: 1. James, died unmarried, the possessor of a considerable fortune, which he be- queathed to the Allegheny and Pittsburgh Hospitals. 2. George W. 3. Sarah Jane, married David Ingram, and lived in Allegheny City (Pitts- burgh North Side) until her death in 1882. 4. Nancy, of previous men- tion, married John Eaton. Children of John and Nancy (Morton) Eaton: I. Andrew Morton, born in 1850, died in 1871. 2. Mary J., married Robert Braden, of Beaver county, and died at her home in Washington, Kansas, in 1905. 3. Edith A. 4. John H., of whom further. 5. James F., born in 1864, died in 1881.
(III) John H. Eaton, son of John and Nancy (Morton) Eaton, was born in Allegheny City, Allegheny county, Pennsylvania, October 8, 1861, and in boyhood attended the public schools of the Second Ward of that city, later attending Duff's Business College, of Pittsburgh. Completing his course at this institution he enrolled in the Western University of Pennsylvania, at Pittsburgh, being compelled to discontinue his studies there while in his junior year. His first business experience was received in the auditor's office of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, where he was employed from 1881 until 1888. In the latter year he associated with the Standard Oil Company, first as salesman and later as manager of a tank station, resigning from his connection with that company in 1907. Since then he has given his entire attention to the administration of his real estate holdings in Pittsburgh (North Side) and in Beaver, Beaver county, Pennsylvania. At the present time he is promoting the erection
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of a large number of houses in that city, all of modern design and im- provement, which will add greatly to the attractiveness of the neighbor- hood in which they are being built, as well as to its value as a residential section. Mr. Eaton is a director of the First National Bank of Beaver, of the First National Bank of Midland, Pennsylvania, and is also in- terested financially in the Star Drilling Machine Company, of Akron, Ohio. He is a member of the Masonic order, belonging to lodge, chapter and commandery, and also affiliates with the Modern Woodmen of the World. Through his straightforward business dealings and enthusiastic enterprise, he has carried many projects to successful terminations, and his counsel is often sought by his business friends.
He married, March 28, 1888, Elizabeth H. Hamilton, born in Alle- gheny City, Pennsylvania, daughter of James and Rebecca (McIlroy) Hamil- ton. Mrs. Eaton moved to Beaver, Pennsylvania, in 1888, living there until her death in September, 1907; she was a member of the United Pres- byterian Church and through her liberality the new United Presbyterian Church was built. Children: 1. John Morton, born in December, 1888; a graduate in the mechanical engineering course from Cornell University, class of 1910, his preparatory education having been obtained in the Beaver. High School and Geneva College; his fraternity was the Sigma Nu; since leaving college he has been employed as assistant superintendent of the Treadwell Construction Company, of Midland, Pennsylvania. 2. Harry H., born April 5, 1891; attended the public and high schools of Beaver and prepared for college at Mercersburg Academy; was graduated in the class of 1913 from Washington and Jefferson College, Washington, Penn- sylvania; he took a prominent part in athletics at that college, playing short-stop on the varsity baseball team and center on the basketball team representing the college, being a member of the Phi Delta Theta fraternity. 3. Margaret E., twin of Harry H., attended the Beaver public school, later entered the high school, going from there to the Walnut Lane school of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from which she graduated in 1911.
The history of the English speaking family of Carrs and Kerrs CARR is as old as the Norman conquest. One of the followers of William the First, taken from a charter in Battle Abbey, bore the name of Karre. The early posterity of this Norman soldier undoubt- edly settled in the north of England and succeeding generations spread on both sides of the border land of England and Scotland, and after- ward into the north of Ireland. The descent of this branch of the Carr family is through the Scotch line, and it is highly probable that the an- cestor of the family who served in the American army during the Revolu- tionary War, Joseph Carr, was the emigrant member of the line, who came to the colonies in the pre-Revolutionary period, settling in New York. Through him the Carrs were represented in the conflict that made us a nation, in his son was the name entered upon the rolls of those who de-
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fended our sovereignty in our second war with Great Britain, while his grandson fought in the rebellion that preserved the integrity of the Union. While the characteristics of the family cannot be said to justify the term warlike, certain it is that each crisis in our national affairs and each call for true-hearted citizens found one of the generations ready and willing to pursue whatever course his duty showed. Joseph Carr married and among his children was Isaac Erastus.
(II) Isaac Erastus Carr, son of Joseph Carr, was in all likelihood a native of New York, where he died. When the War of 1812 broke out he immediately enlisted and at its close held an officer's commission. Farming had been the occupation to which he was accustomed and upon his return from the war he continued in its pursuit. His death occurred when he was seventy-six years of age, and from the traditions that exist concern- ing him he was a neighbor ideal, an entertainer of unusual powers until the day of his death, and an interesting conversationalist on all topics, par- ticularly regarding the wars in which he and his father fought. He mar- ried Prudence C. Wilber and they were the parents of four children: Harriet, who attained the wonderful age of ninety-nine years; Sally, died aged seventy-eight years; Isaiah, died aged eighty years; Horace Corydon, of whom further.
(III) Horace Corydon Carr, youngest of the four children of Isaac Erastus and Prudence C. (Wilber) Carr, was born at Sodus Point, Wayne county, New York, died May 30, 1866, being accidentally drowned in the Red river at Colbert's Ferry, Texas. As a boy he attended the public schools of his vicinity, obtaining a limited education, discontinuing his studies early in life to learn the carpenter's trade. Lumbering and farm- ing also occupied some of his time, and it was to follow the former bus- iness that he moved to Wisconsin, from which state he enlisted in the Union army at the outbreak of the Rebellion. Before relating his martial career, which is one of exceptional interest, it is well to tell of the person- ality of the man. In mechanical work he was regarded by his friends as little short of a genius, the use of tools and instruments apparently com- ing to him as second nature. His physical development was strong and vigorous, swimming being a sport and recreation in which he delighted. His prowess in this accomplishment was once the means of saving the life of a man who was drowning in the Black river, yet in spite of his strength and skill the waters claimed him as their victim when he was in the full vigor of manhood, aged twenty-eight years. He survived the terrors and miseries of Confederate prisons only to meet his death at the hands of the element that had always been his best friend, yet which treacherously betrayed him in his hour of need. To his friends he was ever the fair and honorable gentleman, trusted to the highest degree by all, while upon his family he showered the favors of the loving and considerate husband and father.
His first enlistment in the Union army was made at Glen Haven, Grant
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county, Wisconsin, November 8, 1861, and he became a member of Com- pany C, Second Regiment Wisconsin Cavalry Volunteers, his term of serv- ice expiring in December, 1863. He re-enlisted immediately, January, 1864, and served until the close of the war, the regiment being mustered out of service at Austin, Texas, November 15, 1865. While in active service, he was detailed for picket duty, there being a small stream cross- ing the limits he was guarding which it was necessary for him to ford each time he made the circuit of his guard. In March, 1864, he was riding through this water-course, and just as he reached the opposite bank his animal was shot from under him and he was wounded in the leg. The small reconnoitering band which had captured him placed him upon a horse and bore him to the main body of the Confederate army, whence he was forwarded to Andersonville prison, also being for a time confined in Florence. His term of captivity before his parole covered the period of a year, and some of his experiences were awful in the telling. So horrible is the mere story of his suffering it must have indeed been a brave man to conquer the temptation to end it all by self-destruction. At one time he laid careful plans for escape and was within eight miles of the Union lines before he was recaptured, bloodhounds being the agents employed in trailing him. Returned to the prison, he was ordered to tell who aided him in his attempt to escape, and to disclose the identity of him who had allowed his unmolested departure from the enclosure, for without an ac- complice such an act never could have been performed, so close was the guard maintained over the wretched inmates. Refusing to divulge the desired information, he was hung up by his thumbs, which were twisted cruelly from their sockets. Even after hours of this inhuman torture, which equaled the horrors of the Inquisition, he steadfastly remained loyal to his confederate, and was at last sentenced to solitary confinement in a dungeon that had been dug. Here he fell into a delirium that lasted for several days, but no medical aid nor comfort was vouchsafed him, and at last his rugged constitution and sturdy health restored him to a condition as near normal as one underfed and undernourished may attain. Not long afterward he was given the privilege of a trifle more freedom to allow him to engage in the manufacture of axe-handles for use by the Con- federates, the colonel in charge of the prison having learned of his me- chanical ability, and he was soon paroled, being granted a furlough in which to regain his wasted vitality. It was while traveling homeward that he composed a poem, at present the cherished possession of his children, its theme being the sufferings, tortures and privations endured by those con- fined in southern prison pens. That his barbarous treatment had not broken the patriotic ardor of his spirit, nor weakened his determination to see the successful end of the bitter conflict for human equality and the perpetuation of the Union is proven by the last two verses of the last stanza:
Caliban -
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"The debt we owe our bitter foe will not have long to stand,
We will pay it with a vengeance, down in Dixie's Sunny Land."
After receiving his honorable discharge from the service in Austin, Texas, he and some comrades purchased some live stock with the money they received from the government and were driving their animals across the Red river when he met his death, his comrades bringing the news of his accident which was confirmed by the records of the ferryman at that place, who kept an account of the various casualties occurring there. Mr. Carr was a Republican, and in religion was a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church.
Mr. Carr married, at Liberty, Tioga county, Pennsylvania, May 31, 1854, Patience Adelaide Hughes, the Rev. John Davies, a Congregational minister, performing the ceremony. Patience Adelaide, daughter of Joseph and Sarah Hughes, was the first of her parents' children born in the United States, her birth date being in 1834, they having come to the United States from England, their native land, settling in Tioga county, Pennsylvania, where he became a farmer and coal operator, owning a valuable mine. Children of Joseph and Sarah Hughes: Willia, Elizabeth, Sarah, Richard, Patience Adelaide, of previous mention, married Horace Corydon Carr; Josiah, a soldier in the Union army during the Civil War, was wounded in the leg, returned to his home, and subsequently became the father of a large family; Jane, Prudence, Nathan, Delilah, and Benjamin, the latter a soldier in the Union army, was wounded in battle and died in the hospital from its effects, Children of Horace Corydon and Patience Adelaide (Hughes) Carr: Harriet Elizabeth, born in 1855; Annette, born in 1859; Corydon Grant, of whom further; two sons who died in infancy.
(IV) Corydon Grant Carr, youngest of the three children of Horace Corydon and Patience Adelaide (Hughes) Carr who attained maturity, was born in Glen Haven, Grant county, Wisconsin, May 7, 1862. His father was a hearty admirer and enthusiastic supporter of General Grant, with whom he was personally acquainted, and it was his written wish, sent to his wife from the front, that the infant, born in his absence, should have Grant as one of its names. The only time that the young father ever saw his youngest child was while home on a furlough, his death oc- curring while traveling northward to his family. When Corydon Grant Carr was about three years old his mother returned to her native county, Tioga, making her home at Cherry Flats, Pennsylvania, later, when he was about five years of age, he went to live with his Uncle Isaiah, his father's brother, in Bradford county, his sojourn there covering a period of about six years. When he was twelve years of age he personally con- tracted with Burton Montgomery to work for him nine months in the year, provided that he would be allowed to attend school the three remaining months, during which time Montgomery should be responsible for his maintenance. The negotiations were not particularly in the boy's favor for even when he attended school it was a part of his duties to rise at
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dawn and to attend to the stock, as well as to see that they were comfortably quartered for the night, while Saturday, the school-boy's day of rest, was spent in chopping wood. Just before he passed his sixteenth birthday he secured his release from his agreement with Mr. Montgomery, and for the two following summers was employed as a farm hand at fair wages. In the spring of 1880 he came to Towanda, Pennsylvania, and became a clerk in the employ of D. W. Scott, a grocer and baker, after one year in his service becoming associated with Powell & Company, merchants of the same town. January, 1883, saw him in the employ of Pardee Sons & Company of Hazleton, Pennsylvania, with whom he remained for two years, and then for a year and a half he worked in the Humboldt Colliery, at Hazleton, his next position being with Drumhiller & Company. After one year there he spent the same length of time as an exhibitor for the Engle Clock Company, then traveled for a shoe company as clerk for three years, working in Cleveland and Toledo, Ohio; Detroit, Jackson, and Grand Rapids, Michigan; St. Paul and Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Omaha, Nebraska; in 1890 traveling through Kansas and Oklahoma, being in the latter place when it became a territory. Texas was next the field of his activities, and in August, 1891, he returned to the employ of the Engle Clock Company, traveling in New York state for one year. His attention was next turned to mechanical work, and for six years he was engaged in the plant of S. Howes, in Silver Creek. In 1901, in the employ of A. and S. Wilson, he was sent to West Virginia to attend to some bus- iness for that firm in that locality, returning later to Pennsylvania, and settling in Sewickley, Beaver county. At the time of the first sale of lots in Ambridge, that county, an operation conducted by the American Bridge Company, he purchased some ground and erected thereon a house. In that place he has since resided, conducting a general contracting business, and has built many of the numerous houses that have been erected in the short time that has elapsed since the founding of the town.
Mr. Carr has become a prominent member of the Ambridge community and during the recent judicial campaign played an active part. His bus- iness record is a most unusual one, his many interests necessitating his visiting many of the states of the Union, five years of his somewhat nomadic career having been spent in the wholesale liquor business. He has come into contact with many different types of men in his extensive travels, and through dealings with each has acquired a cosmopolitanism that permits him to transact business with ease and facility, long experience having shown him how each must be approached to obtain desired results. On November 1, 1912, Mr. Carr and C. R. Doyle purchased the business of the Ambridge Hardware and Plumbing Company, which they conduct suc- cessfully at the present time. Both are well-known in the locality, both possess able executive powers, and the patronage of the concern has grown under their management. Mr. Carr was prominently identified with the establishment of a lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows in
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Ambridge, and has passed the chairs of that order, being also a member of the Encampment. He is also affiliated with the Knights of Pythias, being a past officer of that organization.
Mr. Carr married, in December, 1891, Lillian B. Crosby, of Forest- ville, New York, and has children: Mildred P., Marion J., Leo G., aged, respectively, at the present time (1914) twenty, seventeen, fifteen.
Just when the earlier members of this family emigrated GRAEBING to America is not a matter of record, but it is known that a father, his son and several of the women members of the family came from Baltimore to Pittsburgh by stage and canal, while the other members of the family made their way on foot from one city to the other. They had come originally from Germany, and when they ar- rived in the western part of Pennsylvania, located in Allegheny City, on Second avenue, at a little park, the house in which they resided being still in good condition. Mr. Graebing was a shoemaker by trade, a calling he followed during the active years of his life. His death occurred in 1878 or 1879, when he was over eighty years of age. For a number of years he served as captain of the Allegheny Militia, and he was one of the founders of the Weitershousen Lutheran Church, on South Canal street, of which congregation he was president for many years. Among his children were: John, of further mention; Henry, of Allegheny City; Philip, Lewis, Eliza, Catherine, Sophia.
(II) John Graebing was born in Butzbach, Germany, in 1819, and died in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania, in May, 1892. He acquired a sound and practical education in Germany, and his life here was a very active one. For a period of seventeen years he was employed in Leaches' Ware- house on the Canal, and then established himself in the butcher business in Allegheny City. Later he associated himself with a Mr. Mackintire, in the contracting business, one of their contracts being the paving of First street with cobblestones. For eight years he was a conductor of a freight train, then conducted a hotel for a number of years. He was a strong supporter of the Democratic party, and served as councilman in 1851, during which time the Fort Wayne Railroad was run through the park. In 1869 or 1870 he served as sheriff of the county. He was a member of the Lutheran Church. Mr. Graebing married Fredericka Hartje, born in Hanover, Germany, in 1824, died in New Galway, Penn- sylvania, in 1880, daughter of - Hartje, an officer in the English army, who came to America, and Hannah Louisa Hartje, and who were the parents of five children: August, married Henrietta Gearing, and has several children; William, married Mary Zintzmaister; George, married Hettie Grem; Lewis; Fredericka, mentioned above. Mr. and Mrs. Graeb- ing had children: 1. John, deceased; married Lucinda McKnight, and had six children. 2. Albert, of New Galway; married (first) Sophronia Mc- Knight, had two children; married (second) Amelia Miller, had four
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children. 3. Charles Edward, of further mention. 4. Willia, deceased; married Kate Bushman, and had three children. 5. Henry, deceased; married Lizzie Orrison, had three children. 6. Emma, of Buffalo, New York; married C. W. Brown, had three children. 7. Edward, of Chicago; married Annie -, had four children.
(III) Charles Edward Graebing, son of John and Fredericka (Hartje) Graebing, was born in Allegheny City, now Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Jan- uary 20, 1851. Until the age of eight years he lived in his native city, then removed to New Galway, Beaver county, Pennsylvania, where the greater part of his education was acquired. Until 1875 he assisted his father in the management of the farm, hotel and quarry, then became a fireman on the Pennsylvania Railroad, on the road to Ashtabula. At the end of two years he was transferred to the Fort Wayne branch of the same company, his route being between Allegheny and Alliance, and Pitts- burgh and Erie, on the freight and passenger trains. In October, 1880, he was promoted to the position of engineer, on the Pittsburgh & Alliance branch, then was engaged for eight months in the coal business, after which he returned to the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, and was ap- pointed to roundhouse duty. He has been in the service of the railroad company altogether for a period of thirty-seven years. He is a Socialist in his political views, and has filled a number of public offices. He was school director six years; a member of the borough council six years; and is now truant officer, health officer and assessor of the Second Ward. In religious faith he is a Methodist, and fraternally he is a member of the following organizations: Rochester Lodge, No. 229, Free and Accepted Masons; Allegheny Chapter, Royal Arch Masons; Allegheny Commandery, Knights Templar; William Penn Club.
Mr. Graebing married, November 18, 1879, Mary E. McWilliams, born in Morris, Illinois, January 22, 1858, daughter of James and Eliza- beth (Sutcliffe) McWilliams, the former a carpenter, born and died in Lawrence county, Pennsylvania, the latter born in Kentucky. They had children: Ada, now living in Cleveland, married Thomas Whalen, de- ceased; Mary E., mentioned above; Ella, married Robert Van Auker, had eleven children; Elizabeth, living in Great Bend, married Charles Morrison, had two children. Mrs. McWilliams died at Struthers in 1909. Mr. and Mrs. Graebing had children: Carl, an engineer with the Pennsylvania Railroad Company in the yards at Conway, being disabled by an accident; Roy, who was graduated from a Michigan Business College, is also an engineer in the yards of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company at Conway.
EVANS Pennsylvania, is a native of Hungary, where he was born in John Evans, a prominent citizen of Ambridge, Beaver county, the year 1866, a son of George and Anna Evans, who lived and died in that country. To his parents were born five children: John,
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deceased; George, deceased; Helen, deceased; Mary; John, of whom further.
John Evans was educated in the land of his birth, and spent his child- hood and most of his young manhood there. In the year 1901, when he was thirty-five years of age, he came to the United States and settled in McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania, where he lived for some ten years. In 1911 he removed to Ambridge, where his cousin, Samuel Evans, was already located and engaged in a profitable butcher business. This cousin was also a native of Hungary, where he was born in 1868, a son of Peter and Mary (Polivka) Evans, and came to the United States in 1905 and to Ambridge in 1909. Of him John Evans bought the meat business, which he has since conducted most profitably. Mr. Evans is a Republican in politics, and a member of the Orthodox Russian Church. He married, in his native land, Anna Curtice, and has children: Mary, Samuel, Helen.
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