ROBERT
NEWELL, a native of Washington county, Pennsylvania,
is believed to have located in the east part of Montgomery
township in 1811. He had resided for two or three years on
White Eyes plains, near the present site of Newcomerstown, in
Tuscarawas county, Ohio. He is believed to have erected the
first cabin in Montgomery township. It was situated on what
has since been known as the Hugh McGuire farm, some five
miles southeast of Ashland. In the fall of 1812, after the
Ruffner - Zimmer - Copus tragedies on the Black fork, the
cabins of Mr. Newell, Mr. Cuppy, and Mr. Fry,
further up a branch of the same stream, were burned by the
Indians, while the families of the above - mentioned pioneers
sought safety at the fort or Jerome's place, now the village of
Jeromeville. After peace had been declared, Mr. Newell
re-erected and continued to improve his farm, which he finally
sold to the late Hugh McGuire, and located one mile north
of Olivesburgh, in Richland county, where he deceased in 1848, at
an advanced age. When Montgomery township was associated
with Vermillion township for civil purposes, from 1814 to 1816,
Mr. Newell, from Montgomery, and James Wallace, from
Vermillion, were elected justices of the peace. Upon the
organization of Montgomery in 1816, Mr. Newell lost his
office. He is represented as having been a clever, whole-souled
pioneer, but in point of education quite illiterate. He
could not write and consequently kept no docket. There was
but little litigation in those days, and it was the habit of
Squire Newell to appoint a day and cite the plaintiff and
defendant to appear before him. When the parties had
assembled, he required them to state, under oath, the nature of
their claims, and having partially heard both sides, required an
equitable and peaceable adjustment of the dispute. It is
related, that on some occasions, money being exceedingly scarce,
and whiskey being a "legal-tender," it was decided that a gallon
of that article should be provided by the winning party for the
crowd, and the case be dismissed, with the injunction that in the
future the litigants should be neighbors and friends. Mr.
Newell was a very liberal officer. He rarely charged for
his services. Constable Kline, who served under him,
being a poor man, had to exact his fees.
The sons of Mr. Newell were: Absalom,
Franklin, Samuel, Zachariah and Jesse. The
daughters were two - Mrs. Jonathan Edy and Mrs. Lloyd
Edy, of Richland county. The sons all moved west, most
of them to Iowa, where some of them yet reside. Like
Robert Newell, their father, they were all large rugged men,
and preferred the rough and tumble of a new country. Like
the Lattas, the Mackleys, the Uries, and
hundreds of others of the early settlers, they were formidable men
at a military muster, and cabin raising, a political meeting or
any other gathering where physical force was brought into
question. The days of the giants are no more! The race
of backwoodsmen has departed. Feebler men occupy their
places. |
Vermillion Twp. -
ANDREW NEWMAN removed to Vermillion
Township in the fall of the year 1825, and purchased of
Samuel McBride the farm upon which was afterward the site of
Newman's mill - being the same property now owned by
Joseph Boyd. At this date his family consisted of his
wife and two sons, namely, William, and James H.
Mr. Newman subsequently purchased a farm on the
south line of Vermillion Township[, where he died on the 20th of
January, 1861, at the age of eighty-three years.
He had immigrated to Richland County in the year 1806,
and during the war of 1812 resided about three and a half miles
southwest of Petersburg, Mifflin Township, on the Rocky Fork.
Source: History of Ashland County, Ohio - publ. 1863 - Page 283 |
AMOS
NORRIS and wife emigrated from Huntington County,
Pennsylvania, in the fall of 1809. They resided in
Lancaster until 1810, when they immigrated to Mohican Township.
Mr. Norris and William Eagle jointly entered a
quarter section in said township. Mrs. Mary widow
of Amos Norris, (who died in the summer of 1862, at the
age of seventy-four years, and who furnished this memorandum a
few weeks previous to her decease,) states that during the first
and second years of their residence in Mohican the Indians were
numerous, and visited and traded with them almost daily.
"In August, 1812, my husband and myself went on a visit to
Pennsylvania. We did not know that war was declared when
we left home, but when we reached the Pennsylvania settlements,
we found the people greatly excited, and the men volunteering
and drilling. In our absence Hull had surrendered
his army to the British, and when we returned home we found our
panic-stricken neighbors forted. The Indians had been
removed from their villages to Delaware by the Federal troops.
Source: History of Ashland Co., Ohio - Publ. 1863. - Page 517 |
| JOHN
NORRIS was born in Huntingdon county, Pennsylvania, January
25, 1807, came to Ohio in 1823, and first settled on the farm now
owned by Henry Cooper, in Mohican township. He held the office of
supervisor several terms. He was a member of the Presbyterian
church twenty-two years, but is at present connected with the
United Brethren church. In 1829 he married Mary Smith, of Lake
township. He was the father of six children, only two of whom are
living, viz.: Mary A., wife of Darby Taylor, of Ashland county,
and Joseph B., who married Phebe Lee, and lives in Perrysville. |
| JOSEPH
B. NORRIS, son of John Norris, was born in Ashland county
in 1848, and, in 1870, married Phebe I. Lee. He has been engaged
in farming all his life, and is a member of the United Brethren
church. In politics he is a Republican. He is the father of three
children, viz.: Mary J., John L., and Joseph W. |
| WILLIAM
NORRIS was born in Maryland in 1781, came to Ohio from
Huntingdon county, Pennsylvania, in 1823, and first settled on the
farm now owned by John L. Metcalf. In 1805 he married Mary
Hornoc
He was a captain in the war of 1812. He was a member of the
Methodist Episcopal church. In politics he was an old-line Whig.
He was the father of twelve children, of whom five are living,
viz.: John; Nancy, wife of George Miller, of Holmes county;
Joseph, who married Susan Young, and lives in Ashland county;
Matilda, who married Lemuel Burgh, and afterwards
Thomas Urie, and
lives in Michigan; and Margaret, wife of Hiram Watson, of Knox
county, Ohio. |
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