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GEORGE BURDUE, a prominent successful farmer of Townsend township, was born February 19, 1811, in what is now Milan township, Erie county.  He is second in a family of eleven children (four of whom died in infancy) born to William and Elizabeth (Vlazer) Burdue, both of whom were born in Pennsylvania, the former of French and the latter of German extraction.
     William Burdue, the father of the subject, was born November 26, 1782, and received an ordinary common-school education in the fall of the following year (1810) emigrated with his wife and child to the then extreme limit of the western frontier, the almost unbroken and pathless wilderness of northern Ohio.  Settling in the northern part of Lot No. 4, Townsend township, Huron county, he entered wild lands, and built a log cabin in the primitive manner of those days, with clap-board or shake roof, puncheon floor and wooden latches.  During the first winter after his arrival he left his family in the country near the Indian village of Milan, while he busied himself in getting his cabin ready for their reception in the spring.  Here, in the dense forest, by which they were surrounded for miles on every side, he commenced to carve out a home for himself and family, subsequently clearing up and improving an excellent farm.  On this home the family experienced all the hardships and privations incident to a frontier life, mitigated, however, by the various pleasures common to backwoods life in those early days.  The vast forest around wild honey was abundant, and maple syrup and sugar easily obtained.  Though their white neighbors were few and far between, there was a warm, hearty, neighborly feeling existing among them, and their social intercourse at the frequent house raisings, log rollings and quilting bees was of the most friendly character.  Soon after their arrival the family made the acquaintance of an old Indian in the vicinity, who subsequently, by reason of the many favors shown him, especially by Mrs. Burdue, a lady of most excellent character, became warmly attached to the family, and rendered them many services.  On one occasion Mr. Burdue, having lost a span of horses and a colt, was asked by this Indian to show him their tracks; this being done, the Indian carefully measured them with his hands and went away, returning in a few days and informing Mr. Burdue that he had found tracks answering to the description.  He also learned that the Indians would, in a few days, go to Huron, their usual trading point, and Mr. Burdue requested his father, Nathaniel Burdue, who was able to speak the Indian language, to go to Huron and demand the surrender of the animals.  This he did, but the Indians refused to give them up without compensation, the terms being a small quantity of corn and whiskey, which were promptly furnished and the horses returned.
     This same old Indian gave frequent evidences of his friendship for the family, the most important of which occurred during the war of 1812-15, soon after the surrender of Gen. Hull, when, partly by sings, he made the family understand that the savages were preparing to massacre the settlers; that the expiration of a certain number of moons they would all probably be scalped if they remained in the country; and at the same time he enjoined upon them the strictest secrecy as to the source of their information, assuring them that death to him would be the consequence of this friendly warning if known to other members of his tribe.  After this he went away, and was never again seen in these parts.  The family immediately prepared for flight, first hiding some of their household and cooking utensils under the puncheon floor of their cabin, and went back to Pennsylvania, where they remained until after the close of the war, returning to the frontier home in the spring of 1816; and they found the articles hidden under the puncheon floor undisturbed, although the cabin had been occupied by the savages.
     Mr. Burdue brought with him, on his return from Pennsylvania, two small buhrs or stones for a hand-mill, which he set up near one side of the cabin, and which was used by the neighbors for several miles around, and was for a time the only one in the vicinity.  He afterward sold the mill to a potter in Milan, who used it for grinding clay.  For many years the wolves, with which the woods were swarming, were among their greatest pests, and would carry off or destroy calves and young stock of all kinds, unless it was secured under the very eaves of the cabin; they were frequently seen prowling about the spring near the house in daytime, and on one occasion destroyed the children's playhouse near the cabin.  Wild cats and panthers were also quite numerous.  Game of a less dangerous and more useful character, such as deer, wild turkeys, wild hogs and squirrels, abounded.
     One of the greatest difficulties of the settlers in that early day was to procure fabric for clothing and other necessary household articles, everything of the kind being very scarce and very dear; prints and domestics were worth from fifty to sixty cents per yard; hence they were obliged to raise flax and manufacture linen, and to weave linsey-woolsey and jeans for domestic use; and not unfrequently they manufactured various articles of wearing apparel from the skins of deer and other wild animals.  Salt, too, was very scarce, and at one time Mr. Burdue was obliged to pay ten dollars per barrel for a very inferior quality.  Soon after his second arrival he went back to Pennsylvania and returned with several head of cattle, all of which died of bloody-murrain one after another; their milch cows too died of the same disease, until they had lost their last cow seven different times.
     For some time after they came to the country there were no schools in the neighborhood, and when a rude log house was finally erected, the schools were of the crudest, most primitive character for several years.  As to churches, there were none in the section, and, as usual in almost all new countries, the Methodist itinerant preachers, or circuit riders, were the pioneers in the religious field, holding services first at one, and then another, of the settlers' cabins.  Both Mr. Burdue and his wife were lifelong, earnest members of the M. E> Church.  His death occurred at his home in Townsend township, October 23, 1834, and that of his wife March 29, 1868, when she was in her seventy-seventh year, her birth having occurred September 26, 1791.  They reared seven children who grew to maturity, of whom George is the subject of this sketch; Nathaniel resides in Norwalk; John and Benjamin are in Linn County, Kans.; Jacob died August 5, 1874, in Michigan; and William W. died July 22, 1886, at Collins, Ohio.
     Nathaniel Burdue, grandfather of subject, emigrated to northern Ohio in about 1808, settling in Berlin township, now in Erie county, where he entered a large tract of land (including the present site of Berlin Heights), erected a cabin, and the following year went back to Pennsylvania for his wife and family.  Here he subsequently cleared and improved a farm, upon which he resided until his death, which occurred when he was over ninety years old.  He was born and educated in Pennsylvania, where in early life he learned the shoemaker's trade.  Being left an orphan at a very early age, he was bound out till he attained his majority, soon after which he married Miss Margaret Welch, also a native of Pennsylvania.  She also lived to be over ninety years of age, and her death was occasioned by an accident, her clothes having caught fire, whereby she was burned severely.  She was a remarkably active, vigorous and energetic woman all her life, and was a lifelong, devout member of the Presbyterian Church.
     George Burdue, whose name appears at the opening of his sketch, received but a very limited English education in youth, such as could be gleaned at the primitive schools, held in rude log buildings, of the Ohio frontier in that early day.  In after years, however, he succeeded, by his own exertions, in acquiring an ordinary business education.  He is possessed of good judgment and a strong, active mind, and is a close observer of everything around him, thus gaining in the great school of experience a fund of useful knowledge and valuable information.  He has also been a constant reader, and is well informed.  Mr. Burdue owns, and has always lived upon, the old home farm where his youth and early life were passed, and where he has been engaged in agricultural pursuits with the most encouraging success.  For several years he was also engaged in manufacturing charcoal for the market, of which he has burned and sold many kilns.  He is classed among the pioneers and belongs to the "Firelands Historical Society," a pioneer association, being among the first white children born in the northern part of Huron (now Erie) county, Ohio.  In about 1844 he went to Green Springs, Seneca county, thirty-three miles away, to mill, but there being many others ahead of him, he was obliged to leave his grist and go back a second time, thus traveling 132 miles for one grinding.  When a young man our subject was quite a successful hunter, and killed over a hundred deer, besides wild turkeys and other game without number.  In 1830 he killed a very large well-known deer (but a short distance from the house), known as "Old Golden," which other hunters had frequently tried but failed to secure; his track was known by his having lost one hoof.  The antlers of this deer, still in his possession, he keeps as a relic of early days.
     Mr. Burdue was married, November 20, 1838, to Miss Susan Hill, a native of Delaware county, N. Y., born October 5, 1821, daughter of Moses and Sally (Brooks) Hill, both natives of New York State and of English extraction.  Two children - a son and a daughter - have blessed this union:  Moses W., born March 13, 1841, and Sarah E., now Mrs. Thomas E. Riggs, born June  25, 1846.  Mrs. Susan Burdue's death occurred March 17, 1885, when she was in her sixty-fourth year.  Though a member of no church she was nevertheless a firm believer in the Christian religion, and a practical Christian.  Mr. Burdue now makes his home with his son Moses W. and family, on the old home place.  He is and has been an earnest, lifelong member of the M. E. Church.  In politics he was for many years a Democrat, but is now identified with the Prohibition party, and is an earnest advocate of the temperance cause.  He is one of the old pioneers, prominent and representative farmers of the entire county, as well as one of its most respected citizens.
     Moses W. Burdue, with whom our subject now makes his home, has always resided on the old home farm, where he has been engaged in agricultural pursuits, the greater part of the time with good success, trade, at which he has been employed to some extent and at various places.  He received a good English and scientific education in youth at the common schools and at the Western Reserve Normal School.  Miss Betson, and two sons blessed this union.  During the first years of the present century Mr. Hislop emigrated to America, settling in Lower Canada.  He was a stone-cutter and carver by occupation, and was universally conceded to be one of the finest workmen in the country.  Shortly before the war of 1812, he, with others, contracted with the English Government for the construction of extensive barracks and fortifications along the Canadian and American frontier, many of which works are still standing, monuments of their skill and energy.  Mr. Hislop continued to follow his trade until his death.  For many years before coming to America he was a prominent and extensive contractor in the stone-cutting business in Edinburgh, Scotland, during which time he had in his employ a man named Dixon, who, years afterward, became inspector of the reformatory prisons in Canada, one of which was built by Mr. Hislop on the same island in the Richelieu before alluded to as the site of the fort.  Prior to his immigration he was a devout member of the Presbyterian Church, but after his arrival in Canada he identified himself with the Episcopal Church.
     Thomas Hurst, the subject proper of this sketch, was the ninth in the family of eleven children of John and Margaret Hurst, and received a very fair English education at the common schools of Canada in early life.  After his father's death, which occurred when he was only ten years old, he remained on the old homestead with his mother until her death, which occurred in 1857, when our subject was but fourteen years of age.  Being thus left an orphan at an early age, he was thrown entirely on his own resources, and compelled to begin the battle with the stern realities of life alone.  For several years he was employed by the month - generally on a farm - but was neither afraid nor ashamed to turn his hand to any honorable employment that offered an opportunity for making an honest dollar.  On September 1, 1860, he set out for the United States, and on September 3 found himself at Kipton, Lorain Co., Ohio, with two dollars and a half in his pocket.  Here he went to work at anything that offered, usually farm work, and in the spring of 1866 bought a partly improved farm of sixty acres in Wakeman township, Huron county, having no buildings and only five acres cleared;  but during the following fall he built a house, moved on to the place March 13, 1867, and commenced farming on his own account. On this place he remained some fifteen years, when he sold out and bought the farm of one hundred acres in Townsend township, Huron county, known as the Manville farm (of which he is the third owner from the original), upon which he now resides, and where he has since been successfully engaged in agricultural pursuits.  Of Mr. Hurst it may most truthfully be said he is the architect of his own fortune, having commenced the battle of life with no friend save good health and an energy that knew no such word as fail, and with no inheritance save a stout heart and willing hands; nevertheless, by strict attention to business, industry, economy, and honest integrity, he has succeeded in acquiring a very fair share of this world's goods.  He is a man of good judgment and quick perceptions, is at present one of the trustees of Townsend township, and has held various other township positions.  Mr. Hurst took out his naturalization papers and became a citizen of the United States June 20, 1868, casting his first Presidential vote for Gen. U. S. Grant in November of that year.
     On December 25, 1866, Mr. Hurst was married, in Elyria, to Miss Alice M. Close, a native of Henrietta township, Lorain Co., Ohio, daughter of Chauncey R. and Emeline (Ashenhurst) Close, the former of whom was a native of Auburn, N. Y., and of English descent, while the latter was a native of Florence township, Erie Co., Ohio, and of English-German extraction.  Four children have been blessed the union of Mr. and Mrs. Hurst, viz.:  Ernest C., Amy M., Perry T. and Marion A.  Mrs. Hurst is a consistent member of the Disciple Church, and while Mr. Hurst belongs to no church, he is a believer in practical Christianity.  In politics he is a stanch and uncompromising Republican, and is generally recognized as one of the leading spirits of his party in this part of the county, and one of its best workers and organizers.  He ahs always taken a deep interest and an active part in the political affairs of the country, local, State and National, and is one of the prominent, representative citizens of this county.
SOURCE #1 - Commemorative Biographical Records of the counties of Huron and Lorain, Ohio - Illustrated - Published: Chicago: J. H. Beers & Co., 1894 - Page 241