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BIOGRAPHIES
HISTORY
OF
LORAIN COUNTY
OHIO
With
Illustrations & Biographical Sketches
of
Some of Its Prominent Men and Pioneers.
Publ. Philadelphia:
by Williams Brothers
1879
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George Wells
Catherine M. Wells
Maria B. Wells
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DEACON
GEORGE WELLS was born in the City of
Hartford, Connecticut, Sept. 18, 1797, and is the
second son of Ashbel Wells and Mary Hopkins,
the former a son of Ashbel Wells, the latter
a daughter of Thomas Hopkins, a prominent sea
captain of his day; all of English ancestry.
The father of Deacon George Wells was a clerk
in the commissary department of General
Washington's army, during the Revolutionary war,
and subsequently a well known and extensive merchant
at Hartford. He died Sept. 4, 1819, aged
sixty-one years. He was very generally
respected, and his death looked upon as a public
calamity, in the community in which he had been long
engaged in business.
When seventeen years of age, George Wells left
his native city, and came as far west as Albany, New
York, obtaining employment there, at Little Falls,
and at Utica, and finally located at Canandaigua,
working at his trade, which was that of a shoemaker.
He remained there about one and a half years, and
subsequently, on Jun. 18, 1818, arrived at
Brownhelm, Ohio, coming by way of the lake from
Buffalo. He took up some fifty acres of land,
on the lake shore, which he afterward increased to
one hundred acres. His time was occupied
partly at farming, and partly at his trade. He
built a log cabin, in which he lived nineteen years.
In 1837, he sold out, intending to move further west,
but finally purchased the place upon which he now
resides, containing one hundred and twenty-five
acres. He cleared and improved both farms.
Mr. Wells was married to Maria, daughter
of Jonathan Butler, of Hartford, Mar. 22,
1825. They had seven children, - four sons and
three daughters. All the sons have departed
this life. The youngest was killed at the
battle of South Mountain, during the war of the
rebellion. They all attained to manhood.
On the 28th of June, 1866, Mr. Wells died,
aged sixty-three years. The daughters all
survive. Elizabeth G. married Joseph
Sisson, of Hartford, who lost his life by mowing
machine accident; Mary M. married Benjamin
F. Nye, who was killed at the battle of the
Wilderness; Abigail S. married Frederick
H. Bacon, and resides a short distance from her
father's old home. Mr. Wells married
again, Dec. 23, 1866, Mrs. Catherine M. Gardner.
She has one daughter, Marie Antoinette, wife
of Lyman Yerkes, of Detroit, Michigan.
For more than half a century, Deacon Wells has
been a member of the Congregational church, of
Brownhelm. His wife is also a member of the
same church. In politics he is a republican,
and has been for many years. Though now in his
eighty-second year, his health, up to within the
past three months, has been remarkably good.
He was always an active man, and last October,
(1878,) he rode twice to Elyria and back, a distance
of thirty miles. He is one of the very oldest
pioneers of this township, as well as one of its
most worthy citizens. (See illustration on
another page.).
 Source:
History of Lorain County, Ohio - Publ. Philadelphia:
William Brothers - 1879 - page 233 |
Solomon Whittlesey
1824
Residence of
Solomon Whittlesey
and
Cyrus L. Whittlesey |
SOLOMON WHITTLESEY.
One of the earliest and most prominent settlers of
Brownhelm, was Solomon Whittlesey. We
find him frequently mentioned in J. H. Fairchild's
"History of Brownhelm." The exact date of his
arrival is not given, but his name appears in
connection with early religious matters in the year
1819. It is stated in the work above referred
to that "The church was organized June 10, 1819, at
the house of Solomon Whittlesey, and
consisted of sixteen members, seven men and nine
women." Again referring to Mr. Whittlesey,
President Fairchild says: "Thrifty men pursued the
business of hunting as a pastime. The only man
in town, perhaps, to whom it afforded profitable
business in any sense, was Solomon Whittlesey.
Other professional hunters were shiftless men, to
whom hunting was a mere passion, having something of
the attraction of gambling. Mr. Whittlesey
did not neglect his farm, but he knew every haunt
and path of the deer and the turkey, and was often
in their track by day and by night. He is with
us today, (1867) and reports the killing of one
bear, two wolves, twenty wild cats, almost one
hundred and fifty deer, and smaller game too
numerous to specify. One branch of his
business was bee hunting, a pursuit which required a
keen eye, good judgment and practice. The
method of the hunt was to raise an odor in the
forest, by placing honey comb on a hot stone, and in
the vicinity another piece of comb charged with
honey. The bees were attracted by the smell,
and having gorged themselves with the honey, they
took a bee line for their tree. This
line the hunter observed and marked by two or more
trees in range. He then took another station,
not on this line and went through the same
operation. These two lines, if fortunately
selected, would converge upon the bee tree, and
could be followed out by a pocket compass. The
tree, when found, with marked by the hunter with his
initials, and could be cut down by him, at the
proper time." Mr. Whittlesey is also
accredited with having been among the first in
Brownhelm township to manufacture pearl-ash, which
he did quite extensively. He seems to have
been one of the most industrious and energetic of
the pioneers, and a worthy man in every respect.
He died February 22, 1871, aged eighty-four years,
nine months and twenty-two days his excellent widow
survived him about two years, she departing this
life on the 26th of April, 1873, aged seventy-one
years, one month and three days.
Source:
History of Lorain County, Ohio - Publ. Philadelphia:
William Brothers - 1879 - page 233 |
NOTES: |
