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Descendants of El Shandon Squyre


      764. Ethan15 Squier (Nathaniel14, Nathaniel13, Nathaniel12 Squire, Jonathan11, George10, Samuel9, Thomas8 Squier, William7, John6, George5, Thomas4, Thomas3, Thomas2 Squyre, El Shandon1)2010,2011,2012 was born 31 May 1804 in Hummingford, Champlain Village, Lower Canada2013,2014,2015,2016,2017,2018,2019, and died 16 January 1892 in Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2020,2021,2022. He married (1) Lovina Huntley2023,2024,2025 23 February 1830 in Macomb County, Michigan2026, daughter of Enoch Huntley and Sally Stanley. She was born 20 July 18122027,2028,2029, and died 31 December 1858 in Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2030,2031,2032,2033,2034. He married (2) Lucinda Churchill2035,2036,2037 15 January 1860 in Michigan2038,2038, daughter of Carmel Churchill and Arilla (Churchill). She was born 20 February 1832 in Canada2039,2040,2041,2042,2043, and died 11 December 1874 in Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2044,2045,2046,2047,2048. He married (3) Naomia Churchill2049,2050 26 September 18762051,2051, daughter of Carmel Churchill and Arilla (Churchill). She was born 1837 in Canada2051,2052,2053,2054, and died Unknown.

Notes for Ethan Squier:
Ethan Squier was born on the 31st day of May, 1804 near Champlain Village, Lower Canada, not far from the New York state line. In the month of February 1811, his father, Nathaniel Squier b. 1752, with his family moved to the state of Vermont and settled in the township of Cornwall, Addison County. The third day after moving to this place Ethan's mother, Jemima Delano Squier died of Consumption or Pneumonia. The family remained at this place about 1 year.

In February 1812, the father moved his family to Oxford, Upper Canada and remained there during the War of 1812. The father was twice drafted into the British Army, and participated in the Battle of Malcolm Mills. In the year of 1815, the family moved to Westminster, 2 miles from where the city of London now stands, before that city was located or settled and built.

In the month of May 1815, the father and his family moved to the United States and on the 15th of May 1815 settled on section 12, township of Utica, Macomb County.

They moved on a raft of lumber down the Thames River to a place where the raft stopped and at that place they obtained or made 2 canoes, and with the family of Amasa Messinger went down the Thames River to its mouth in Lake St. Clair and there one of the canoes was traded for a small sail boat and a sail was placed on the remaining canoe which the father managed.

They then sailed or poled their way down the southeast shore of the lake to Peach Island. At this point they crossed the mouth of the Detroit River, to the shore of Michigan, landing about 9 miles above "Belle Isle" or Detroit which at that time was a small place. From this landing they again took up boats and went up the West shore of the lake to the mouth of the Clinton River to Mt. Clemens in the boat and the canoe.

They still kept to the boats and went on up to Teanbley's Mills above Mt Clemens where they landed and remained for 3 days. Here Mr. Squier and Amasa Messinger made a cart entirely of wood. The wheels were of plank pinned together, the axle tree, tongue and rack or box all of wood. The belongings of these 2 families were placed on this cart . Two yolk of oxen were hitched to this cart and and they traveled to Utica on a trail or road cut out wide enough to allow a wagon to travel through the woods. Ethan and his brother Luman walked behind the cart.

They arrived in Utica on the 15th day of May 1817. From Utica they followed an Indian Trail for 2 miles north where Nathaniel and his family stopped and settled. The Messinger family went on 1/2 mile further where they settled. The land at that time was unsurveyed, and public domain. Nathaniel lived here until he died in 1832.

For the first 2 years (1817 and 1818) the family saw hard times and many times went to bed hungry. Game was plentiful, of deer and wild turkeys there were uncountable numbers, but the family was too poor to afford a firearm for hunting.

In the autumn of 1819 or 1820, a band of Indians came, numbering 300, and camped on the banks of the river and held a meeting. They borrowed the family's kettles and cooked corn and held a harvest festival. After their dances and plays were over, a chief by the name of Nowaheckweto talked for 2 hours in the Indian language and made a deep impression upon the children of the family.

In the year 1828, Nathaniel purchased 80 acres of land near the village of Utica and after 3 years sold it.

In 1830 Ethan married Miss Lovina Luisa Huntley and lived in the vicinity of Utica. In that year he and a party of 4 neighbors went into Lapeer County and made shingles on Section 6, now the township of Almont. The shingles were hauled out on sleighs with oxen, following the trail made by James N. Deneen in 1827, to Mt. Clemens and sold for 75 cents per thousand.

In 1830 there was but one store in Romeo and one tavern or hotel and very few houses. At Almont, Oliver Bristol had a frame up for a house but it was not enclosed. There was one log house built by Mr. Sleeper, but no one lived there at the time, and where the village of Almont now stands was a vast forest.

At the time Ethan made shingles on section 6, Almont, he called on Mr. James Deneen, who had been on his place 3 years, and bought a bushel of potatoes from him and paid him 4 shillings for them. Deneen was the first white man to settle in Lapeer County.

Shingle timber on unsurveyed or government land was considered public property or common stock, and early settlers considered they had a right to take it and supply their needs with the shingles.

In February 1836 Ethan moved to the Township of Dryden and bought of the United States the S.E. 1/4 of Sec.11, six range 11 East, and built a log house about one-half mile from the corner of the section. The house was covered with Basswood split in halves and tongued and inverted so that the rain would run off. The floor was hewn out of Basswood and there was but one board and that was the door. Mr. Joseph Frazer's family lived with them until he could build a house or shanty on the NW 1/4 of Sec. 14. In March Ethan had occasion to go to Detroit and was absent for 3 days and when he returned he found that his wife had torn the roof off the house and a new one had been put on in it's place. The new roof was made of Oak shakes with a stick and mud chimney nearly completed. The work was not done entirely alone but with the aid of three neighbors who had worked under Mrs. Squier's supervision.

In the spring Ethan chopped and cleared ten acres around the log house which was located on the NE corner of the farm, and he planted it with corn, potatoes and oats in the summer of 1836 and had 10 more acres cleared for wheat and 10 more for fallow. He sewed 10 acres to wheat and the next year, 1837, after harvesting with cradle and rake and threshing it with flails, the 10 acres yielded 318 bushels of splendid wheat which he sold for 1 dollar and as high as 2 dollars a bushel. In the fall of 1836, a snowstorm came in September and snowed under the oats, but when it melted they gathered them with a scythe.

Lumbering was an inseparable part of farming in Ethan's day. Every acre cultivated had to be cleared of timber first. The ax was the most important of farm implements. In fact a farmer always carried an ax or at least a hatchet largely for protection from wolves or to kill other wild animals he met up with while tracking. Guns even the clumsy flintlocks, were not common and were used only in the most dire emergency or when no other means would serve.

A farm was hewn out of the forest and a home built when the circle was broken by the reaper taking the wife of his youth on December 31, 1858.

Mr. Ethan Squier was then married to Miss Lucinda Churchill on January 15, 1860, but again the home was broken when his wife died December 11, 1875.

He was again married September 26, 1876 to Miss Naomia Churchill (sister of his former wife). He left his farm April 28, 1869, in the decline of his life and retired to the village of Dryden, which is partly built upon the land that Ethan had cleared of the forest. He was never out of the state after he came to it in 1817.

He had joined the M.E. Church in 1838 and at the time of this interview was the only one living of those who had joined with him. He had served the church as leader, steward and trustee, and was faithful to his religious conviction.

Two children were born to him, Alman Justice, and Melerine Melvina.

Ethan Squier was a strong man mentally and physically. He could read a chapter in his Bible and carry it in his mind and repeat it. He was the most learned in the biblical history of any man I had ever conversed with and he would repeat chapter after chapter without a reference to the Good Book. His mind was very receptive in grasping ideas and his memory would always retain them.

The many trying incidents of a Pioneer life were overcome or pushed aside with a sense of duty that to him seemed a pleasure. He became an Odd Fellow in 1864, and by relieving the distressed, he believed he obeyed the voice of his master.

Politically he was a Whig, Abolitionist Republican but always advocated temperance. His voyage through life was most commendably that of a Just and Upright man.


(Copied from a book of Mrs. Florence Miller on GenealogyDryden Bicentennial Book: An Overview of the Community 1834-1976\



More About Ethan Squier:
Burial: 1892, North Dryden Cemetery, Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2055
Property 1: 08 June 1833, 080 acres-t:3 N r:12 E s:27 Michigan2056,2057
Property 2: 01 May 1837, 160 acres- Sec11 t:6 N r:11 E s:11 LO Code2 doc16654 Lapeer County, Michigan2058,2059
Property 3: 03 May 1837, 040 acres- Sec35 t:7 N r:11 E s:35 LO Code2 doc18265 Lapeer County, Michigan2060,2061
Residence: 1810, Canada2062
Residence 1: 1820, Macomb County, Michigan2063
Residence 2: Bet. 1817 - 1835, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2064
Residence 3: 1823, Mount Clemens, Macomb County, Michigan2065
Residence 4: 24 December 1835, Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2066
Residence 5: 1840, Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2067
Residence 6: 1850, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2068
Residence 7: 1860, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2069
Residence 8: 1870, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2070
Residence 9: 1880, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2071
Vocation 1: 1850, Farmer2072
Vocation 2: 1860, Farmer2073
Vocation 3: 1870, Farmer2074
Vocation 4: 1880, Retired Farmer2075

More About Lovina Huntley:
Burial: Unknown, North Dryden Cemetery, Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2076,2076
Residence 2: 1830, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2077
Residence 3: 1840, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2078
Residence 4: 1850, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2079

More About Lucinda Churchill:
Burial: Unknown, North Dryden Cemetery, Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2080,2080
Cause of Death: Heart Disease2081
Residence 3: 1860, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2082
Residence 4: 1870, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2083

More About Naomia Churchill:
Residence: 1880, Dryden, Lapeer Co, Michigan2084
     
Children of Ethan Squier and Lovina Huntley are:
+ 1289 i.   Almon Justice16 Squier, born 15 July 1832 in Michigan; died 05 May 1905.
+ 1290 ii.   Melvinia E. Squier, born 1836 in Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan; died 1903.
  1291 iii.   Jason Squier2085,2086, born 16 January 1845 in Michigan2087,2088; died 13 April 18452089,2090,2091.
  More About Jason Squier:
Burial: Unknown, North Dryden Cemetery, Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan2091,2091



      766. Hiram15 Squier (Nathaniel14, Nathaniel13, Nathaniel12 Squire, Jonathan11, George10, Samuel9, Thomas8 Squier, William7, John6, George5, Thomas4, Thomas3, Thomas2 Squyre, El Shandon1)2092,2093,2094,2095,2096 was born 08 July 1806 in Montreal, Canada2097,2098,2099, and died 29 September 1891 in Utica, Macomb County, Michigan2100. He met (1) Matilda Fowler 26 September 1830 in Macomb County, Michigan2101. She died Unknown. He married (2) Mahala Moe2102,2102,2102,2102 25 November 1830 in Macomb County, Michigan2102,2103,2104, daughter of Peter Moe and Louisa (Moe). She was born Abt. 1805 in New York2105, and died 10 February 1867 in Utica, Michigan. He married (3) Maria Harris Bronson2106 29 March 1845 in Pontiac, Michigan2107,2107. She was born 20 March 1816 in Canada2107,2108,2109, and died Bef. November 1896.

Notes for Hiram Squier:
Macomb County History- Macomb County Web Page Hiram Squier was born in Canada in 1806 the child of Nathaniel Squier of Connecticut and Jemima Delano of Cornwall, Vermont. After his mothers death in 1811 in Vermont, his father eventually moved the family to Utica, arriving there in 1817. In 1831 Hiram located on 120 acres in Shelby Township. Hiram attended the first town meeting held in 1827 and attended the first English school in 1819. He also helped build the first 3 houses in Shelby Township.

Macomb County History- Macomb County Web Page

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

THE MICHIGAN PIONEERS

Lo! each grateful generation never tires
      Weaving the past into prose and rhyme;
Praising the greater wisdom of the sires- -
      Yet the world grows wiser all the time.

Not man alone the work and danger dared,
      To found a State on Michigan soil;
Mothers the sickness and hardship shared- -
      A weary round of unremitting toil.

And oft from out of the gloomy wilderness,
      Their thoughts to the eastern hill-homes turned;
And then resumed their cares with faithfulness,
      While for brighter scenes their true hearts yearned.

For he who clears the land and makes it bloom,
      Underneaththe summer's rain and sun,
Much better serves his country and his home
      Than heroes who have great battles won.

Men of oday, for pleasant homes and farms,
      Towns where sense of thrift and cofort cheers,
For all the wealth for all the many charms,
      For all the progress, thank the pioneers!


Barber, Edward W.
"The Vermontville Colony"
MICHIGAN PIONEER AND HISTORICAL COLLECTIONS
28 (1897-98):288-289[Squier2004update.FTW]



More About Hiram Squier:
Burial: 02 October 1891, Utica, Macomb County, Michigan2110
Cause of Death: Old Age
Education: 1819, Attended 1st English School in Macomb County at Almont Teacher- Asa Hadsell2111
Fact 1: 1827, Attended 1st Town Meeting in Shelby Township2111
Political Affiliation 1: Democrat then became an Abolitionist2111
Political Affiliation 2: 1870, Prohibitionist2111
Property 1: 04 April 1833, 80 acres-t:3 N r:12 E s:34 Michigan2112,2113
Property 2: 02 September 1835, 40 acres- t:7 N r:12 E s:34 Michigan2114,2115
Property 3: 09 July 1839, 80 acres-t:6 N r:11 E s:11 LO Code2 doc20085 Lapeer County, Michigan2116,2117
Property 4: 09 July 1839, 80 acres-t:6 N r:11 E s:15 LO Code2 doc20100 Lapeer County, Michigan2118,2119
Religion 1: 1817, Attended the first sermon preached in Shelby Township 1817. It was on Temperance2120
Religion 2: 19 March 1839, Helped organize 1st Methodist Episcopal Church of Utica- Trustee2120
Residence 1: Bef. 1817, Canada2121
Residence 2: 1820, Macomb County, Michigan2122
Residence 3: 1830, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2123
Residence 4: 1840, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2124
Residence 5: 1850, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2125
Residence 6: 1860, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2126
Residence 7: 1870, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2127
Residence 8: 1880, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2128
Vocation 1: 1850, Farmer2129
Vocation 2: 1860, Farmer2130
Vocation 3: 1870, Farmer2131
Vocation 4: 1872, Macomb County Treasurer2132
Vocation 5: 1874, Macomb County Coroner2132
Vocation 6: 1880, Farmer2133

More About Mahala Moe:
Residence 4: 1840, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2134
Residence 5: 1850, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2135
Residence 6: 1860, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2136
Vocation 1: 1850, Domestic2137
Vocation 2: 1860, Domestic2138

More About Maria Harris Bronson:
Residence 6: 1870, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2139
Residence 7: 1880, Shelby Township, Macomb County, Michigan2140
     
Children of Hiram Squier and Mahala Moe are:
+ 1292 i.   Harriet Marie16 Squier, born 1831 in Michigan; died 21 December 1866.
+ 1293 ii.   Esther Jane Squier, born 16 March 1833 in Michigan; died 12 January 1862.
+ 1294 iii.   Clarinda Squier, born 1835 in Michigan; died Unknown.
+ 1295 iv.   Helen M. Squier, born 1837 in Michigan; died Bef. 1869.
+ 1296 v.   Emily E. Squier, born 20 December 1838 in Utica, Macomb County, MI; died 13 January 1900 in Mapleton, Grand Traverse Co., MI.
+ 1297 vi.   Caroline Squier, born 1842 in Michigan; died Unknown.

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