Oviatt, Rockwell, Mather, Myers Ancestry:Information about James Start DeFrees
James Start DeFrees (b. 28 December 1779, d. 08 December 1847)
Notes for James Start DeFrees:
James Start Defrees, son of Joseph H. Defrees was born in Philadelphia, Pa., in 1780.He moved with his family at the age of six to Virginia.In 1806 he settled in White County, Sparta, TN where he married Margaret Dougherty.He had served a time in the business of making hats and moved about for several years as a journeyman.There were nine children born to Margaret Dougherty Defrees before she died in 1829 or 1830.They had moved to Piqua, OH in 1812 where James continued his work as a hatter, and served as postmaster during John Quincy Adam's Administration 1824-1828.
Ref:Defrees Family History by his brother Anthony Defrees
Moved to OH about 1819, to Indiana in 1835, where he was one of the first settlers in Jefferson Township, afterward justice of the peace, being the first elected in the township.Ref: History of Elkhart Co. p. 1028.
About ten or twelve years after the settlement of Piqua, there being many among the pioneers of the Episcopal following, it was decided to have an Episcopal Church.The church was started in 1822 when a small body of men gatheredto sign the Articles of Association, including James Defrees and Joseph Defrees Junior.
12 Feb 1834 James M.Defrees bought from Wm. Scott Piqua Twp. Lot #59, recorded Book 11, p. 305, and 27 Feb Lot #29 from John Stevens, Book 11, p. 306.In 1838. James M Defrees sold land in Concord Twp to Robert Shannon Book 18, p.99http://www.tdn - net.com/genealogy/m-county/deeds/deeds-
Ref: "Concerning the Forefathers" by Charlotte R. Conover.
After the death of his first wife in Piqua, OH, James Defrees married Mary Reed Frost Rollin, daughter of William Frost and Elizabeth Reed, widow of Joseph Rollin.They had four more children, making the family total of thirteen.They left Piqua, Oh in 1835 and settled an a farm near Goshen, Indiana, where he lived for some years, serving as justice of the peace.He then went to Syracuse, Indiana to assist his son Joseph in his business.He had a "violent attack of lung fever" and died suddenly in his sixty-seventh year.He is buried in the Oak Ridge Cemetery at Goshen, Indiana.
References:
Marriage- Marriage record #101, Probate Court, Miami Co. OH, pg 164.
Census-1820;US;OH;Miami Co;Piqua, Washington Twp, National Archives Microfilm M-33, roll 94.(Age 40)
Census-1830;US;OH;Miami Co.;Piqua, Washington Twp.,p.4, line 7, (age 50)
N.A. film M-19, roll 136.
Census-1840;US;IN;Elkhart Co.,Goshen;p.51/26, line 2, N.A. film M-704, roll
79.
Census 1850; US; IN; Elkhart Co.; Goshen; family 2170
Death-Pictures of tombstone;Goshen Cemetery;belonging to Beverly Schonewolf
Birth-DeFrees, Anthony, Defrees Family History, South Bend, IN, 1864
Parents-Will of Joseph H. Defrees; Shelby Co. OH; Book 1, file A-38
Deahl, Anthony; History and Biographical Record of Elkhart Co. IN
Indiana Source Book Vol 2., p. 153 and Vol. 3 p. 21
.
(Extracts from)
Copy of a manuscript by Caroline Maclean Defrees Frazer, sent to me, (Rollin David Larrick) by Lindsay Decker Metcalfe, ca.1968. The manuscript is not dated, but Caroline Frazer died Jan. 22, 1923.
Dictated by Caroline McLean DeFrees Frazer to her daughter Harriet DeFrees Frazer
My father was James Start DeFrees, the second child of Joseph Hutton DeFrees and Mary Start, who were married in the Old Swede's Church, in Philadelphia, July 10, 1777. (The date of the church record as reported by William Defrees Mann, is September 10, 1777; he located this record about 1915, so this manuscript can be dated between 1915 and 1923.)He was born at Philadelphia December 28, 1779. For some years my grandfather continued to live at Philadelphia, and in 1786 he moved to Rockbridge County, Va.
My mother was Margaret Dougherty, the daughter of John Dougherty and Nancy or Agnes Davidson.
My grandfather, John Dougherty, came to Virginia from the
north of Ireland.From Virginia he moved to White County, Tennessee, where he located at Sparta. My father, who had known the family in Virginia, followed them to Tennessee, and married my mother on November 2, 1809. He purchased a farm just south of Sparta, where he lived for several years, and where my brothers, John Dougherty, Joseph Hutton, James, and Anthony, were born. My grandfather DeFrees became dissatisfied in Virginia, and moved to a farm near Piqua, Ohio, and insisted upon all his family joining him in this new country.
My Uncle, Anthony DeFrees, in his History of the DeFrees Family, gives the names of his father's twelve children, with date of birth as follows:
John, born July 11, 1778.
James, born December 28, 1779.
Ann, born October 20, 178-.
Joseph, born March 1, 1786. [other records say 1784]
Anthony, born May 4. 1788.
Rebecca, born September 20, --, died young.
Archibald, born October 25, 1792.
Polly, born December 28, 1794.
Nancy, born July 4, 1797.
Elizabeth, born December 28, 1799.
Rebecca, born July, 1802.
Jefferson, born November 4, 1804.
(Uncle Anthony's) sister, Elizabeth, who married Rowland Devor, gives in her family record the same names of her father's children, except that (Uncle Anthony) gives Polly's name as Mary and Nancy's name as Anna. Mrs. Lindsay Brien, of Dayton, Ohio, a Great-granddaughter of John, states that in their record, in addition to these names, they have the names of Benjamin and Isabella. She says that Benjamin was a cobbler, who lived at a little village called Anna, near Sidney, Ohio. John had a daughter named Isabella, and Mrs. Brien thinks she was named for the Isabella who is found in their records as one of the children of Joseph Hutton DeFrees and Mary Start. I knew all my uncles and aunts, except Anna and Rebecca who died in childhood, and I am sure that Benjamin and Isabella were not children of my grandfather and grandmother.
I do not know just when my father and mother moved from Tennessee to Ohio, but it was sometime after the birth of my brother Anthony and before the birth of my sister Harriet, (i.e. between 1816 and 1819). They made their journey with horses and wagon, camping out along the way, and were two weeks making the trip.
My father located in Piqua, and carried on his business as a hatter for a good many years. He had a shop on Main Street. I remember being there many times. In the front room were shelves upon which the finished wool and felt hats were kept, while the beaver hats were kept in boxes. The back room was where the hats were pressed. The workshop was upstairs, and I do not remember ever being up there. The hats were sent down from the workroom folded in a three-cornered shape. Father would place them on the blocks and press them with a long narrow iron. I also remember seeing him put the fur from beaver skins and glue it to the wool hats making the beaver hats.
Our house was near the business part of the town, on a corner and was built right on the street. It was a large, two story red frame house. Downstairs there was a living room and two bedrooms, and upstairs there were two bedrooms and at the end of the hall, over the two downstairs bedrooms, there was a large room with two beds in it, where we four girls slept--Harriet, Mary, Mag, and I. The kitchen was across the back porch from the house, in southern style, and was also the dining room. After stepmother came there, when we had company the meals were served in the living room. During John Quincy Adams's administration, father was postmaster at Piqua [1824-1831], and a room was built onto the side of the living room, which was used as a post office. When General Jackson was elected president, a Dr. Jackson, who was our family physician, wrote to Washington that father was a Whig, and he was removed. I can remember how indignantly the older children talked about "Old Jackson, who took the post office away from father". After that, stepmother used the room for her spinning wheel and reel, and I can remember her at work there many times.
After moving to Piqua, the family made two visits to Tennessee. The last time was after mother's health failed. She had consumption, and it was thought the trip might be of benefit to her. The four older boys were left in Piqua, and the rest of us went to Tennessee. Mother grew worse, and wanted to see the boys before she died, and so we started on the return trip. At Cincinnati, we stopped at my Uncle Anthony's, where she died. I was then eighteen months old [Nov., 1829].
My mother was a woman of great energy and ambition. My father used to boast about her being a great worker, and he never semed to realize that she was over-worked. He was very dependent on her, and I have often heard him say, "Everything has gone wrong since Peggy died". He was a sweet-tempered, lovable man, and an affectionate father.
In my father's Bible is the following record:
James Defrees and Margaret Defrees was Married Nov. 2d 1809.
John Defrees was Born Nov. 8th 1810. Joseph Defrees was Born May 13th 1812. James Defrees was Born Oct. 3d 1814. Anthony Defrees was Born Nov. 14th 1816. Harriet Defrees was Born March 6th 1819.
Wm Russel Defrees was Born Feb. 28th 1821.
Mary Ann Defrees was Born Oct. llth 1823.
Peggy D. Defrees was Born 13th June 1826.
Caroline M. Defrees Apr. 26 1828.
My earliest remembrance is of a visit to my grandmother, Mary Start Defrees, who lived with her daughter Rebecca in a small brick house a short distance from our house. Some of the older children took me there and left me. She made a great fuss over me, and Aunt Rebecca or Grandmother gave me some dried peaches. The older children have told me I could not possibly remember her, as she died when I was two years old, but I do remember her distinctly, and I remember hearing the family talking about her death [1829].
My father was a widower about two years. He had great difficulty in keeping a housekeeper, and my oldest sister, Harriet, who was about eleven years old when mother died, kept house a great part of the time. There was one housekeeper he wanted to marry, and after she left, he went to see her, and
Joseph and James went after him and brought him home. Joseph used to tell this story, and he thought it was very funny until he became a widower himself [1864]. Then when sister Mary reminded him of his taking father away from his courting, he felt differently about it, and said the old gentleman should have given him a good thrashing.
I remember when father married [Nov., 1831] and brought his wife home. Father's sisters-in-law--Aunt Polly, who was Uncle John's wife, and Aunt Betsy, who was Uncle Jefferson's wife--were there. When the carriage drove up in front of the house, my sister Mary was squealing and yelling as loud as she could, and Aunt Polly and Aunt Betsy shut her up in a bedroom. I did not understand it at the time, but afterwards I asked Mary what she was making such a fuss about, and she said she was so mad about father's bringing stepmother home that she wanted to go out and tell them what she thought about it, and they wouldn't let her.
A few days after they were married, stepmother called us around her, and told us to call her mother, but as I couldn't say it she said I could say Mammy. She began teaching us our manners. She said when anyone spoke to us we must put the palms of our hands together and courtsy. She taught us our prayers --something we had never learned before. We were to say "Now I lay me down to sleep" at night, and the Lord's Prayer in the morning. I was very careful to say the evening prayer for fear I might die before morning, but I was not too particular about the morning prayer.
My stepmother was a widow, whose maiden name was Frost. She was twenty-five, and my father was fifty years old with nine children. She always wore a cap, as was the custom of married women at that time. I remember one cap that she wore that was called a "Crazy Jane". It was white with a pleated lace border, and was tied under her chin. I used to think she looked very pretty in this cap. She had one son, whose name was William Frost Rollins, (Joseph and Mary Frost Rollins had had four children: William Frost, Josiah, Rufus, and Elizabeth, but the younger three had died in childhood.William Frost Rollins married young and moved to Indiana, where he, his wife, and only child died soon thereafter)but as we had a William in the family he was always called Frost. When she married, he was left at her father's, and never lived with us until we moved to Indiana.
My father had four children by his second wife. They were Elizabeth, who was called Lib; Ebenezer Rollins, who was called Rollin (originally named Ebenezer Rollins DeFrees, Ebenezer being a long-standing Frost family name, and Rollins in honor of his mother's first husband.Rollin continues to be a family name among his descendants) ; Frances, who was called Fanny; and Jane, who only lived a short time.
At the time my father married, my brothers John and Joseph did not live at home. My Father's brother Anthony had moved to South Bend, and he invited John and Joseph to visit him. They liked the country, and decided to locate there. At that time there was no newspaper in the northern part of Indiana, and as they were both printers, they concluded there was a good opening for one at South Bend. I do not remember this, but years after, I was told by a gentleman who lived in Piqua at that time that the whole town turned out to see them start off into the wilderness [1831]. I have often thought what an undertaking this was for two boys of nineteen and twenty-one. They were three weeks on the journey. The roads were almost impassable, and they could go only a short distance in a day. Often they were mired, and had to pry the wheels of their wagon out of the mud. At one time, after travelling all day, they had made so little progress that at night one of them went back to a farmhouse, where they had spent the previous night, and got a shovel full of coals to start their campfire. This, of course, was before the days of matches, and I remember seeing my brothers make a fire by striking flint stones with their knives to make sparks, which were caught upon tow. After the tow was ignited, bits of shavings and sticks were added, and in this way the fire was started. It was so hard to start a fire, that people were very careful not to let it go out, and every night the coals were covered with ashes to keep them alive.
After they arrived at south Bend, some friends in Chicagoadvised them to take their printing press to that place, and brother John went there to look over the prospects.It was a small town at the foot of Lake Michigan, with swampy surroundings, and he concluded that South Bend stood a better chance of becoming a great city, so decided to remain there. On Wednesday, November 16, 1831, they published the first number of "The Northwestern Pioneer and St. Joseph Intelligencer."
When I was about five years old, my brother Joseph, with his wife and baby, came to Piqua on a visit and brought me home with them, as they said, "to take care of the baby", which made me feel very important. We travelled with horses and wagon, carrying our own provisions, and stopped at houses along the way, where we did our own cooking at the family fireplace. One place I remember, there was a large room with a fireplace at each end, and while Joseph's wife did our cooking at one fireplace another party of travellers cooked at the other. A little girl in the other party cried because there were lumps in her corn meal mush, and I was much disgusted with her for being such a baby. I do not remember how long we were on the way, but I remember reaching South Bend in the evening. The house had two stories, and the printing press was upstairs. Two families lived downstairs. I do not know how long I stayed at South Bend, but it seems to me in a short time Brother Joseph moved to Goshen, and Brother John took the printing press to White Pigeon, where he started a newspaper. John had married Sarah Crane, and Joseph married Mary McKinney, the daughter of a farmer who lived north of Piqua. I remained a year in Indiana, most of the time at Goshen. John and Sarah came over and took me home with them for a visit. This was a few days after there was a shower of meteors, which caused much alarm, as people thought the end of the world had come. Sarah took a great interest in dressing me up. I was always fond of pretty things and no one had felt much interest in me. Sarah was considered by the family to be very worldly because she "kept up with the styles" She made me several new dresses, and I have always had a tender feeling for her because she was so nice to me. One dress she made me was a pretty dark calico made low in the neck. Stepmother was very much shocked at this and ran a gathering string in the neck and brought it up under my chin. Sarah also gave me a red merino dress and a pair of red morocco shoes, which were the pride of my life. After I went home, stepmother took the dress away from me, and gave it to Lib, but no one else could wear the shoes.
I do not remember when my brother James came to Indiana, but he was at South Bend and moved to Goshen when Joseph did, and later Anthony came out. James and Anthony had a store, and then Harriet came and kept house for them. Joseph was at that time sheriff [1836-40]. The boys were always writing father enthusiastic letters about the new country, and insisting that he move out, so about 1835, I think it was, he sold out in Piqua, and started with his family for Indiana. He had two wagons filled with household goods and the boys, William and Frost, drove a cow and calf. Father drove one wagon, and a man named Russell drove the other. In the back of one of the wagons there was a space where Mag and I took turns with the calf in riding. When the calf got tired, Mag and I had to get out and walk. We were two weeks in making the journey, we stopped overnight at farmhouses where we did our own cooking and slept upon our own bedding, spread upon the floor. William and Frost slept in the wagon. When we reached Goshen, we moved into Joseph's house, as his wife and the children were away, and stayed until father built a cabin on a farm he bought north of Goshen in what was called the Pine Creek settlement. The cabin consisted of one room and a loft, reached by a ladder, where William and Frost slept. The one room was divided into two by stretching bedspreads across, and there were three beds in the bedroom part. Jane was born [Sept., 1835] after we moved into the cabin, but she did not live long. I only lived in this cabin about a year and went to live with Harriet, who was keeping house for James
and Anthony. Father did not know much about farming, and was not very successful. He was very fond of reading, and would often become so interested in his book that he would forget his work. This was very annoying to his wife, who was very energetic and a great worker. William and Frost managed the farm. Frost married very young, and moved upon a farm of his own. After Frost married, William could not remain on the farm, and some time after, father sold it and moved to Syracuse, where my brothers, Joseph and James had a store and mill. Joseph remained in Goshen. Father managed the store, and James managed the mill. Richard Mann, who married my sister Elizabeth, was a clerk in the store at that time, but afterward moved to Middlebury, where he had a flour mill. James took cold, working in the mill race, and died of pneumonia [1850]. Father also died at Syracuse [1847].
I think I was about nine years old when Harriet married Stephen Colms [1837]. James and Anthony were living in Elkhart, where they had a store. James married Louisa Snow, and Anthony married her sister Mary. When Joseph left the Sheriff's office, he went into the mercantile business with a Mr. Barnes. I lived with Harriet most of the time until she moved to Sparta, Tennessee. I think Mr. Colms was not a very good businessman. My brother Joseph set him up in business at Milford, and we moved there about a year. Then we moved to Leesburg, which was then quite a flourishing little town. We lived there a year or two, and then moved to Warsaw. where we lived a short time. It was while living here that I met James S. Frazer, whom I afterward married. While I was living with Harriet, Mary married Hiram Morgan [ca. 1839]. She was sixteen years old. They moved to Wolf Lake, where he was a merchant. There was a very good school there taught by a Baptist minister, so Mary had me with her for some time attending school.
I do not remember when I learned to read. I went to school before we left Piqua, but I could read before that. While we were living on the farm I attended school at Pine Creek. while I lived at Goshen with Harriet, I attended school there, and also at Milford. Afterward I spent some time at Indianapolis with my brother John, who was then editor of the Indianapolis Journal, and I attended school there.
After Harriet and her husband moved to Tennessee, I went to live with Mary at Goshen, where I remained until I was married [1848]. During that time, Joseph had business in Chicago, and asked me to go with him. We started about eight or nine o'clock in the morning with a horse and buggy. We went from Goshen to Elkhart, and from there to Berrien Springs, Michigan. We reached there in the evening, after driving all day, and stayed there all night. Berrien Springs at that time consisted of only a few houses and a tavern, as it was called. The next day we drove to St. Joseph, and arrived there about nine or ten o'clock in the morning, where we left the horse and buggy, and took a steamboat that morning, and crossed the lake to Chicago. It was just a little bit of a boat. We reached Chicago in the afternoon, and
went to the Tremont House, which was in the second story, with stores below. Joseph left me there while he went to attend his business. I spent the afternoon looking out of that window. Across the street were a few little one-story shops. There were very few passers-by, and once in a while I would see a team. Joseph did not return until after supper had been served, and when he came they served our supper on a table in the corner of the room where I had spent the afternoon. It was only a cold lunch. I don't think there was either coffee or tea. There was no one to wait on the table, and we sat down and waited on ourselves. We had Boston brown bread, which was the first I had ever tasted, and I made my supper of that and thought it was the best supper I had ever eaten. After eating supper we walked over to the boat, as the tavern was only a short distance from the lake. The sun was just setting when we took the boat. There were no staterooms. The cabin was divided into two rooms, and there were shelves or bunks that let down from the walls, and the passengers climbed into these without undressing, the men in one room and the women in the other. We reached St. Joseph early in the morning, took our horse and buggy and got back to Goshen that evening. I felt that I was a greatly travelled person. At that time Joseph was keeping a store at Goshen.
In October, 1848, I was married at Goshen, at my sister Mary's home. We came to Warsaw, and for some time we boarded in the home of Mr. Michael Funk, the father of Joseph Funk, who lived north of the court house, on Main Street, on the second lot west of Buffalo Street. Then we bought a house on the corner of Lake and Market Streets, where the Union Printing Office now is. Our yard extended on Lake Street from Market Street to what is now Columbia street, but there was no street there at that time. Three children, William, Harriet, and Martha were born there [1849, 1852, 1854]. Warsaw was a small town surrounded by marshes, and ague was prevalent all the time. I did not like Warsaw. It was not as good a town as Goshen, and the children were sick at all times. When the Pittsburgh, Ft. Wayne, and Chicago Railroad was built through here, my husband was offered the position of General Counsel, but as he would have to move to Pittsburgh, he did not accept it. (This is the Penn. RR. System).
Finally we decided to leave Warsaw, and James went west in search of a location. He liked Davenport, Iowa, and decided to move there. I was very much pleased, as I was anxious to get away from Warsaw. On his way home from Davenport, he stopped at Waukegan, Ill., where my sister Mary and my brother Anthony lived, and they persuaded him to move there, instead of Davenport. I was much disappointed, as I did not want to go to Waukegan. We left Warsaw in 1855. For a time we lived in a two story brick house, about two blocks south of the ravine, as it was called. This was a creek, with high banks, which ran east through the town into Lake Michigan. Our daughter Mary Caroline, who was always called Dade, was born in that house [1856].
My sister Mary's husband, Hiram Morgan, had a store, and they lived on a twenty acre farm just south of town. He failed in business, and in trying to help him, my husband became involved, and had to take the farm. Mary and her husband moved to Middlebury, where my sister Elizabeth lived. We lived on this farm several years, and it was there that our daughter Nellie Ruth was born [1860].
We lived in Waukegan seven years. During that time James kept his practice in Warsaw, and never missed a term of court, which kept him away from home a great part of the time. The building of a railroad through the west part of the country drew a good deal of business away from the town, and many of the lawyers opened offices in Chicago. It was decided that we should move back to Warsaw. I did not want to do so, but it seemed the best thing to do, as James was well-known there, and had a good business waiting for him. We returned to Warsaw in July, 1862.
At this time James was elected one of the Justices of the Supreme Court, and spent most of his time at Indianapolis, as it was impossible to get to or from Indianapolis in one day. As I was left to bring up the children, his good friend George Moon and Silas Chipman felt it their duty to keep him informed as to what the children were doing. When he came home they told him what they thought had taken place. I resented this very much, as I thought I was able to raise my family without their help.
Occasionally my sister Mary would come and stay with the children, and I would go to Indianapolis for a week or two. The salary of a Supreme Court Judge at that time was $3000 a year, so he would not accept a nomination for a second term.
While we where living in that house our daughter Fannie was born [1864], but she only lived a little over two years.
Our daughter Jennie Dougherty was born[1865]. We then moved to the corner of Center and Indiana Sts., where the Hotel Hays now stands. We stayed there one year, and moved to our own house where we now live.
After his term as Supreme Court Judge expired, James was appointed a member of the Commission to settle claims of Great Britain against the United States and claims of the United States against Great Britain growing out of the Civil War. (The "Alabama Claims" at the Geneva Arbitration of 1871 and 1872, leading to the Treaty of Washington, by which Great Britain paid the US over $15 million for violating neutrality and assisting the Confederacy).The members were Mr. Russell Gurney for Great Britain, James S. Frazer for the United States, and the Italian Minister, Count Corti. This lasted several years, and then he was given a position in the Treasury Dept. to settle claims against the government for property destroyed during the war.
The office of Chief Justice was vacant, and President Grant decided to appoint James to that office, and had his name on a list of appointments to be sent to the Senate the next day.During the day the Ohio people persuaded him to appoint an Ohio ma,. Chief Justice Morrison R. Waite (1874).I was very much disappointed, but James did not seem to feel badly about it.
He came back to Warsaw to practice law, Benjamin Harrison wrote asking him to become his partner in Indianapolis, but he declined.He did not want to leave Warsaw.I was not told of this for several years because I would have insisted on his accepting it.I always liked South Bend, and would have liked to live there.
(Manuscript provided by Rollin David Larrick, 1999)
Two of his sons:
DEFREES: See also William Defrees Frazer. Defrees, John D. (1810-1882) Brother of Joseph Hutton Defrees; uncle of William Defrees Frazer. Born in Sparta, Tenn., November 8, 1810. Member of Indiana state house of representatives, 1840-42; member of Indiana state senate, 1842-45. Died in Berkeley Springs, W.Va., October 19, 1882. Burial location unknown.
Defrees, Joseph Hutton (1812-1885) Brother of John D. Defrees; uncle of William Defrees Frazer. Born in Sparta, Tenn., May 13, 1812. Member of Indiana state house of representatives, 1849-50, 1871; member of Indiana state senate, 1850-52; U.S. Representative from Indiana, 1865-67. Died in Goshen, Ind., December 21, 1885. Interment at Oak Ridge Cemetery, Goshen, Ind
More About James Start DeFrees:
Burial: Unknown, Oak Ridge Cem, Goshen, IN.
Migration: Phila. PA, Rockbridge Co., VA, Piqua, OH, Goshen, IN.
Vocation: postmaster, hatter.
More About James Start DeFrees and Mary Reed Frost:
Marriage: 13 November 1831, Piqua, Miami Co, OH.727, 728
Children of James Start DeFrees and Mary Reed Frost are: