NEAL-Nathan - Fountain County INGenWeb Project

Nathan Neal, farmer, Hillsboro, was born near Lexington, Kentucky, July 20, 1801. About 1807 his parents, Benjamin and Mary (Seller) Neal, moved to preble county, Ohio, where they lived and died. He was married February 1, 1821, to Delilah Fleming, of Darke county, Ohio. In August, 1825, he came to Fountain county to view the country, in company with Jacob Hawk and Ebenezer Bridge, who had been here the spring before and entered land. They had come now to put up cabins, and while so engaged Bridge decided not to move his family until the succeeding spring. Hawk, rather than come to the county with his family alone, sold twenty-five acres off from his eighty to Mr. Neal, on four years' credit. The latter left Ohio October 25, 1825, with his wife and three children, without a cent of money, and drove through with a yoke of oxen and two cows, his entire worldly estate, arriving on the 6th of November. It seems hardly credible that it was but a generation ago that he sat down here in a wooded wilderness where there was but little sign or sound of human life to disturb the primal solitude, and bring cheer to the heart of the lonely pioneer. No Indians were to be seen, but deserted wigwams were yet standing in good order. At different times two bands afterward came into the settlement. The family had to depend mostly on game for provisions. Mr. Neal obtained twenty-five bushesl of corn on credit from George Ives, who lived on the Shawnee; the rest he worked for at the Hillsboro mill, a little corn-cracker where he could occasionally work a day for a bushel of meal. The only feed he had for his cattle was browse; they wintered on this very well. Except the Hawk family, who came with him, his neighbors were David Yeazel, who lived three miles north on Coal creek, and who subsequently built a saw-mill; and the same distance south, on the present location of Hillsboro, were Charles McLaughlin and Jesse Kester, owners of the little mill just mentioned. These were the only white settlers nearer than Chambersburg. He had erected his cabin in August, and on his arrival with his family he at once set about clearing his land, as well to have a patch ready for seeding in the spring as to provide browse for his stock. By the first of May he had six acres cleared out of the dense forest, fenced and ready for the husbandman's care. Exchanging the use of his oxen with Mr. McLaughlin for his horse, with a bar-plow he check-rowed his ground, and after it was planted, plowed out between the rows. At this point of progress he traded one of his two cows for a two-year-old colt. With this young animal he tended his crop. Mr. Neal says he never raised a better crop of corn in Indiana on the same amount of land. Next fall he had a plenty of sound corn to sell at sixteen cents a bushel. He put the whole field into shock, which made a great quantity of fodder; this he divided with Henry Strader, a neighbor who had come into the settlement that fall, giving him what he could use. The land which he had bought from Hawk not proving desirable, the latter took it back, paying Mr. Neal for his labor expended in its improvement, and in March, 1829 he entered and occupied the land on which he has ever since lived. The first piece entered was the W. 1/2 S. E. 1/4 Sec. 26, T. 20, R. 7, and the patent was signed by Andrew Jackson April 3, 1829. His wife died in childbirth, with her twelfth child, September 22, probably in the year 1842. Her children were the following: Polly (dead), Elizabeth, David (dead), Thomas (dead), Eliza (dead), three infants which died without names, Benjamin, John, and George. Thomas was a soldier in the war with Mexico, and died in that far-off country. He married a second time, March 13, 1843, to Mary Ann, widow of Adam Shover. By this wife he had three children: Sally Ann, Nathan, and Kerziah. She died October 29, 1876, and he was married a third time, January 23, 1877, to Mary Ann, widow of William Riley. Mr. Neal and his wife are members of the New Light church. He has been in communion twenty-five years. Politically, he is an ardent supporter of the greenback doctrines. In the early years of his settlement here he got little, if ever any, rest; and what with hard work through the week, and at first hunting deer and wild turkeys and bee trees on Sundays, and a long period of well-directed activity and industry, and careful management, he has succeeded in gathering around him a handsome property. He owns 390 acres, 230 being in the home place and 160 in another body. Besides he holds evidences of credit amounting to more than $5,000. He is now in his eightieth year, enjoying robust health, and is remarkable for the soundness of his bodily powers, for his well-preserved firmness and agility, and his still clear and vigorous understanding. The writer acknowledges himself indebted to this octogenarian for a specimen of the genuine, old-fashioned hospitality.

Source: HW Beckwith – History of Fountain County Indiana.  Chicago: HH Hill, 1881,  p 215

File Created: 2006-Aug-15