FARROW, Col. Alexander Shore - Putnam

No history of Putnam County would be complete without a resume of the intensely interesting and useful life record of Col. Alexander S. Farrow, who was, more than three decades ago, called to a higher plane of action. He is well remembered for his many good deeds and strong innate characteristics, having left behind him, among many other treasured inheritances, what is most to be desired-a good name.

Colonel Farrow was born near Grassy Lick, Montgomery County, Kentucky, April 21, 1794. His father, William Farrow, a sterling representative of Scotch-Irish parentage, caught the spirit of the tide of emigration that poured through the Cumberland Gap and other passes of the Blue Ridge mountains in the early days, and left his Virginia homestead to try his fortunes anew in the then boundless undeveloped middle West. Those were days that tried men's souls and such tedious, hazardous journeys were no pleasure excursions, and for years after the advent of the first settlers, the stockaded village and huge block-house were the only title proofs to the soil, but the reign of the savage here was forever ended by General Wayne's campaign of 1794. In the closing year of this Indian war, Mr. Farrow was born, and he grew to manhood before the country around his home had been entirely reclaimed from primitive conditions. Thus familiarized from childhood with the simple customs and wants of the pioneer farmer, he became qualified for the part he afterward performed in the opening and settling of a new country.

In August following the declaration of war against Great Britain in 1812, three regiments of volunteer Infantry and one of regulars left Georgetown, Kentucky, for the relief of Detroit. Alexander S. Farrow, then a lad of eighteen, could not repress his youthful patriotism and joined this detachment under Capt. Samuel L. Williams. AT the crossing of the Ohio they received the news of the surrender of Detroit and Michigan Territory by General Hull to the British, but continued their march under General Harrison to Ft. Wayne, on the Maumee, which was invested by the Indians, and young Farrow participated in the subsequent operations against the red men, undergoing the vicissitudes incident to a soldier, their sufferings from hard marches, cold and privations in general being very trying, and they were frequently reduced to the point of starvation. "At one time," Mr. Farrow related, "we went seventeen days without a mouthful of break, subsisting on fat pork alone. " It was interesting to hear him relate the trials of those days, how the horses died of exhaustion or became useless from starvation, so that the sleds carrying their baggage were drawn by the soldiers themselves six men being harnessed in the place of one horse. At night they bivouacked in the frozen forest, sleeping on beds of bark and boughs upon which they spread their blankets. The morning reveille woke many a poor fellow to the consciousness of frosted limbs and racking rheumatic pains. The first week in January a two-foot snow fell which rendered their marches slower and more painful. At this stage of the return march a runner brought news of the threatening of Frenchtown by the British and Indians and a detachment of five hundred soldiers was sent tot the town's relief. In that detachment was young Farrow, who was destined shortly to more trying experiences than ever. He fought under General Winchester there in a losing battle against General Proctor's forces and was taken prisoner to Malden, escaping the famous massacre of the River Raisin. He with his comrades were confined for many days in open warehouses, where they suffered from lack of fire and food. From Malden they were marched through southern Canada to Fort George on the Niagara river, a journey of two weeks, at which place they were paroled and sent across the line. From this point they crossed the country on foot to Pittsburg, and thence by water to Kentucky. Notwithstanding the hardships of this adventure in the wild and frozen north, beset with the gravest dangers, young Farrow never regretted his service to his country.

Shortly after his return from his experience in the army, Colonel Farrow was married, being yet under age, and settled in the neighborhood of his old home, adopting the occupation of a farmer. On May 26, 1815 he was commissioned by Gov. Isaac Shelby adjutant of the Thirty-first Regiment of the Kentucky Militia, and on December 22, 1820, Governor Adair appointed him brigade inspector of the fifth Brigade. About this time he became a candidate for the Legislature, and canvassed his native county in a series of convincing speeches, being an enthusiastic supporter of Henry Clay and his doctrine. He was subsequently elected and very ably served one or more terms in the General Assembly, being barely eligible at the time of his first election and perhaps the youngest man in the Assembly.

In 1830 colonel Farrow determined to case his lot in the new state of Indiana, where cheaper lands and better facilities were offered to the wants of a large and growing family. Accordingly he arrived in Putnam County in the autumn of that year, and settled nine miles north of Greencastle, on lands purchased, in part, of the original preemptors. He immediately took an active and leading part in the opening and development of the new country, and from the first assumed broad and liberal views in all his undertakings and in his intercourse and dealings with his neighbors. He was one of the first to introduce blue grass in the county, and was the first to sow it extensively, having brought a supply of the seed on his removal from Kentucky. He also made several trips to Ohio and his native state, bringing back valuable breeds of horses and cattle, which he used extensively or the improvement of the stock of the country. March 15, 1832, Governor Noble commissioned him colonel of the Fifty-sixth Regiment of Militia and as such he regularly took part in the annual drills and musters.

Being a devoted member of the church, Colonel Farrow early felt the deprivation occasioned by the want of such an associates in his new home, and, with characteristic promptitude, he organized in his own house, with the aid of a few of his neighbors, the first church association ever held in that part of the country, the organization consisting of nine members, colonel Farrow and his wife, James Nelson and wife, Henry Foster and wife, and a Mr. Blake, also John Leaton and wife.

In 1851 Colonel Farrow was elected one of the representatives from Putnam County to the state constitutional convention, and the records of that assemblage will show that during the four months' session he was never absent from his seat or evaded a vote on any of the questions that came before that body, for he never desired to conceal his views on any subject.

Early in life Colonel Farrow took a decided stand for the cause of temperance and the suppression of the liquor traffic. He was among the first to throw the whisky jug from his house and announce to his neighbors that he would furnish no more liquor at log-rollings and husking-bees, let the consequences be what they would. His example was later followed by many of his neighbors.

Colonel Farrow possessed remarkably strong qualities both of head and heart, and he was at all times manly and dignified in character and honest and outspoken in the expression of his views and opinions. Hypocrisy and duplicity found no lodgment in his composition, and his inability to see such traits in other s often led to his being imposed upon by designing and unscrupulous men. He was alike free from an envious and jealous disposition, and it has been said of him, indeed, that, practically, he did not know the meaning of the terms. He possessed the virtue of patience in a remarkable degree, and whether in health or sickness, in prosperity or misfortune, his mind adapted itself with philosophic complaisance to the conditions of his lot. His natural bent of mind was toward politics, subject to a strong moral and religious supervision, and being an honest opponent and always remarkably conscientious, the later-day school of politics found no favor in his sight. He was a close and constant reader on all topics of the day, his mind being, seemingly, as clear at fourscore to perceive and analyze the drift of events as in the prime and vigor of life. His religious convictions were the steady and gradual growth of a lifetime, and became at length remarkably strong and deep seated. He was moral from his childhood, and, as an instance of his moral rectitude of mind, it may be told, that on the occasion of his marriage, although not a member of the church, he announced to his wife that they would begin life with the daily practice of family prayer.

Colonel Farrow was twice married, and was the father of six sons and four daughter, all of them the children of his first wife, whose maiden name was Elizabeth Nelson. The total number of his descendants at the time of his death was ninety-six. Two of his children, William Simpson and Francis Marion, had died.

This venerable, and, in many respects, remarkable patriarch was gathered in the fullness of his years to the reward of his merits on March 31, 1877, at the home of his eldest daughter in Greencastle, leaving behind him the rich remembrance of a blameless life to become the inheritance of his children and his children's children forever, while he sleeps the sleep of the just on the old homestead nine miles north of Greencastle, in the family cemetery. Here, in the soil he had reclaimed from the wilderness, by the highway he had traveled when it was but a blazed trail, and in sight of the church he had organized in his early manhood, he rests from his weary pilgrimage of four score years, but the light of his example is still shining brightly on the pathways of his numerous descendants.