Memorials › Margaret Kirby Saddoris

Margaret Kirby Saddoris

1 Mar 1829 – 1 Mar 1903

Birth1 Mar 1829
Death1 Mar 1903
CemeteryFremont Cemetery
Clarke County , Iowa , USA
Added byFrank on 06 May 2011
FaGhttps://www.findagrave.com/memorial/64343097

Bio

In 1792 in Maryland, Elias Kirby Sr., was born. in 1815 Elias married Mary Johnson in Pickaway County, Ohio. In 1829, on March 1st , in Fountain Co., Indiana, their 7th child, Margaret Kirby Saddoris was born. ( obituary at the end) In 1829, in August, the Elias Kirby family were one of the first settlers at Big Grove in, Somer Township, Champaign Co., Illinois.  A new cabin on the prairie had to be built for the 7 children, the oldest 2 being a 13-year-old son and an 11-year-old daughter.   Elias Sr. and Mary would have 9 living children born between 1816 and 1838. Only after the Blackhawk War of 1832 did a more steady arrival of settlers occur. Talk of alternate routes for the first railroad increased arrivals of settlers and land prices. . In 1850's, the early years, the Illinois Central Railroad was coming into reality and it reached Champaign County, Illinois in early 1854. The land which Illinois Central Railroad got from the U.S. Government as incentive to build tracks, was being sold by Illinois Central for $10 to $12 an acre; attracting immigrants, including the thousands that had come from Europe and were now building the train tracks across Illinois. In 1850, the entire county of Champaign had only 545 families so there was land enough, it would seem, but the lure of land in Iowa at $1.25 an acre must have been powerful. With families often numbering 10 or more children; children who would need land for their own farms. Whether for this or other reasons, Elias Sr. and Mary Kirby would again decide, by the middle of the decade, to become pioneering settlers … in the newly created state of Iowa, not yet 10 years removed from being an unorganized territory. In 1853, Margaret Kirby and her husband Henry Clay Saddoris made the journey to Iowa. The 1854 census of Clarke County, Iowa showed Henry Saddoris as head of a family of 2 males and 4 females. https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/1084/images/IA_121-0147?ssrc=&usePUB=true&pId=4673579 With 4 children in tow under the age of 7, they trekked over 400 miles with ox-drawn wagon to Clarke County, Iowa which had only been organized by the state legislature in 1851. Henry Clay Saddoris Sr. was 30 years old and his wife, Margaret, was 25. They had been married in Wisconsin… though they had returned to Champaign County, Illinois to begin their family. It seems they each had an uncle which had migrated to Wisconsin Territory from Champaign County, Illinois. The 1854 Clarke County, Iowa census also included John Kirby, 4th son of Elias and Mary Kirby. He was head of a family which included his wife and two young daughters. John Kirby's family may have accompanied the Henry Saddoris family. .  Initially, due to land deeds, it seemed John Kirby's family traveled with the family of his younger sister, Margaret Kirby Saddoris. The land patents that John Kirby and Henry Saddoris held were for the same date and they had even bought some land jointly.  But the 1856 Clarke County census had the Henry Clay Saddoris family having lived in Iowa for 3 years and John Kirby's family for only 2 years. William Farley's daughter ….. wrote this detail in 1926 …" With new settlers coming all the time (in the early 1850's) often while camping (as shelter and log cabin were being built) the rain would sometimes put out their camp fire. No matches. No flint. Nothing dry. There was nothing else to do but find a settler and borrow some fire. Henry Saddoris came four miles to my father's home to get a kettle of fire one morning before the family could have their breakfast.z' That incident does not mean that John Kirby's family did not come with Henry Saddoris' from Illinois. The two families would have been sharing the same camp fire. They would have known that the Farley family homestead was due south of their claim … as the Mormon Trail and trails west to the Gold Rush traversed the county south of the Farley place which was a mile or so north of the few log cabins that made up the county seat of Osceola. In 1855, Elias Kirby Sr., his wife, Mary, and unmarried youngest son, Henry, had arrived. It seems they   may have travelled with Elias Kirby Jr., Lucinda and their 3 year old daughter. by the 1856 census, Theresea Kirby Blanchard and husband Alvah and 5 children had also arrived and owned farm land next door to her parents. Since there was both an 1854 census as well as a 1856 state census for the new county, it helped pinpoint when various families arrived; with the state in which children were born being recorded. In the 1860 census, Joshua Kirby was in Fremont Township, Clarke County, Iowa with wife, Francis (Fanny)  Crabb, and 8 children. Three of the children, aged 5 and under, were born in Iowa. The family may have been missed by the 1856 census or had not yet quite reached Clarke County. One possibility may be related to the fact that Fanny Crabb Kirby's parents also moved to Iowa (Dallas County area, so perhaps they had traveled with them, or had visited them before arriving in Clarke County. Joshua's son, born on January 2, of 1856…lists himself as being born in Iowa. Elias Kirby Sr.'s oldest grandson, Perry Blanchard, the oldest daughter's boy, appeared in the Elias Kirby Sr. home in 1860 census.  Perry's parents had sold their nearby land in Fremont Township, and moved up to Palmyra in Union County, Iowa.  Perhaps the grandson was left behind to support his grandparents Kirby who were now in their 60's.  Their youngest son, Henry, who had been living with them, had bought land of his own nearby and had married Mary Howard in September of 1860. Osceola Newspaper Mrs. Henry Saddoris Margaret Kirby was born in Indiana, March 1, 1829; moved to Illinois with her parents while in her childhood. She was united in marriage to Henry Saddoris, March 7, 1847; moved to Iowa in 1853 and settled on a homestead north of Osceola where both lived until death called them away. To them were born twelve children, six sons and six daughters, one having died in infancy, and one in 1895, Mrs. Williams. The rest are all living. She was converted and joined the M.P. Church while living in Illinois. After moving to Iowa she united with the M.P. Church at Fremont. She was a faithful Christian until death which occurred at her late home, March 1, 1903, at the age of seventy one years, the husband having preceded her almost a year. The funeral services were held at Fremont Church March 3rd, conducted by the undersigned. Nearly all the children were present and a large concourse of sympathizing friends. May the Lord bless the bereaved ones. G.W. Robinson. Obituary and place of birth provided by Barry Mateer.

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