Newton Lamb (1818 - 1892)

Born 11 Aug 1818 in Whitewater, Wayne, Indiana, USA

Ancestors

Husband of Caroline (Evans) Lamb — married 4 Feb 1841 in Wayne County, Indiana, United States

Descendants

Died 21 Apr 1892 at age 73 in Polk County, Iowa, USA

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Biography

"NEWTON LAMB. A man ever thoughtful of the comfort and happiness of others and a safe guide and advisor, Newton Lamb will be remembered as a public-spirited and progressive citizen of Polk county.

He was born in Wayne county, Indiana, August 11, 1818, coming of ancestry which has been traced to the time of William Wallace, the patriot of Scotland, whose troubles with King Edward I of England led to his death. The family originally lived in England but on account of sympathy with the Scottish cause removed to Perthshire, Scotland. James Lamb, the progenitor in America, came from Perthshire in 1776, being impelled by a love of liberty and a desire to assist the colonies in the Revolution. He fought under General Greene and on account of his activity against the mother country was disowned and disinherited by his relatives in Scotland. Several years after the Revolutionary war he was married to Hannah Boone, a first cousin of Daniel Boone, of Kentucky, and settled in Bourbon county, that state.

He was bitterly opposed to slavery and on account of his opposition to this institution he moved to Wayne county, Indiana, in 1811, where he bought fourteen hundred acres of land, for which he paid two dollars per acre. The country was new and the woods abounded in wolves, deer, bear and numerous other wild animals, Indians also roaming at will and often alarming the women of the household by their threatening appearance. The present city of Richmond, Indiana, was then a trading post and a large part of the state was an unbroken wilderness.

Mr. Lamb was a soldier in the army under General Anthony Wayne and assisted materially in promoting the advancement of the section in which he established his home. He and his sons built one of the most substantial residences in the county, the building being made of stone which they were two years in hauling. It still stands and is one of the interesting historical landmarks of Wayne county. The father died at the age of eighty-five years from injuries which he received by being thrown from a horse, and his wife passed away at the age of seventy. In the family were eight children: James, Betsy, William, John, Catharine, Hannah, Joseph B. and Jane. William Lamb, the father of our subject, passed the greater part of his life at Richmond, Indiana.

Newton Lamb possessed such advantages of education as were available in the pioneer days. Upon the home farm he spent the years of his boyhood and later he engaged in farming in his native state. He was a pioneer of the county, possessing a strong purpose and an ambition which never faltered in the presence of obstacles. He worked his way through every difficulty to success. He cultivated the soil and also raised and fed stock and by his good management made, both branches of the business profitable.

At Richmond, Indiana, Mr. Lamb was united in marriage to Miss Caroline Evans and by this union nine children were born: Harriet, who became Mrs. Austin Garrett; James, who married Miss Rebecca Stockdale; Casper, who married Miss Louisa Mathews; Henry, who married Miss Flora Brinkerhoff; Ira, who married Sadie Yergy; Fanny, who became the wife of J. D. Finch; Orrin; Rosanna; and Florence, who became Mrs. Wallace Maricle. Casper died at Sturdivant, Missouri, in 1907 at the age of sixty-one years.

Mr. Lamb was called from earthly scenes in 1892 and a large part of his life was spent in converting the forest or the prairie to the uses of man and as a pioneer he nobly performed his part. His daughter Rosa, who lives on part of the home place, tells of wolves carrying away pigs from under the house while the father was absent on a trip to the mill at Oskaloosa to secure flour for the family. He voted for Martin Van Buren as president of the United States and at the time of the Civil war was an earnest supporter of the Union, being like his grandfather unalterably opposed to slavery. He lived an industrious, honest and upright life and gained the respect of all who knew him.

It will be interesting in this connection to know something more in detail of the pioneer experiences which came to Mr. Lamb and his family following his removal from Richmond, Indiana, to Jefferson county, Iowa, in 1841. He bought a farm in the vicinity of Fairfield but in the fall of 1845 sold that property and removed to the Raccoon Forks, where he had preempted three hundred acres in what is now southeastern Des Moines but was then known as the Sac and Fox Agency. On driving from his former home at Fairfield, Iowa, in a “prairie schooner” the weather was so cold that the wagon cover had to be pulled down to keep out the frost. Shortly after reaching his new farm he took up his abode temporarily in a log cabin near the present site of the Agar packing plant. During the winter Mr. Lamb built a substantial log house on his claim and the following spring occupied it. The Indians were numerous, wolves were plentiful and there was every evidence of frontier life but little evidence of modern civilization. The Indians in the neighborhood at that time numbered about twenty five hundred. On returning from their first inspection of their new home the Lamb family discovered an Indian sitting on his pony by the gate. On another occasion Mrs. Newton Lamb pinned a shawl over her head, got upon a horse and went to call on a new settler. The people whom she intended to visit saw her coming and barricaded the doors until satisfied they were not to be attacked by Indians. The relief and laugh that followed when they found their caller a real white neighbor was talked of for many years. Another neighbor on returning to her house discovered her baby to be missing and found the child in the Indian camp, the Indians having a great time playing with the little one. That baby is now Mrs. Cassie Newcomber Hardy, of Los Angeles, California.

The social life in which the family engaged consisted mainly of log rollings, corn huskings and other such events, on which occasions the few neighbors would get together and assist in the work and visit at the same time. Mr. Lamb, being a splendid violinist, spent many evenings in playing to the entertainment of his family as well as his lonely neighbors, thus breaking the monotonous sound of the yelling Indians engaged in their war dances and also the sound of the night prowlers. The spinning wheel and carpet loom were among the early features in the Newton Lamb household. Then, too, they provided for the winter's needs by putting up great barrels of kraut, gathering a plentiful supply of pumpkins, filling great casks with butter and caves with vegetables. Hogs, too, were killed and meat put by for the winter's use, for no stranger was ever turned away without “eating,” as this entertainment of a guest was then styled. Wild turkeys, geese, ducks and other kinds of wild game were to be had in abundance and on one occasion Newton Lamb chased a fawn or young deer across the capital grounds in a vain endeavor to add venison to his table supply.

The Lamb family grew and prospered. The children, walking three miles to school and sitting on hard benches, their feet dangling in the air, held their own from an educational standpoint and eventually emerged from these early hardships, some as teachers and all very well qualified to meet the business world. The three hundred-acre farm on the banks of the Des Moines was selected that they might be near the boats and commercial center, but before this was realized the rail road train was invented and a line built through, thus succeeding the ox teams and boat traffic. Then came inventions and improvements following each other until when the final call came for this “early settler” he had seen trains, street cars, paved streets, brick blocks, colleges and state buildings at Des Moines, while the Sac and Fox Agency had become incorporated and the three-hundred-acre farm of the family was included within the southeastern part of the city of Des Moines."^[1]

Moved to Fort Des Moines area in 1845. Built one of the first log cabins.

Residences: 1856 Iowa Census: Four Mile 1860 Census: Lee, Polk, Iowa 1870 Census: Lee, Polk, Iowa 1880 Census: Grant, Polk, Iowa

Cause of death: Lung trouble & old age.

Note

Note: Newton Lamb Is Dead

http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=f84d1aa4-e252-4b8f-afe9-901b8e58a573&tid=1593140&pid=-1914668334

Marriage: 6 ft tall

Date: 4 FEB 1841

Place: Indiana, United States

Sources

1. ↑ Des Moines The Pioneers of Municipal Progress and Reform of the Middle West vol 2

• FamilySearch.org record
• Find-A-Grave record

Original info imported through DownloadGedcom.aspx.ged on 03 May 2011.