Thomas Wiseman (1832 - 1903)

Born 17 Jul 1832 in Carroll County, Ohio

Ancestors

Husband of Sarah C. (Livesay) Wiseman — married 1 Jul 1852 in Meigs, Ohio, United States

Died 30 Apr 1903 at age 70 in Ohio

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Biography

Thomas wrote this account of his early years in The Leader newspaper, Dexter, Ohio, March 6, 1898, published by the Meigs County Pioneer and Historical Society, Inc., Pomeroy, Ohio, 1992.:

I was born in Carroll County, O., June 17, 1832, near the Still Fork of Big Sandy, two miles from Augusta town, Augusta township, four miles from Hanover, eight miles from Carlton. The Still Fork of Sandy is a nice valley. All the farmers lived in log cabins or hewed-log houses... Augusta town had about a dozen houses. There is where I first went to school, a distance of two miles. We had a nice brick school houses. There were 140 scholars in the district.... We lived beside the road leading from Augusta to Carlton, in a log house at the foot of the hill. The creek bottom is a half mile wide. Connally Bridge across the creek is near here. Betwixt the bridge and our house on the creek bank in 1840, and during the memorable Harrison campaign, the boys trimmed a sapling and we put our flag on it, and took it in every night. Close to the house was a good coal bank. Just below the bank was a swamp where the cows used to mire down. Along the creek there were cherry trees, which would be full of cherries, called “choke” cherries. You could not eat one dozen of them.... On a hill a quarter of a mile above our house was the Methodist church. Down in the bottom below our house was quite a lot of timber and woods. Lida’s Run ran through it, and on that the beaver animals cut logs and built their dam, called the Beaver dam...

(Continuing the story, March 19, 1898): Harrison’s campaign in 1840 was a grand rally. There was a big speech at Augusta. Among the displays was a wagon with a log cabin on it which had several coon skins tacked on the outside. Another wagon had on it a canoe well seated and filled with men with paddles.... Brother Franklin Wiseman, 11 years old and I, 8 years old, waited for the Carlton band and procession to come. We were up our sappling flag pole on the creek bank sitting on the snags of the limbs when they came. They halted, gave us a tune on their instruments, gave us three cheers and went on. In November, 1840, the election being over, we started for Meigs County. We moved in a four horse wagon 65 miles to Wellsville on the Ohio river and got there after dark. We got on a steamboat next day and remained that night and next day until after dark when we landed at Rice’s Landing below the mouth of Leading Creek. The next day was Sunday. Father, John and William Wiseman all struck out into the wilderness. Monday John came back and with him came Alexander Wallahan with his team. They loaded the wagon. Then we struck out for Salem township. We came over the hill and forded the creek at Bingham’s Mill... Night came on. It was 12 o’clock at night when we got to Alexander Wallahon’s... The first day we lived in Salem township some of the older boys went to look over the Wiseman farm which was all in the woods. Not one sapling or bush was missing. Some of the younger boys helped Wallahon haul fodder. William Robison came there in the evening and said he had a big patch of turnips and wanted us to come and help pull and top and we could have all we wanted. Father, brother, Frank, and I went the next day.

(Continuing the story, May 9, 1898) In the year ’41 father planted eight acres of corn, and fenced in six acres of woods. That was the first field on his farm. During the summer he cleared 22 acres of land, cut and hewed a set of house logs and tended his corn. He had some boys to help. In the fall father bought twelve bushels of wheat of Stephen Titus for $12 and sowed it on ten acres of land. He had a good crop of wheat. After he was through sowing wheat, he had house raising. Everybody turned out to the raising. He finished the house and moved in. In the fall of ’41 as I was going to a neighbor’s on an errand I saw three wildcats come into the path about eighty yards ahead of me. I stood very still until they got out of sight, then I started on my errand. There didn’t much grass grow under my feet, if it was up hill. There were plenty of deer here those days. My brothers, William and Henry, killed quite a number of deer. I remember once there fell a good snow and they were out early the next morning. Wm. came in with his deer just as mother had breakfast ready. Henry came dragging his deer on the snow just as breakfast was over.... There was a plenty of wild turkeys here in the early 40’s. We got quite a number of them to eat. In the year of ’45 there was a panther in the hills here for five nights. It screamed very shrill and loud, like a woman with a good voice. There were wild hogs here those days. After our wheat grew we had to thresh it with flails. Father made a riddle to riddle the wheat down, and Frank and I made wind with a sheet to clean it. We went to mill on horse-back those days to Wm. McMaster’s, at Langsville, Croy’s mill and Quinn’s mill on Big Raccoon. Everybody’s cattle ran in the woods those days. Every man had one or two bells for cattle and horses. The first school I went to was taught in a log cabin near where the Dexter Chapel now stands. It had a large fireplace for wood and a stone chimney. The teacher had three panes of glass for a window, fixed in a crack of the house which had been enlarged some with an ax. All other light came through paper pasted over cracks and then oiled. The benches were made of split saplings. The door was hung on wooded hinges and had a wooden latch. There are two marks to show where the house stood; first a depression in the ground where mud was made to daub it, second a rise where the chimney stood. I am, yours truly, THOMAS WISEMAN.

Sources

• Thomas Wiseman on Find a Grave
• "United States Census, 1850," index and images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MXQP-CCX : accessed 2 April 2015), Thomas Wiseman in household of George Wiseman, Salem, Meigs, Ohio, United States; citing family 128, NARA microfilm publication M432 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).