Alexander Marshall (1797 - 1881)

Born 23 Mar 1797 in West Nantmeal, Pennsylvania, USA

Died 7 Jul 1881 at age 84 in West Chester, Pennsylvania, USA

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Biography

Alexander was the fifth child of Alexander and Jane Johnston Marshall. His father immigrated to Pennsylvania from Scotland soon after the American Revolution. Alexander, Sr, was a flax-hackler and settled in Chester County and served three months with the troops trying to suppress the Whiskey Insurrection of 1794, encamped part of the time at Downington. Alexander, Jr. married (1) Elizabeth Sloanaker and (2) Hopeful Hoffman Windle.

Excerpt from Fulthey & Cope:

"ALEXANDER MARSHALL, born March 23, 1797, in West Nantmeal (now Wallace) township. In 1819 he married Elizabeth Sloanaker, by whom he had five children, three of whom are still living. He was the second time married, in 1863, to Hopeful (Hoffman) Windle, widow of Davis Windie. In April, 1829, in connection with Nathan Siegfried, a practical printer, he began the publication of The Literary Casket at Yellow Springs, he officiating as its editor. While conducting this paper they printed the first numbers of the Anti-Masonic Register for Joseph Painter. In about a year he sold The Literary Casket to Cheyney Hannum and Morris Mattson, who moved it to West Chester, where it was subsequently merged into another paper. Mr. Marshall was afterwards assistant editor of an agricultural paper, printed at Parkesburg by N. P. Boyer & Co., who sold it to the Potts Brothers, for whom he conducted it as chief editor for some time. In 1844-45 he taught school in Phoenixville. In 1845 he was elected clerk of the Orphans' Court of Chester County, and in December of that year moved to West Chester, where he has ever since resided. After his three years' incumbency as clerk, he was engaged in the nursery business, and later in the manufacture of brick until 1861, when the breaking out of the Rebellion paralyzed this industry for some time. This venerable citizen, a happy type of the old-school gentleman, is the oldest man living in the county who has been connected with the press, having (July, 1881) passed his eighty-fourth birthday*. ...
*Since the above was in type he died, July 11, 1881."

Sources

• Futhey, J. Smith & Gilbert Cope: History of Chester County, Pennsylvania, with Genealogical and Biographical Sketches, Philadelphia: J.B. Lippencot & Co., 1881, p. 652.