Cozad, Felix Woodard (Capt.)

COZAD, SCOTT, BEEMAN, MCCULLEY, PIFER, BLACK, MCCULLOUGH, COWMAN, WORMLEY, CONNABLE, CARLTON, PARSONS

Posted By: Volunteer Transcriber
Date: 12/3/2008 at 19:51:32

COZAD, F. W.
Dry goods, millinery, notions and underwear, north side square. He was born 17 Feb 1827 in West Virginia. He came with his parents to Warren Co., OH, then removed to Cincinnati, OH. In 1849 he went to California and returned to Cincinnati in 1853. He came to Newton, Iowa in 1855. In Aug 1862 he raised Co D, 40th I. V. I, served to the end of the war. On his return, he commenced his present business. He married Sarah A. SCOTT in 1856. She was born in 1833 in Richmond, VA. They have two children---Ida and Charles B. He is a Republican. ~ "Newton Township Biographies," The History of Jasper County, Iowa, (Chicago: Western Historical Company, 1878)
===============================================
Capt. F. W. Cozad, of Newton, was born in Lewis County, W. Va., February 17, 1827, and is a son of Jacob W. and Betsy (Beeman) Cozad. The family is of French ancestry, but the forefathers left France during the Revolution in that country and settled in Germany, from which country they immigrated to America. The name of the original emigrant or the exact date of emigration we are unable to give, but it is probable it was the great-grandfather of the Captain, who, it is supposed, settled in Virginia. The family belonged to the farming class, and in religious matters affiliated with the Baptist Church. Grandfather Cozad was born about the close of the Revolutionary War, and at the age of about nine years he and three younger brothers were one day playing not far from home when a band of Indians swooped down on them, taking them captive, and plunged into the woods with them. The youngest was so small that he was not able to keep up with the others, whom he followed, crying bitterly. To rid themselves of this encumbrance the Indians tomahawked him in the presence of the others. The names of the three who were spared were Jacob (our subject's grandfather), Samuel and Benjamin.

The boys were compelled to travel away into the Indian country, and although a party of settlers gave pursuit they were unable to rescue them. For four long years they were held in captivity and had been given up long before as dead, their family and friends thinking they had met with the same fate as the little one whose lifeless body had been found where he was murdered but a short distance from the house. After four years they learned, doubtless through a friendly Indian, that the other three children were alive and with the Indians in their country. Meantime the red men had become more friendly and the father penetrated their country and there found the long-lost boys. But four years had made a great change in the little ones. The Indians had become greatly attached to them and very reluctantly agreed to surrender them to their parents. The boys also had become attached to the tribe, and being but children when taken into captivity, had forgotten their father and mother. It was their choice to remain with the tribe, who had been kind to them, and continue the life they had learned to like, but they finally consented to return to their former home.

Triumphantly the father returned home with his sons. Imagine for a moment the joy of the mother upon once more seeing the faces of her long-lost dear ones! The eldest of these, Jacob, afterward became a wealthy farmer, owning some fifteen hundred acres of land. He was also a local preacher and a large slave owner, but at his death he gave his slaves their freedom and bequeathed them $500 each. He was twice married, his second wife being a member of the Beeman family, one of the most prominent in the Old Dominion. It is a strange coincidence that two of his sons, John W. being one of them, married sisters of his second wife, and thus father and sons became brothers-in-law.

The mother of the Captain was born in Virginia and was a member of an old Puritan family, who early removed from Vermont to Virginia. About 1831 the Cozad family settled near Lebanon, Ohio. The Captain was the eldest of three children. His brother Jacob was born in 1832, the mother dying at his birth. He afterward became a soldier in Company D, Fortieth Iowa Infantry, and died in 1863, while in active service. The sister Cecelia married Jacob B. Pifer, who died several years ago. She is now living in Virginia, not far from the place of her birth. Our subject was a child of some four years when his father removed to Ohio, and he traveled the entire distance on horseback with his mother. Upon his father's farm he grew to robust manhood, receiving limited educational advantages. At the age of thirteen he commenced to learn the trade of a blacksmith, and four years later went to St. Louis, Mo., where he secured employment in a carriage shop.

Until twenty-one years old, our subject worked in carriage shops in St. Louis, Louisville and Cincinnati, and afterward, in company with others, he established a carriage manufactory in Cincinnati. A year later, in 1849, the gold fever from California swept over the plains. He took the fever, dropped his tools, abandoned his business and sailed for San Francisco. Embarking in mining, he made some money, though he failed to secure the coveted fortune. Discerning an opportunity to make more money in other ways than mining, he opened a shop to sharpen picks for the miners. In this enterprise he prospered. Later he started a carriage shop, and he built the first buggy ever run in the streets of San Francisco.

After spending three years in California, Captain Cozad returned to Ohio with a snug fortune, which about a year later he invested in a section of land near Dwight, Ill. He also traveled through Iowa, and bought some property in Newton. He had left a large sum of money with parties in Cincinnati, through whose failure he met with heavy reverses. In 1855 he came to Newton, where he embarked in the mercantile business in company with A. K. Emerson, under the firm name of Emerson & Cozad. After two years he sold his interest in the concern, but after another two years he bought the business again, and continued to superintend the establishment until August 1862.

The excitement of the Civil War was then at its height, and our subject, closing the doors of his store, within four days organized a company of which he was commissioned Captain. This was Company D of the Fortieth Iowa Infantry. In December 1862, they penetrated the enemy's country in Kentucky and were stationed at Columbus, that state, until March 1863. They then proceeded to Paducah, Ky., and from there to Vicksburg, remaining in the rear of that place until after its surrender. After that the Captain was stationed on duty much of the time in Arkansas, until March 27, 1865, when he was honorably discharged. His health was greatly impaired from his long service, and for some time after his discharge he was not able to attend to business. Finally he embarked in the insurance business, in which he continued until 1874. He then returned to merchandising, in which he remained until December 1882, since which time he has been an insurance agent.

In April 1856, the Captain married Miss Sarah A. Scott, a native of Richmond, Va. Her father, Bennett Scott, was born in Maryland and died when she was sixteen years old, her mother having died some eight years previous. After the demise of her mother she made her home with a cousin in Cincinnati, Ohio, where she was educated. Mr. and Mrs. Cozad have had three children. Harriet C. died at the age of four years. Ida V. had the advantage of a fine musical education and is an accomplished young lady she married George B. McCulley, a merchant or Jefferson, Greene County, Iowa, and they have two children. Benjamin Bennett, our subject's only surviving son, is a druggist in Prairie City, Iowa, and is also extensively engaged in raising fine-blooded stock.

Socially, the Captain is a member of the Grand Army of the Republic. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity, in which he bas attained the third degree. In religious belief he is identified with the Methodist Episcopal Church, to which his wife also belongs. Born and reared a Democrat, he joined the Republican Party in 1856 and has ever since been true to the principles of that political organization. Though never an aspirant for office, he has served in various positions of trust and has been a member of the Common Council and the Board of Education. Portrait and Biographical Record, Jasper, Marshall and Grundy Counties, IA Page 350.
=============================================
Cozad, Capt. Felix Woodard

A romantic glamour clings about the life history of Capt. Felix Woodard Cozad, gold digger of the days of the "forty-niners," loyal soldier and officer in the great Civil War and now retired business man of Newton, Jasper County, who, although well past his eightieth milestone, is hale and hearty, as straight as a pine, and as alert as most men of fifty. He comes of a hardy New England ancestry. His grandfather was born just at the close of the Revolutionary War, and when he was nine years old he was playing with three younger brothers when a band of Indians surprised and captured them, carrying them away into captivity. The youngest, unable to keep up, cried bitterly and was promptly brained with a tomahawk. The others were held captive four years before they were rescued by their father. They had by that time become so attached to the Indians and the Indians to them, that it was with great difficulty that the father persuaded them to go home with him.

Captain Cozad was born in Lewis County, West Virginia, February 17, 1827, being the son of Jacob W. and Beedy (Beaman) Cozad, the father born in the same County as the subject and the mother in Vermont. She died when the son Felix W. was four years old, and the father being left alone with three small children, remarried, his second wife being Phoebe Beeman, who was a sister of the first wife. By the first marriage there were born these children: Jacob C., now deceased; Cecelia, the widow of Jacob Pifer, lives in Buckhannon, Upshire County, West Virginia, the home of her birth, and Felix W., of this sketch. The second marriage resulted in the birth of Clara, who married Luther Black, and died in Colorado, whither she had gone for her health; David is now living in Butler County, Ohio; Francis Marion, who has not been heard from for twenty-five years; George W. died in Wheeling, West Virginia, in 1882. The death of the father of these children occurred in 1845, while yet a young man, only thirty-eight years old.

Soon after attaining his majority, early in 1849, Captain Cozad, of this review, engaged in the manufacture of carriages in Cincinnati. Later in that year, attracted by the stories of treasure and adventure coming from the far West, he set out by way of the isthmus of Panama for the new Eldorado. The holidays of 1849-50 were spent on the isthmus at a point not far from where the present great canal is being built. In January, 1850, he embarked on a sailing vessel up the Pacific coast, arriving at San Francisco on April 8th following, the landing there being made upon the bare shore, there being no wharf of any kind there at that time. Securing his mining outfit, he plunged into the interior wilds of that region, finally locating in Trinity County, where he remained two years, spending three years in all in the gold diggings, during which time he met with far greater success than many others of the great army of prospectors. In June 1853, he returned to Cincinnati and in 1854 came to Newton, Iowa, being among the pioneers of this region, and here engaged in the mercantile business, which he continued until 1862, when Lincoln issued his call for three hundred thousand volunteers, whereupon Mr. Cozad closed out his business and in four days' time raised a company of one hundred men, of which he was elected captain, this being Company D, Fortieth Iowa Volunteer Infantry. He was soon at the front, proving to be an efficient and gallant officer, remaining until the close of hostilities, being honorably discharged on March 27, 1865, ten days prior to the actual close of the war. While he did not participate in any of the great battles of the war, he took part in many lively skirmishes and was in the famous siege of Vicksburg. During the last year of his service he was taken sick with chills and fever and forced to enter the regimental hospital, and from there he was sent home, this illness causing him to tender his resignation a few days before the close of the war. According to his comrades, he made a very efficient officer.

In 1856 Captain Cozad was united in marriage with Sarah A. Scott, a native of Richmond, Virginia, and this union resulted in the birth of three children, as follows: Ida V., born February 14, 1857, who married George B. McCullough, now residing in Jefferson, Iowa; Charles B., born in April 1859, engaged in the drug and jewelry business in Adel, Iowa, married Laura Cowman, and he has been postmaster at Prairie City for years; Cecelia C., born February 14, 1862, died when four years old. The wife and mother passed to her rest on October 25, 1899, and eight years later, October 14, 1907, Captain Cozad was united in marriage with Mrs. Celia Therese Wormley, widow of Frederick P. Wormley. She was the daughter of Benjamin Hale and Mary A. (Connable) Carlton, and her birth occurred on January 16, 1834, at Keene, New Hampshire, her parents being natives of Massachusetts. Mrs. Cozad is one of three children, a sister, Ellen, was the wife of George R. Parsons and she and a brother, Edgar L., are both deceased.

Mrs. Cozad was formerly prominent in social life, devoting much time the different social clubs and also organized for benevolent and literary purposes; but of late years she has practically withdrawn from society and now devotes most of her time to her home. She is a woman of education, culture and affable disposition, which has made her a favorite with a wide circle of friends. She and the Captain are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Newton, and she is a member of the Order of the Eastern Star, and is charter member of the chapter in Pueblo, Colorado. The Captain belongs to Newton Lodge No. 59, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, having been Mason since 1862; he is also a member of Garrett Post No. 16, Grand Army of the Republic, which post was named for his colonel.

Captain Cozad has an attractive and substantial home, surrounding which are some beautiful and stately maple trees which he planted from the seed fifty-two years ago. Past and Present of Jasper County Iowa B. F. Bowden & Company, Indianapolis, IN, 1912 Page 629