Samuel Minsker Eyerly

BAILEY, BRINTON, CATERLLIN, CORWIN, EASTER, EYERLY, FERRIN, FORD, GAMBLE, GRANDRATH, HISKEY, HOWELL, LAPELLA, LOW, NOWELL, MCGINNIS, PIPER, SLYDER, THUMA, TOWNSEND, WAXIN

Posted By: Kent Transier (email)
Date: 9/22/2004 at 00:23:48

Samuel Minsker Eyerly was born on May 2, 1803 at Franklin, Venango, Pennsylvania. As a youth, Samuel Eyerly learned the carpenter's trade and was a working carpenter until his sons were grown. He then turned to farming, which he did in addition to carpentry for the rest of his life. On May 5, 1830, Samuel married Mary Ann Slyder who was born July 20, 1809. Mary Ann died 7 months later. On March 20, 1832, Samuel married Regina Hiskey who was born on September 6, 1813. She bore him 4 sons, Daniel Hiskey who married Rebecca Easter, Josiah Bartlett who married three times to Charlotte A. Piper, Zerua Townsend, and Celia Grandrath; William Rosecranz who died in the Union Army at the siege of Atlanta;and Benjamin Abbott who died at 3 ½ months. Regina died ten days after the birth of the fourth child, indicating that her death was possibly a complication of childbirth. Regina is buried at Mansfield, Ohio.

Samuel married a third time on March 28, 1839 in Richland County, Ohio, this time to Mary Ann (Polly) Thuma, daughter of John Thuma and Eva Ann Waxin. Polly was born on August 9, 1814 in Frankford, Cumberland, Pennsylvania. Samuel and Polly had 10 children; Mary Ann who died at 6 months; George Washington, a prominent Madison County citizen who married Martha Angeline Howell and later, Clara Bailey; Erastus Sullivan who married Sirilda Nowell; Nancy Jane who married John Caterllin; Harriet Wiseman who married John Gamble; Catherine Ellen who married John H. LaPella; an infant son who died young; Mary Edna who married three times to Byrant E. Corwin, Joseph S. McGinnis, and Thomas James Low; Sarah Alice Carey who married Arthur Ferrin; and James Harlan who married Laura May Ford.

The Eyerlys lived in Richland County, Ohio until 1846 when they moved to Washington County, Iowa, making the trip from Cincinnati to Keokuk by riverboat. In Washington County, they built a log cabin house where they remained for several years.

Published accounts state that Samuel and his family moved to Monroe, Jasper County in 1855, then to Jefferson County in 1861, and finally to Madison County in 1863 where he practiced carpentry and farmed a small tract of land. However, the first two locations appear to be reversed for he was at dwelling # 87, Blackhawk Township, Jefferson County, in the Iowa 1856 census. Three of his sons served in the Civil War. Samuel moved back to Jasper County shortly before before the 1870 census and died at Newton, Jasper, Iowa on May 3, 1871.

Samuel was member of the Episcopal Church and was also and active abolitionist. He served as a justice of the peace In Madison County. After Samuel died, Polly Thuma Eyerly remarried, at age 68, to Hiram Lovelace, age 71. The wedding took place in Madison County, Iowa. Hiram was the son of William Lovelace and Rebecca Brinton. Polly died while living with her daughter, Nancy, in Winterset, Iowa, and is buried at Newton, Jasper, Iowa, next to her first husband in the Eyerly burial plot.

Sources: obituaries, newspaper articles, county, state, and federal records, and county histories.