Wray, William

WRAY

Posted By: Joyce Hickman (email)
Date: 9/10/2008 at 13:47:01

William Wray

(From the 1883 History of Pottawattamie County, Iowa, by J. H. Keatley, p.148, Lewis Twp.)
William Wray, farmer, P. O. Council Bluffs, was born in England in 1833, in Lincolnshire; came to America in 1851, lived in Indiana till 1858; he came to Iowa, and settled in Pottawattamie County, and has been here ever since, except three years he was in Montgomery County, Ind. In 1869, he moved to Lewis Township, and has been here ever since. Mr. Wray was educated in England. He has followed farming most all his life, but freighted across the plains for about three years - from the Missouri River to Denver and different mountain towns. On account of the Indians getting bad, he quit in 1864 or 1865. Mr. Wray's father, Benjamin Wray, died in England, but his mother came to America, and died in Union County, Iowa. He has six brothers and two sisters, all in Iowa. His first farm, in Lewis Township, was in Section 14, and had been improved some by the Mormons, but not enough to help it much. He now lives on Section 13, on the bank of Horseshoe Lake. Till the spring of 1881, the channel of the Missouri River was within eight or ten rods of the house, but it has changed till now it is about three miles distant. He was married, in 1865, in Union County, Iowa, to Miss Sarah Barton; she was born in England. They have two children dead, but none living. He is a Democrat in politics.