Goff, Henry A. (1833-1908)

GOFF

Posted By: Karon Velau (email)
Date: 9/24/2019 at 23:44:19

Henry Austin Goff
Jan 30, 1833 - Aug 20, 1908

(From the 1883 History of Pottawattamie County, Iowa, by J. H. Keatley, p.69, Belknap Twp.)
H. A. Goff, Stock-dealer, Oakland, was born in Henry County, Ind., January 30, 1833, son of Abram and Nancy (Smith) Goff, natives of Kentucky; he was a farmer by occupation, and died when our subject was eighteen months old; she was born about 1809; after the death of her first husband, she married Robert Erwin, of Virginia; she died in Henderson County, Ill., in 1879. Mr. Goff left home at the age of sixteen, and worked by the month till November, 1851, when he was married in Tippecanoe County, Ind., to Elizabeth Crose, a native of the aforesaid county, born in 1833, daughter of John and Elizabeth (Crouch) Crose, natives of Ohio. After his marriage, Mr. Goff farmed one year in Tippecanoe County, Ind., then moved to Henderson County, Ill., where he bought land and farmed for sixteen years. There Mr. Goff lost his wife March 20, 1858, and then he again married, November 28, 1859, this time to Sarah Jane Brown, born in Kentucky October 28, 1839, daughter of Charles and Ann (Percell) Brown, natives of Kentucky; he was born December 25, 1810, and came to Illinois with his family, when Mrs. Goff was five years old; her mother died in Illinois; her father is now living with his children in Iowa. In the fall of 1868, Mr. Goff came to Pottawattamie County, Iowa, and bought land in James Township; this land he improved and lived upon till the following summer, when the grasshoppers became troublesome and he returned to Illinois. After remaining in the latter State eighteen months, he returned to his farm in Iowa, where he remained till the spring of 1882, when he moved in Oakland, where he has since been engaged in trading in cattle and hogs. For the past ten years, Mr. Goff has furnished beeves to the butchers of Avoca. Mr. Groff has, by his second wife, seven children - Ellen (now Mrs. Hayse), George, Flora Ann (now Mrs. Clayton), Dolly Jane (now Mrs. Strong), Charles, Lily May and Samuel. Mr. Goff is a Democrat.