Carroll County IAGenWeb

HISTORY OF CARROLL COUNTY IOWA

A Record of Settlement, Organization, Progress and Achievement

VOLUME II ILLUSTRATED

CHICAGO THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY 1912

Transcribed by Sharon Elijah October 5, 2020

Mr. & Mrs. Turner

The ranks of Civil war veterans are fast becoming decimated. Year by year many respond to the last roll call, and it is fitting that while some of the boys in blue survive they should be honored by their fellow townsmen for the service which they rendered to the country during the darkest hour in all its history. Mr. Turner is among those who for more than four years did active duty on southern battlefields, and in days of peace he has been equally loyal to his country. At present he is living retired but for many years was a progressive farmer of Richland township, and is numbered among the oldest settlers in this district. He was born in Rochester, New York, on the 1st of May, 1843, a son of Charles M. and Hannah (TIney) Turner, both natives of Scotland. Mr. Turner’s great-grandfather served under Admiral Paul Jones in the Revolutionary war. The father, who was by trade a mechanic, came to America in early life, locating first in Rochester, New York, and in 1844 removed to Toledo, Ohio. The subsequent history of himself and his wife are unknown. Their family consisted of six children of whom the subject of this review was the only son.

Manly Turner was reared under the direction of Ephraim Hinkle, the period of his boyhood and youth being passed for the most part on a farm in Lucas county, now a part of the present site of Toledo. At an early age he took his place in the fields, as soon as he was old enough to handle the plow, and when the crops were all harvested in the autumn he had the opportunity of attending the district school, the session of which covered little more than the winter months. He was but eighteen years of age at the time of the outbreak of the Civil war but, prompted by a spirit of patriotism, enlisted in the Union army, becoming a private of Company I, Forty-seventh Ohio Volunteer Infantry. He took part in all of the engagements of his regiment, participating in the battles of Vicksburg, Jackson, Missionary Ridge, Lookout Mountain, Atlanta and the campaign of Atlanta, while he also accompanied Sherman on his memorable march to the sea. After four years and two months of loyal and brave service, during which period he was slightly wounded two or three times, he was honorably discharged, and after being mustered out of the regiment returned home.

In the winter of 1865-6 Mr. Turner came to Iowa, first locating at Sioux City, whence he later removed to Marshall county, and in May, 1878, arrived in Carroll county, within the borders of which he has since maintained his home. His first purchase made him the owner of forty acres in Richland township, to which he later added eighty acres, and upon that tract of one hundred and twenty acres resided for thirty years, concentrating his energies upon its cultivation and development. He greatly improved that property and the abundant harvests which he annually gathered as a result of the care and labor which he bestowed upon his fields soon made him financially independent, so that later he was able to withdraw from active business life. In 1909 he sold his farm and moved to Glidden, where he purchased what was known as the Culbertson property. Here he and his family have since resided, and their home, which is ever the abode of a warm hospitality, has become a favorite resort with their many friends.

On the 7th of April, 1874, Mr. Turner was united in marriage to Miss Ione G. Webster, a native of Connecticut and a daughter of Charles F. and Sarah (Scranton) Webster, also natives of that state. Mrs. Turner’s great-grandfather was a solider in the Revolutionary war. The parents came to Iowa in 1864, locating in Tama county, and there the father passed away in February, 1864. The mother survived until 1906, when her death occurred at the age of eighty-seven years. In their family were seven children, Alice, Mary, Ione, Charles, Emanuel, Edward and Lillian. Unto Mr. and Mrs. Turner have been born three children, as follows: Fred, who is a farmer of Richland township and who married Edna Ruark, by whom he has two children, Lethyl and Ruby; Charlie, a farmer of southern Idaho, who married Alice Arnold and now has two children, Wendell and Doris; and Alice, a student in Drake University. Politically Mr. Turner is a republican, stanchly supporting that party which was the aid of the Union during the dark days of the Civil war, and maintains pleasant relations with his old army comrades through his membership in Scranton Post, G.A.R. Mr. Turner is now in the sixty-eighth year of his age and in a review of his past it is seen that his life record has been an honorable and useful one, characterized by thorough and progressive business activity that has resulted in bringing to him a comfortable and well merited competency. Moreover he has borne his full share in the work of general development and improvement here since he took up his abode in this county, which was at that time sparsely settled. It was rich in its natural resources but its opportunities had not yet been fully utilized. Mr. Turner is numbered among those who believed in the value of the land and its possibilities –the wisdom of his opinions being evidenced as the years have gone buy.

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