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Elgin Echo
Elgin,
Iowa
June 14,
1917
Front Page
DEATH OF ALEX W. PETERS
A. W. Peters of Illyria township died Tuesday
of last week, June 5, lacking only a few days of being eighty-five
years of age. Mr. Peters who had been suffering from a cold for
about ten days, took to his bed on Sunday, and died at 1:30 the
following Tuesday, from old age, pneumonia. The funeral was held
Thursday from the Illyria church, conducted by Rev. J. S. Moore of
Wadena.
Another of the very early pioneers has passed
out of this life. How few of these early settlers of Fayette county
re left! It will not be long until they will be but a memory. Let us
stop for a moment and try to gain an appreciation of what the lives
of these old fellow mean to us, the younger generation.
Alexander Wade Peters was born in Peterstown,
Monroe County, West Virginia, June 11, 1832. He died at his home in
Illyria township June 5, 1917. He came from German, French and
English stock. He was the youngest member of his father’s family and
could trace his ancestry back to Revolutionary days. As a young man
in his native state he worked as a freighter and drove a stage coach
at times, over the Blue Ridge mountain.
In 1851 with his father’s family eh emigrated
to St. Charles, Ill., and in the fall of 1852, in company with his
brother Henry and brother-in-law, John Craft, came to the place
where Brainard now stands and located there. At that time there was
but one house between Elkader and West Union. He made three trips
back to St. Charles after other members of his family, one of which
was made with ox team, taking six weeks to make the journey. It was
always his delight to recite the incidents and hardships of this
early pioneer life to the younger generation.
On October 18, 1853, he was united in marriage
to Margaret Jane Mattocks, who died July 22, 1915. Their children
all survive them—three sons and four daughters, as follows:
Mrs. Elizabeth Ernst of Wadena; Robert Henry of Clayton county; Miss
Mary Henrietta at home; Mrs. Margaret Gehring of Jennings, Oklahoma;
William Alexander of Clermont; Wallace Lee at home; also James
Fisher, his sister’s child. Whom they brought up from infancy. He
was the grandfather of eleven children and eleven
great-grandchildren.
Mr. Peters was a good father and husband, a
real neighbor, and often said he never turned a hungry man from his
door. He was honest and upright in all his dealings with his
fellowmen. “Uncle Alex” will be missed form the Illyria community,
where he has lived for over fifty-five years.—Argo Gazette.
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