Harrison County Iowa Genealogy

HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY, IOWA, 1891
BIOGRAPHIES
Page 791
DAVID CHAMBERS

David CHAMBERS (Portrait), one of the most extensive land owners in Harrison County, came to this section in the spring of 1869 and settled on section 4, of Washington Township, which at that time was included in Union Township. At first he bought forty acres of wild land and hauled the frame of a house which was to be 12x14 feet from Council Bluffs, where he bought the lumber and framed it. This building served as a residence for about four years, when he built a frame house 24x32 feet, with ten-foot posts. Mr. CHAMBERS lived on that farm until the spring of 1883, when he bought forty acres more of section 4, which he improved and from time to time added to it until he now owns four hundred and thirty-two acres of finely improved land in the locality, besides enough elsewhere to make six hundred acres in all.

Mr. CHAMBERS named Washington Township, as he got up the petition to have it set off from Union Township. All was then new and wild, and not a single wagon bridge had been built in that part of the country.

It may be of interest to the reader to know something of our subject's ancestors and his earlier life. He was born in Glasgow, Scotland, June 16, 1841, and in March, 1856, sailed with his parents for America, arriving at Iowa City, Iowa, during the month of May that year, and from that point, which was then the capital of the State, they joined the handcart overland expedition made up of Mormons en route for Utah Territory. They started in May and arrived in Salt Lake City, in October, 1856-walking the entire distance-men, women and children-the smaller children being carried by their mothers, or hauled in the carts. Those of whom we write remained in that vicinity until 1869, when, as above stated, he came to Harrison County.

He was married June 21, 1867, in Pottawattamie County, to Mary MCKEE, who was born in Pottawattamie County, Iowa, August 18, 1849, and remained there with her parents until the date of her marriage.

David CHAMBERS Sr., father of our subject, was born in the North of Ireland, and came to this country as above described, and spent several years in Salt Lake City, and returned to Harrison County, Iowan, and died in February, 1880. His wife, the mother of our subject, Mary (MALCOMB) CHAMBERS, was also born in the North of Ireland, and departed this life in Harrison County, in February, 1872.

In explanation as to how the Mormon handcart caravan subsisted while crossing the great plains, it may be stated that ox-teams, sufficient to haul provisions, were driven, with cows giving milk, and other cattle which were killed for beef while enroute.

Politically our subject is a supporter of the Democratic party. Both he and his wife are devout members of the Latter Day Saints Church. He united with the Re-organized Church in 1863, and he is now Presiding Elder of the Little Sioux District, extending to the State Line north.

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