Harrison County Iowa Genealogy

HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY, IOWA, 1891
BIOGRAPHIES
Page 420
WILLIAM CHAMBERS

William CHAMBERS, who came to Harrison County in the spring of 1869, located on section 5, of Washington Township, where he now lives. At first he bought forty acres, but his present farm consists of one hundred and fifty acres. He at one time owned three hundred acres, but finally sold and helped his children by getting teams, etc., for them. When he came to the township there was no school nearer than Union Grove, but being desirous to have a school for his children, he informed the School Board that if they would furnish the teacher he would provide the school room, which they concurred in, and a part of his house was used for a schoolroom. This was in the fall of 1870, and there were five terms of school taught in this place, before a schoolhouse was provided.

It may also be said that at the time of our subject's moving to Washington Township that subdivision of the county was not provided with a single wagon ridge. Mr. CHAMBERS built and kept in repair the ridge across Spring Creek, near his house, for fifteen years. His nearest market town was Council Bluffs, and his nearest post office Unionburg, at Union Grove, with Howard SMITH as Postmaster. When Woodbine was started this provided a new trading point, and upon one occasion he and his brother David went to Woodbine with hogs, and there being no bridges they laid boards down and hauled their wagons across by hand. They could cross with teams but not with a load.

Mr. CHAMBERS was born in Glasgow, Scotland, December 29, 1830, and in 1853 came to America, working his passage across the ocean, landing at New Orleans; he remained there a short time and then came up the river to where Kansas City now stands, and where there was no evidences of a town except a sawmill and a frame store building. The mill was owned by a Mr. MCGEE; and our subject worked for him hauling logs and goods to the store driving an ox-team. In July 1853, or 1854; he hired to drive a team across the plains to Salt Lake City, Utah. He was on the road three months, and while there worked in a sawmill, which was the first job that presented itself to him.

In 1850 Mr. CHAMBERS sent to Scotland for his father, mother and brother David, who came across the ocean and on by rail to Iowa City, Iowa, and joined the hand-cart caravan, in which the Mormons went across the plains to Utah, and they all came back to Council Bluffs in the spring of 1861, where they remained until our subject came to Harrison County. While at Council Bluffs he started a rope factory, which employed his time there; he also worked at that some after coming to Harrison County.

Our subject was married at Spanish Fork City, Utah, October 5, 1858, to Miss Louisa M. MCKEE. The ceremony was performed y Col. Stephen MARKHAM. They are the parents of twelve children-David R., born August 17, 1859; Thomas, October 21, 1861; William, October 27, 1863; William J., January 16, 1865; Mary J., June 3, 1867; James, December 15, 1869; Anna L., August 12, 1872; Robert, May 24, 1875; Elizabeth L., December 31, 1877; Flora M., June 29, 1880; Alfred, August 1, 1883, and Mabel F., October 18, 1886. William and Alfred are deceased.

Mrs. CHAMBERS was born in Hancock County, Ohio, January 13, 1842, and in 1854 her parents crossed the plains to Utah, where she remained until married.

David CHAMBERS, father of our subject, was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1798, and died in Washington Township, Harrison County, Iowa, February 16, 1878. The mother of our subject, Mary (MALCOMB) CHAMBERS, was born in Glasgow, Scotland, 1798 and died in Washington Township February 14, 1872. Mrs. and Mrs. David CHAMBERS were the parents of nine children of who our subject was the fifth child. Mrs. CHAMBERS united with the Latter Day Saint's Church in the fall of 1862, and is now president of the "second quorum" of Elders.

There are but few men in any community who have passed through a more varied and checkered experience than the man of whom this sketch is written. Starting from his home in Scotland, in 1852, without means, making his passage across the ocean; becoming a day laborer and driver of ox-teams on the site of what now has grown to be the great metropolis of the West-Kansas City, when there were but two houses and one bond store in the place, and on across the plains of Nebraska and Colorado into the wilds of Utah, and back into the Hawkeye State, where he settled on forty acres of wild land, which through good management finally brought about his present well-to-do circumstances, this is a record not to be ashamed of, and may well be looked at with pride by those who come after him.

While in Utah, in 1855, our subject was located at a village called Palmyra, sixty miles south of Salt Lake City. The Utah Indians were on the war path and killed a large number of the whites and drove off six hundred head of stock from the herds. It was then that Col. CONOVER called for volunteers to go after the Indian thieves. The volunteers where to find their own horses and fire-arms and receive $5 per day. Mr. CHAMBERS was one of nearly two hundred who went on such an expedition. They crossed the Utah Lake on the ice, the distance across being about twelve miles. Onward they pressed and finally overtook the Indians and recovered the stolen stock. The trip consumed thirty-two days and the party were assured that as soon as proper papers, reports, etc. could be sent to Washington all should be paid. But our subject, for one, has looked for all these passing years and has never seen the promised paymaster!

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