Harrison County Iowa Genealogy

HISTORY OF HARRISON COUNTY, IOWA, 1891
BIOGRAPHIES
Page 926
FREDERICK SCHWERTLEY

Frederick SCHWERTLEY has been a resident of Harrison County since June 1857, when he located a mile and a half north of the village of Magnolia, but at present is a successful farmer of section 24, Calhoun Township. The following is a brief review of his life, with what he has encountered and achieved:

He was born April 28, 1828, in Wurtempburg, Germany, and is a son of Conrad and Margaret (SCHMIDT) SCHWERTLEY. He is the youngest of a family of sixteen children, of whom four are now living, and he being the only one in this country. The father died in Germany, April 6, 1858, aged sixty-eight years. The mother died in Germany, at the age of ninety-three years, in 1886. Believing that the New World afforded a better field of labor for the poor man than the old and densely populated German Empire, our subject sailed to America, landing in New York, January 10, 1853. From the time he was old enough, in the old country, he followed teaming and freighting from one town to another, and until he was fourteen years old managed to attend the common school of his native country, where he received a fair education. Upon coming to this country he engaged with the Northwestern Stage Company, at Wheeling, Va., to take care of their horses, and there he learned to speak our language, and went on to their line, coming West with them in the spring of 1855. He drove stage for them eighteen months, from Iowa city to Marengo, and then came to Calhoun, Harrison County, and drove six months for them, from Calhoun to Kirby, in Pottawattamie County, ending his services with them in the spring of 1857.

July 2, 1857, our subject as united in marriage at Iowa City (then the Capital of the State), to Salome BRECHT, a native of Baden, Germany, born October 10, 1832. She was the daughter of Philipine and Franz BRECHT. Our subject and his wife are the parents of eleven children, eight of whom still survive - Francis W., Margaret, Philipine, Emma, Frederick, Ida, Catherine, Frances, Leo (died when ten years of age), and to died in infancy.

The family belong to two churches, he to the German Lutheran Church, and she and the children to the Roman Catholic. Politically, he affiliates with the Democratic party.

The first year after our subject came to Harrison County to remain, he lived near Magnolia, and then bought one hundred and sixty acres of land on section 10, of Taylor Township, in 1858, and a little later, in company with Josiah Crome, fitted out a team and started on a prospecting trip to Pike's Peak, but only went as far as Ft. Kearney, and there met large numbers of the gold explorers returning home, not being successful, hence our subject and his companion also returned, and in the spring of 1860 moved to his place in Taylor Township, where he built a log house 18x20 feet, with a cottonwood floor. He improved this farm and remained nine years and then moved to section 17, of the same township, afterwards sold that place, and in the spring of 1869 bought a prairie farm of one hundred and sixty acres, where he lived until 1887, then moved to his present place in Calhoun Township. He now owns sixteen hundred and seventy-four acres of land in Harrison County, five hundred and fifty of which is plow land, four hundred in pasture, the balance in timber and meadow land. He also owns a house and lot in Modale. He generally keeps about one hundred head of cattle, as many swine, and about seventeen head of horses.

Return to 1891 Biographical S Surnames Index

Back to 1891 Biographies Index