A MEMORIAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD OF IOWA
MILTON WILSON
MILTON WILSON has been a resident of Madison county, Iowa, since 1856, when he located in Madison township, entering land from the general Government. On his arrival he went to the place and lived there for six weeks without a house, setting up boards against a pole in the form of a roof, and thus securing a place in which to live. He then built a small shanty, in which he spent one of the coldest winters ever known in Iowa. He later erected a more comfortable house, in which he resided until 1875, when he moved to the village of Earl ham, where he has since continued to reside, though he is still operating his farm of 460 acres. He was born near Milton, Wayne county, Indiana, December 11, 1825. father, Seth Wilson, was a native of South Carolina, but went to Ohio with his parents at the age of two years, and from there to Wayne county, Indiana, when he was about His ‘ father of our subject, was born in Pennsylvania, and is supposed to have been of Scotch descent. In early life he removed to South Carolina, thence to Ohio, and later (1818) to Wayne county, Indiana, and there died. He was a member of the Friends' Church, with which body the entire family are connected. Seth Wilson married Martha Elizabeth Thorn burg, a native of North Carolina, born in 1806. In her girlhood she removed with her parents to Ohio, and later to Indiana, and located in Fayette county. Her father, Henry Thorn burg, is supposed to have been born in North Carolina. The marriage of Seth Wilson and Elizabeth Thornburg took place in Wayne county, Indiana, where they continued to re side until 1860, when they removed to Madison county, Iowa, and located on a farm in Madison township. but later removed to Earlham, where the father died at the age of eighty-seven years, and the mother May 30, 1895, in her ninetieth year. They were members of the Friends' Church, and lived the quiet, happy life peculiar to that people. They were the parents of eight children, two sons and six daughters, as follows: Milton, Eliza A., Caroline M., Henry, Eunice C., Rebecca T., Sarah H., and Maria E.
Milton Wilson, our subject, was reared in his native county and educated in its public schools, which he usually attended in the winter months, while assisting in the labors of the farm in other seasons of the year. He remained at home, assisting his father, until his marriage, October 18, 1852, with Miss Sarah J. Murphy, a native of Henry county, Indiana, born November 11, 1831, a daughter of Robert and Sarah (Burgess) Murphy, the former a native of North Carolina and the latter of South Carolina. Robert Murphy was of English descent and reared in his native State, from which he removed to Henry county, Indiana, at a very early day in the history of the latter State. John Burgess, the grandfather of Mrs. Wilson, was a native of South Carolina, of English descent. He also removed to Indiana in a very early day. Mrs. Wilson is eighteen years of age. Jehu Wilson, the grand- . the tenth child of a family of twelve children, and was reared in Henry and Wayne counties, Indiana, and graduated at the high school in Milton. She has always been prominent in educational work and is at present a member of the School Board of Earlham, Iowa, and also a member of the board of trustees of the academy in the same place. To Milton and Sarah Wilson were born six children: John, died in infancy; Flora M., now the wife of Professor C. M. Pinkerton, of Fairbury, Nebraska; Mahala E., who for five years served acceptably as Postmistress of Earlham, is at home; Robert S. is engaged in merchandising in Minneapolis, Minnesota; Hon. Isaac K., home secretary of the Iowa Savings and Loan Association, of Des Moines, represented Madison county in the Legislature, being elected on the Republican ticket; and Mattie C., who died in childhood.
Mr. and Mrs. Wilson are members of the Friends' Church, in which they take especial interest, and endeavor to walk closely in the footsteps of the Master. In politics he is a Republican and served as a member of the County Board of Supervisors of Madison county, Iowa, for six years. He was a member of the board when the county court-house was destroyed by fire, and in the building of the present court-house took an active part. While naturally a conservative man, he is enterprising and progressive, and never hesitates to do that which will best advance the interests of his adopted county and State.
From A Memorial and Biographical Record of Iowa, Volume I, Chicago: The Lewis Publishing Company, 1896, pp. 505-506. Transcribed July, 2015 by Conni McDaniel Hall.