Biographies For Muscatine County Iowa 1889

Source: Portrait and Biographical Album, Muscatine County, Iowa, 1889, page 459
JOSEPH BAILEY, whose farm and residence is situated on section 4, is numbered among the well-known citizens of Wilton Township, of which he has been a resident since 1859. He was born on Christmas Eve in the year 1827, in Lincolnshire, England, and is a member of a family of seven children, two sons and five daughters, born to Joseph and Anne Bailey. The latter died in England when our subject was but five years of age, and the father's death also occurred in his native land in 1886, when eighty-four years of age. Their children yet living are Ann, Joseph and William, while those who have departed this life are Elizabeth, Letitia, Mary and Jane, all of whom were married and left families with the exception of Jane, who died in girlhood.

Our subject is the only one of the family who ever emigrated to America. The days of his childhood and youth were spent upon his father's farm, and on the 16th day of September, 1851, he was united in marriage with Eliza Harrison. The following day with his young bride he sailed from Liverpool, and after a voyage of six weeks landed in America. Going directly from New York to Columbiana County, Ohio, he there resided for a period of eight years, after which he came to Iowa. For several years he engaged in cultivating a farm for Henry Adams, of Ohio, his former employer,and then purchased the land upon which he still makes his home.

Mrs. Bailey, the wife of our subject, is also a native of Lincolnshire, England, and a daughter of Charles and Mary Harrison, who resided in that country until their death. They were the parents of eight children, two of whom, besides Mrs. Bailey came to America : John, who lives in Crawford County, Ohio, and Ann, a resident of Franklin County, Neb. Two brothers and three sisters of the family are still living in England, namely : Fanny, George, Sally, Thomas and Alice.

Mr. and Mrs. Bailey have six living children : William G., Mary Ann, Fanny E., John Henry, George Lincoln, and Joseph Lincolnshire. They have prospered, greatly since coming to this country, in many ways, yet trouble has also come to them in the loss of their eldest son, Charles James, who was drowned on the 22d day of August, 1868, in Mud Creek, while bathing with some of his comrades. He was then in his seventeenth year, was a bright, intelligent boy and gave promise of future usefulness. For a long period of thirty years Mr. and Mrs. Bailey have resided at their beautiful home in Wilton Township, on their farm of 177 acres, and have there reared their children, all of whom have grown to man and womanhood with the exception mentioned above, and now have families of their own. What they now possess has been acquired by their own industry and perseverance, and their competence is but the well merited reward of their labors. They have long been faithful and consistent members of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and are numbered among the respected citizens of Muscatine County. In politics Mr. Bailey is a Republican.

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