WILLIAM H. CONNER
William H. Conner, a veteran of the Civil war and for twenty-five years actively and prominently connected with agricultural interests of Union township, is living retired in Derby, having won rest and leisure by earnest and straightforward labor in the past. He was born in Preston county, West Virginia, September 8, 1839, and is a son of Job and Nancy (McNier) Conner, the former a native of Preston county and the latter of Pennsylvania. The parents journeyed overland in 1855 and settled in Union township, Lucas county, where they remained for a number of years. The father died in Indiana at the age of forty years and the mother passed away in Union township in 1861 when she was fifty years of age. Eight children were born to their union: Mrs. Margaret Clymer, deceased; Alfred, who resides in Derby; Elizabeth, who has passed away; William H., of this review; Harrison, deceased; Lucy Ann, who died at the age of eighteen; a son who died in infancy; and John who died when six years of age. With the exception of the youngest all of these children were born in West Virginia.
William
H. Conner spent his childhood and early youth in Indiana, and
there acquired a common school education. At the age of
sixteen he came overland with his parents and settled in Union
township in 1855. He
afterward removed to Indiana and from that state enlisted in
Company D, Forty-sixth Indiana Volunteers, Thirteenth Army
Corps, Infantry, for service in the Civil war. He participated in
many of the important engagements on the southern battle
fields and was wounded at Champion hills. On the 5th
of April, 1865, he was mustered out with honorable discharge
and returned to Indiana, where he continued to reside until
1869. In that
year he removed to Union township, Lucas county, and turned
his attention to farming.
Upon a fine property of eighty acres, which he still
owns, he carried on general agricultural pursuits and
stock-raising, winning in the course of years success,
prominence and substantial fortune. In 1893, having acquired a comfortable
competency, he retired from active life and moved into a
modern and well furnished home in Derby, where he and his wife
are spending their declining years in the rest and comfort
which they have won by a long period of earnest labor.
In
Logansport, Indiana, September 1, 1869, Mr. Conner was united
in marriage to Miss Sarah Marshall, who was born in Carroll
county, Indiana, May 20, 1850.
She is a daughter of John Hanks and Margaret (Kendall)
Marshall, who went as pioneers to Ohio and emigrated to Monroe
county, Indiana, at an early date. Mrs. Conner lived in Carroll county
until she was fifteen years of age and then removed to Cass
county, in the same state, where she resided until her
marriage. She is
one of a family of eleven children, as follows: Mrs. Mary Brown;
George, who resides in Logansport, Indiana; Mrs. Susanna
Chord, also of Logansport; Mrs. Conner, wife of the subject of
this review; James J. and Mrs. Candace Cragin, both of
Logansport. All
the other children in this family died in infancy. Mr. and Mrs. Conner
has become the parents of four children, all born in Wayne
county: John,
whose birth occurred June 15, 1870, and who now resides in
Montrose, Colorado; Charles, who was born April 19, 1872, and
who lives in Union township; Mrs. Margaret Sidebottom, who was
born May 22, 1877, and who makes her home in Lucas county; and
Bruce, who was born May 22, 1889, and who died July 23, 1906. He was gifted with
an unusual talent for painting and music and two of his
pictures which hang in the Conner home in Derby show rare
promise along this line.
He was just entering upon a career which undoubtedly
would have led to prominence and distinction had it not been
cut short by his untimely death.
Mrs. Conner is a member of the Presbyterian church and is a lady of many excellent qualities of mind and character, highly esteemed and respected in the city where she makes her home. Mr. Conner is connected with the local post of the Grand Army of the Republic and thus keeps in touch with his comrades of fifty years ago. His political allegiance is given to the republican party and he was for three years supervisor of Lucas county, discharging his duties in this responsible position in a creditable and able way. He is a man of many sterling traits of character, able in business and progressive in citizenship, and his success is well deserved for it has been well earned and is always worthily used.