Davis, Enos

DAVIS, WHITAKER, ANTHONY

Posted By: Mary H. Cochrane, Volunteer
Date: 6/29/2019 at 13:19:28

Biography ~ Enos Davis
Garden Grove Township, Decatur County, Iowa
Biographical and Historical Record of Ringgold and Decatur Counties, Iowa
(Lewis Publishing Company (1887)), pp. 649-50:

"ENOS DAVIS, farmer, section 13, Garden Grove Township, was born in Atwater, Portage County, Ohio, in 1816, a son of William and Phebe (Whitaker) Davis, the former a native of South Carolina, and the latter of Pennsylvania. The father was three times married, and had a family of seventeen children, Enos being a child of the second marriage. In 1843 Enos Davis was married at Ontario, Lagrange County, Indiana, to Mary Anthony, who was born in Worcester County, Massachusetts, in 1824, a daughter of Dr. Isaac and P. Marium Anthony, of English and Scotch descent, their ancestry dating to John Anthony, who came from England to Rhode Island, in 1846. Four children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Davis -- P. Marium, deceased; Homer A., deceased; Charles A. and George E. In the fall of 1848 Mr. Davis and his family located in what is now Garden Grove Township, being one of the first three settlers, the others being his father, William Davis, and Ozro N. Kellogg. Of these Mr. Davis is the only one living. Garden Grove was one of the temporary settlements of the Mormons when en route to Salt Lake from Nauvoo, in the early spring of 1846. Many of them were very destitute and some died from the effects of their privations. These first three settlers bought the improvements made by the Mormons, and at that time theirs was supposed to be the only settlement in Decatur County. There were several families living from ten to twenty miles south of them, who thought they were living in Missouri, but when the disputed strip was assigned to Iowa, became residents of Decatur County. In the winter of 1848 Mrs. Davis taught a school for the benefit of the children in their colony, which was also patronized by a number of Mormon children. This was the first school for a distance of several counties east, west and north. They borrowed four lights of glass from a lady who was taking them to Salt Lake, made a puncheon floor, stuck legs into split logs for seats, made a stick chimney, and thus made a school-house in their Western home. In 1853 Mrs. Davis drew the first money, $94, from the school fund in Decatur County, for services at Garden Grove, then the only district formed. The school at that time was taught in a private house, and some of the scholars came a distance of four miles. Mr. Davis did a good business showing land, which was held by claim a number of years. Settlers formed a protective society to prevent speculators from enjoying peaceable possession of land entered that was already occupied or claimed, the necessary amount of improvements being made. In the fall of 1853 Mr. Davis entered land, and removed to Seven Mile Grove, seven miles northwest of Garden Grove, in Franklin Township, which he helped to organize and name, and was its first justice of the peace, an office he held several years. Mrs. Davis taught school in their house in the winter, and also sometimes had private scholars, as there were no school-houses nor schools. In 1854 she made the first cheese in Decatur County, according to the assessor's report. In 1862 they returned to Garden Grove Township, where they have since lived. A brother of Mr. Davis, Amasa J., came to Decatur County with the rest of the family, and now lives on a farm near Weldon, in Franklin Township, where he has lived over thirty years. October 12, 1838, three of the colony, all that are now living, met to celebrate the thirty-eighth anniversary of their coming to the county."

(Submitted to the Decatur County GenWeb site by Christy Jay, email: Jaygenie@aol.com)