L. L. COLTON
L. L. Colton came to Cass county in 1876, and purchased a farm of T. W. Williamson, located on the southwest quarter of section 29. There was then upon the place, a frame house, and a grove had been planted. Mr. Colton has since built a frame barn and made other improvements. He was born in the city of Buffalo, New York, April 29, 1831, and is a son of Samuel H. and Samantha (Dodge) Colton. The latter was a descendant of John Dodge who was born near the river Tweed, in England, and emigrated to America in 1667, and settled on Block Island, in the State of Rhode Island. Samantha (Dodge) Colton was born in Herkimer county, New York, in 1804, and removed with her parents to Buffalo, in 1810. There they were among the pioneers of that city, and endured the hardships and privations incident to the early settlement of any locality, and which in their case, were rendered particularly severe, being added, as they were to the horrors of the war of 1812, during which they were driven from their home by the British soldiers and their Indian allies. This occurred December 30, 1813, the time when Buffalo was burned by the British. Samuel H. Colton was born at Cherry Valley, New York. He settled, with his parents, in Buffalo previous to the war of 1812. His death occurred in Johnson county, Iowa, July 5, 1881. He was then in the eighty-eighth year of his age. When the subject of this sketch was very young, his parents moved to Wyoming county of the same state, where they lived six years, then returned to Erie county and located at Alden. He remained there until 1862, when he came to Iowa and engaged in driving stage from Bellevue to Dubuque. The same year he joined the army and was employed in the quarter-master's department until July 1865, then returned to Iowa and purchased a farm in Washington township, Jackson county. He lived there until the date of his coming to this county, 1876. Mr. Colton was married in Erie county, New York, February, 20, 1851, to Mariette Johnson a native of St. Lawerence county, New York, and daughter of Amasa and Sarah (Wells) Johnson, natives of Connecticut. Mr. and Mrs. Colton have one child--Alice, wife of W. W. Shuman.
Contributed by Lisa Varnes-Rex from "History of Cass County, Iowa. Together With Sketches of its Towns, Villages and Townships, Educational, Civil, Military and Political History: Portraits of Prominent Persons, and Biographies of Old Settlers and Representative Citizens." Springfield, Ill.: Continental Historical Company, 1884, pg. 816.
