A Family History of Alvin Brooks: Articles and Documents
The Autobiography of Alvin Brooks
In writing a history of myself I shall not go into detailed account of circumstances as they transpired, but merely to show a line of ancestry. My father was born in the year of 1771. He was the youngest of eleven children. His father died when he was very young therefore his chance for education was very limited.
About the year of 1794 he was married to my mother, Mary Peck, she also lost her father, and was brought up by her step-father, whose name was Jonathan Dean.
My mother had eight children. Their names were respectively; Russel, Eunice, Louisa, Norman, Rhoda, Alvin, Orval and Alphonzo, five boys and three girls. My parents were born in Connecticut, they were married in the state of New York and settled in West Moreland Co. when it was all a wilderness. They had many hardships to encounter in that wild country. They were hard working industrious people and tried to bring their children up to industry and education to the best of their ability.
They were of the Presbiterian Church and in those days were very strict.
I shall leave the history of my parents and notice some of the events of my own life. I was born in the town of Otisco, Unandago Co., state of New York, in the year 1807 about the time my father’s house was burned down and, according to account I narrowly escaped, as I was the last that was saved from the flames. After I was old enough to attend school, I went to school until I was ten or twelve years old and then my father moved to Genesee County near the Genesse River where we lived ten or eleven years. Here he bought and cleared up a new farm. He sold out and moved farther west into Chetocua Co. We stayed but one year there. While we lived there my mother was taken sick and died in 1818, in the fifty-seventh year of her age. From here we moved to Erie Co., town of Aurora, where we bought a small farm and built a house and made some improvements. Here I became acquainted with Sallie Carr, and after a short acquaintance, we were married Dec.1831, and in 1832 our first child was born. We called her Sophrona. Soon after I sold my farm and the next winter I moved into a house to live through the winter and one evening when we were away from home the house took fire and burned down, with most of its contents. And there in the dead of winter without house or home or nothing to do. And in May following,1833, our second child was born. We called him Gilmon. We then lived in a shop until we could get a better place. In the summer my brother-in-law, Wm. Farrington, took a large job of chopping. I moved into the place to chop and to board hands for him. I will stop here and relate the death of my father. He had been absent a year when he came in 1833 and was taken sick with pleuracy and died. He was sixty-one years of age. After working through the summer and most of the fall, I moved to the town of Ewins, distant about twenty miles and lived with my wife’s father through the winter, and the next spring we moved to Erie, Elk Creek township, Pennsylvania. I moved into the forest a mile from any house and put me up a shanty. It was all woods for five or six miles around and here I saw trouble and hardships. The first winter I lost my oxen and cow with murrin. I had nothing to help myself with but my hands and wages were low. Men could only get from fifty to seventy-five cents a day for haying and harvesting and I had to work some away from home. I would find my way by my wife hallowing for me as the thick timber made it very dark and there were no plain roads. I stayed night and day and chopped. I chopped several jobs while I was there. About this time Alphonzo was born and from the time of his birth my wife became insane and caused me a great deal of trouble. I had to watch her all the time. She would often try to run away and often attempt to kill herself. She thought her neighbors all wanted to kill her. At last when I was away from home one day she took her babe and as much as she could carry and started to run away. I came home at night and found that she had gone, the two children were in bed and everything was in confusion. I went to the nearest neighbor and got him to see to the children and things and I went in pursuit of her. I went five or six miles that night and the next day I overtook her. I got aboard the stage and took her to her father’s in Ohio. I went back and got the children and things and we lived there through the winter. I was obliged to give up my farm so I took a job of cutting cord wood. I took ten acres of heavy timber to cut into cord wood and would have done well if I could have done it but in the summer I was again broken up. She left me again and I was left with the two youngest children and I was obliged to give up my job and here I could relate a good many things which would be unpleasant to relate. After a short absence she wrote to me, she was married to another man, and then I gave her up for good.
In the fall of the same year I started for the state of Illinois, town of Erie, county of Whiteside,, where I made me a claim several years before the land came into market. The country was entirely new. I worked a farm on the shares the first season and the next spring I was married to Dorcus Barney. We were married May 16th, 1839. I built on my claim and on May 16 1840 Ruth Eliza was born and in Sept. following we were both taken sick with the fever. We were both unable to help ourselves and help was scarce.
My brother and my wife’s brother-in-law came with a wagon and took us to my brother’s where we were both confined to our beds and on the 10th of Sept. 1840 she departed this life in the 34th year of her age, having a babe of six months old and I was left with three helpless children to provide for the best I could.
In Feb. 1841 I was married to Phoebe Freer and since that time we have had eight children, five sons and three daughters.
July 24th Ruth Eliza died, aged six years and four months, and on March 29th 1849 Minerva Jane died, aged three months, and Oct. 15th 1856 Alphonzo Brooks was killed in Minnesota, aged twenty years and ten months, and from 1840 to 1853 nothing of importance transpired more than I have mentioned. About this time I sold my farm and bough another one about one mile from the old farm. Thee I made improvements and lived for fourteen or fifteen years and then I sold again and in Oct. 1867 we started for Kansas.
We landed on the Republican and here I expect to spend the remainder of my life. I have seen many hard times as I have been a pioneer most of my life. I have seen the heavy forest turned into fruitful fields. I have seen towns and cities spring up on the wild prairies and wild beasts and Indians have vanished before the pioneer, and civilization has taken the place of savages and their hunting grounds. Here I shall close my narrative. I could have written much more, but all I intended was to give a few of the events of my life as they came to my mind in a period of sixty-three years.
Alvin Brooks
Alvin Brooks died July 5th 1893. Aged eighty-six years and four months.
Index | Family Histories | Photo Album | Articles and Documents