My Genealogy Hound

PARISH, F. W., P. O. Clarinda; born June 11, 1846, in Iowa county, Wisconsin. His parents moved to Grant county when he was about six years old. There he matured to manhood and was educated in the common schools of that state. His father having died when he was about six years old, he was left to the cold charities of the world, and was engaged in almost all kinds of business until the breaking out of the rebellion when he enlisted September 28, 1862, in the sixth Wisconsin battery, and re-enlisted in 1864, serving until the close of the war, and was discharged August 26, 1865, at Madison, Wisconsin. He was promoted to sergeant of the battery for gallant service in defending his guns at the battle of Corinth, when the company lost thirty-two out of sixty-three in less than six minutes. In this engagement he received a saber cut in the head and also in his left arm, and was carried from the field in an insensible condition. After his return home he went to Madison, Wisconsin, and went through Worthington & Warren’s commercial school, where he graduated in 1866. He then worked on a farm for a few months and then went to Boscobel, where he got a situation in the grain house of Palmer & Cotes, with a salary of $20 per month. He remained with them about eighteen months in various capacities. In 1868 he came to Decorah, Iowa, and engaged with the Commonwealth Insurance company of that place, as general agent. He remained there but a short time as the company soon failed. He then came to Marshalltown, where he was employed as clerk in the Williamson house; there he remained until the fall of 1869, at which time he became the manager of the new Willard house of that place, but as this house soon changed hands he, in February, 1870, went to Council Bluffs where he was employed in the Ogden house as clerk, and in May of that year he went to the Pacific house, and from there to the Barrott house, at Burlington, in August, 1870. He returned to Council Bluffs in October, 1870. He went into the Ogden house again as clerk, where he remained until the spring of 1872, at which time, on account of poor health, he gave up the hotel business and engaged with the C. B. & Q. railroad as brakesman, and then was baggage master, which he followed one year, during which time he was thrown from the train when running thirty-five miles an hour, without serious injury. In March, 1873, he opened the Ogden house at Council Bluffs for the proprietors, and stayed with them until June of the same year, when he went to Long View Junction, Texas, and opened the railroad hotel at that place. He was there during the quarantine against the yellow fever, remaining there until May, 1874, when he returned to Council Bluffs, and in connection with Mr. Porterfield, leased the Pacific house, which they run until October 6, 1875, when he sold out and came to Clarinda, where he purchased the drug stock and good will of N. L. & A. S. Van Sandt, which business he is still engaged in. He was married September 12, 1869, to Miss Jennie Wicken, a native of Wisconsin. They have had three children: Charles O., living, and two deceased in infancy.