My Genealogy Hound

JOHN E. ELLIS, farmer, P. O. Georgetown, was born in Pleasant Township May 24, 1817; the son of Noah and Margaret (Evans) Ellis, both of whom were natives of Pennsylvania, his parentage being Irish; hers Scotch and Irish. Noah was in the war of 1812. John E. was reared in the country and received the limited education his neighborhood afforded. He adopted farming as his life pursuit, and has made a success of it. In 1837, he was married to Mary Wright, born in 1818, the daughter of Robert and Lydia (Waters) Wright. Her father was of Irish; her mother of Dutch extraction. Their children are Samuel, Lydia (wife of Samuel Burns, of Clark Township), Matilda, Arminda (wife of Matthew Dooley), G. L., Sally May (wife of Henry Andrews), Margaret A. (wife of William Page), Charles and Alcinda Isolina Douraman Devargus Dust. This rather remarkable name of the youngest child has this origin. Her eldest brother had been on a visit to Pike’s Peak and out west met a young lady, Alcinda Dust, to whom he became greatly attached. On his return, he wanted his baby sister named after her, but his father had seen an American heroine, so good and kind to disabled soldiers that he wished to perpetuate her name in his family. They compromised the matter by giving her both names. The family is noted for great physical development. The average weight of the children exceeds two hundred pounds; three of the girls have a combined weight of 647 pounds, while the young lady, who revels in the quintuple given name, now a blooming lass of twenty summers, tips the scales at something over 200 pounds. Mr. and Mrs. Ellis are members of the Union Church. He is a Democrat.