Obit: |
O'Neill, Hon. James O'Neill (1810 -1882) |
Contact: |
Susie |
Email: |
searcher4u@hotmail.com |
Surnames: |
O'NEILL DOUGLAS COVILL DARLING |
----Source: Republican Press March 30, 1882
O'Neill, Hon. James O'Neill (1810 - 1882)
The death of Hon. James O'Neill, Sr., who was one of the first, if not the first permanent settler in the territory now embraced in Clark county, and the founder of Neillsville, occurred at his residence in this village at 4 o'clock P.M. on Tuesday last, March 28, 1882, after an illness of but a few days duration. Though his death had been momentarily expected during the entire day upon which his eventful life dates its close, not until the whispered announcement, made in sadness and confirmed by tolling bells, that he had passed the portals of Time to the great hereafter, did we fully realize how deeply his loss could be felt by a community of which he was the founder and which owes its existence and prosperity to the privations he endured.
The deceased was born in the town of Lisbon, St. Lawrence County,
New York, May 4, 1810, and was the third of a family of nine
children, but one of whom is still living. At the age of seventeen
he left the paternal roof and commenced to hew for himself the
pathway of life, going into the employ of an elder brother then
doing business at Edwardsburg, Canada, as a clerk. A few years
later, in partnership with another brother, he engaged in lumbering
on the American side of the St. Lawrence River, in which business
he was engaged about a year, after which he was engaged in various
business enterprises in connection with his brothers in that
locality, until in June 1836, when bidding his father and mother
what proved to be a last farewell, he started for the then
unexplored and boundless west. During the three years following his
departure from home he visited many places in the west and south.
In September, 1839, in company with his brother Alexander, he
procured a canoe at Prairie du Chien, which they stocked with
provisions, and with which they made their first settlement on
Black River, stopping at a point about three miles below what is
now known as Black River Falls, where they built a saw mill. He
remained at that point until 1844 when he settled on the present
site of Neillsville and built the first building erected in the
territory now covered by our village, a rough log cabin that stood
on or near the ground now occupied by the Neillsville flouring
mills. On the sixth of March, 1846, after a bachlerhood that had
carried him to his thirty-sixth year, he espoused Jane Douglas, a
sister of the Hon. Mark Douglas, of Melrose, Jackson County, and of
Mrs. Isabella Mason, of Black River Falls, and with this event in
his life ended his disposition to roam from place to place, and
made him the founder of our present prosperous village, in whose
honor it was named.
He was elected to the assembly of Wisconsin in the fall of 1848
from the district composed of the counties of Chippewa and
Crawford, and was a member of the legislature of 1879. From
1861 - 1865 he held the office of treasure of Clark County, and in
1868 was again elected to the assembly from the district then
composed of the counties of Clark and Jackson. Aside from the
offices of honor and trust mentioned above, he served this county
in the important position of chairman of the county board of
supervisors for fifteen years, and held many important town
offices. In official position in which he was tried repeatedly and
well, as in other walks of life, he was ever found worthy of
confidence. He was a man of broad and generous sympathies, whose
hand was ever open to the needy. Generous to his friends, he was
equally just to his enemies, and today, though summoned to his rest
at a ripe old age, his loss is the occasion of universal regret,
and his memory will be cherished through life by all who knew
him.
Among the immediate friends who mourn his death are his widow and
their son, now in his seventh year, and the two daughters by his
first marriage- Mrs. W. S. Covill and Mrs. F. E. Darling, of this
place, and a brother residing on the old homestead where the life
now ended first began.
The funeral, which takes place from the Court House today at 2 pm,
will be conducted by the Rev. H. W. Bushnell, formerly the minister
in charge of the Methodist Church of this place.
© Every submission is protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998.
Show your appreciation of this freely provided information by not copying it to any other site without our permission.
Become a Clark County History Buff
|
|
A site created and
maintained by the Clark County History Buffs
Webmasters: Leon Konieczny, Tanya Paschke, Janet & Stan Schwarze, James W. Sternitzky,
|