Person:Abner Eddy (3)

He appears in Salisbury in land transactions with his brothers in 1798 and 1799. By 1801 he was located in Great Bend, Pennsylvania, where he carried on a business. He is listed as a cordwainer among the other merchants. In 1805 and 1807 he purchased land in Oneida County, New York, and in 1805 and 1806 he sold land there. He was drafted in the War of 1812, but because of poor health, he hired David Tryon to serve in his stead. In 1815 he moved to Wayne County, Ohio. He built a homestead and lived in it the remainder of his life.

He died in Prairie, Wayne County, Ohio on June 22, 1861. Martha died on February 8, 1847.

Abner was in Plain Township 19 June 1801. He puchased land on that date. He then sold land in Plain Township to Augustus on 25 July 1814. Abner was an Innkeeper with property valued at $3,500 in 1850, Wayne County, Ohio.

BIOGRAPHY: From The History of Wayne County, Ohio by Ben Douglass: Abner Eddy, Sen., was born in Salisbury, Conn., April 4, ,1773. His father was a native of Rhode Island, and his grandfather was an Englishman. He remained with his father, who was a tanner and leather dealer, until he was twenty-five years of age, when he married to Martha Chapman, of Litchfield, Conn., in 1798, when he removed to Birmingham, and thence to Luzerne County, Pa., thence to Madison County, New York, and thence to Erie County, same state, having been in the neighborhood of Buffalo when it was sacked and burned. From Erie County he removed to what is now Clinton Township, in 1815, settling on the place now occupied by Asa Eddy (date of writing, 1878). Though Mr. Eddy can not be classed with the first grade of pioneers, he nevertheless entered the county at a period when there were but few white settlers, and when the surrounding country was a wilderness. On his arrival he built a log-cabin, in which he lived for thirteen years, when he erected a brick house upon the foundation of the original one, upon its completion, in January, 1830, he opened a place of public entertainment, called "Eddy's Inn," in which he continued until the opening up of the railroad, in 1852. Judge Eddy's house was headquarters for stage-men, public officials and speculators, who traversed the old coach-line for nearly a quarter of a century. This coach-line was owned by Neal, Moore & Co., of Columbus, and superintended by K.R. Porter, of Wooster, who also had stock in the route. This route extended from Cleveland to Cincinnati, and the travel upon it was simply immense. Mr. Eddy was appointed Postmaster in 1822, the first appointment, probably, in the township, and retained the office for many years. He was elected Justice of the Peace about 1822, the first record in the journal bearing date of May 13, 1822, and the first case he issued upon was that of Albert White against Abner Lake, in a civil transaction. From the appearance of Judge Eddy's docket, and his old files of papers, he must have done a thriving business, for he had them nearly all brought before him, "dead or alive," from John Driskel up to the Baptist minister or the Methodist class-leader. He slammed even justice into the face of the professional Christians the same as into the professional thief. The Driskels, the Jewells, the Rowans, the Conner and Lytles, and the notorious Nathan Nichols and Jones, all were at times brought under his jurisdiction. One party he sent to the Wooster jail for thirty days for stealing a hog. When Juge Eddy (When living in Erie, New York, the Governor of that State appointed him one of the Associate Judges of the Court) settled on his place 63 years ago he encountered many obstacles, before which men of less determination would have succumbed. In going to Wooster, for the first five years he had to go by the way of Newkirk's, for the reason that he could not cross the prairies east of him. Near his house were distinct remains of beaver dams, and rattlesnakes and blacksnakes. Deer roamed the county in abundance, and a fact notably observable was that they remained in that section ten years longer than elsewhere in the county. Cranberries grew north of him in abundance, and so plenty were they that his son, Asa Eddy, remarked to us that "he could pick a bushel in an hour." They were finally destroyed by drainage and general pasturage. He had eleven children, eight boys and three girls. His death occurred June 22, 1861, in his 89th year. Judge Eddy wsa a useful, valuable and intelligent citizen, and performed a heroic part in the early settlement of the county. Emmet Eddy, his son, was born in Madison County, New York, February 25, 1807, and removed to Wayne County with his father in 1815, and Asa Eddy, another son, lives on the homestead farm entered by his father on his arrival in the county. They are men of business and intelligence, and scrupulously honest in their relations to the world. They are men of independent minds, energetic workers, devoted to agriculture, stock-raising, and are honorable, hard-working, prosperous and wealthy farmers.

1. ↑ Lucius Barnes Barbour 1878-1934. Barbour Collection: Connecticut vital records prior to 1850
   #2912.
2. ↑ Burials in Wayne County, Ohio
   pg 168.
3.   Douglass, Ben; Wooster, Ohio. History of Wayne County, Ohio: From the Days of the Pioneers and First Settlers to the Present Time. (Robert Douglas, Publisher; Indianapolis, Ind., 1878).