Person:Samuel Cassman (3)

SAMUEL L. CASSMAN was born on 10 Feb 1837 at Delaware County, Indiana. Samuel suffered continual tragedy throughout his life. It started with the death of his five year old brother Philander Jr. when he was eight. Five years later Philander Senior died at the age of 34, leaving the 13-year-old Samuel without a father. Five years after that the now 18-year-old Samuel became an orphan when his mother Catherine also died before the age of 40.

It isn’t known of Philander and Catherine moved their family from Muncie to Lafayette or if sometime after Samuel lost his parents he moved there. In any event, Samuel met Mary Kahl of Lafayette and married her there five years after his mother’s death left him an orphan at 18.

He married MARY ANN KAHL on 18 Jul 1861 at Tippecanoe County, Indiana, at the age of 24. They quickly had six children in just ten years. Trouble began again after the birth of their fifth child, daughter Jennie in 1870. The next year Sam’s brother Hamilton died at 28. Sam’s oldest son James died that same year, just nine years old. Mary gave birth to youngest daughter Mary Agnes a year later, but something must have been wrong because Sam would have daughter Ida with another woman the year after Mary Agnes was born. Mary died two years later, just 37. Mary was just 37 years old when she died, leaving her husband to raise the children, aged three to thirteen at the time of her death.

He married JEANNOT [CASSMAN] circa 1875. Jeannot and Sam had a daughter Ida, who was born in 1873, two years before Sam's first wife Mary died. Four years later the 1880 census shows finds Samuel in his brother Oliver’s house in Lafayette. His children aren’t listed as members of the household. Jeannot and Ida aren't listed either. Of course the surviving children grew up and lived full lives in the Lafayette area, so the only mystery is how they were taken care of as children. Perhaps Samuel was simply visiting his brother when the census taker came by. Samuel was listed in the Lafayette city directory at several different residences throughout the 1880s. He was an iceman for the Lafayette Ice Co between 1880 and 1891.

He married RENA SNEATHEN on 17 Jan 1885 at Tippecanoe County, Indiana, at the age of 47. He and RENA SNEATHEN appeared on the census of 1900 at Farifield Township, Lafayette, Tippecanoe County, Indiana. He was a Day Laborer in 1900.

He died in a horse and wagon accident on 12 Feb 1904 at Lafayette, Tippecanoe County, Indiana, at age 67.

The Tragic Life of Sam Cassman

• Sam’s father Philander died when he was thirteen.
• He became an orphan at eighteen when his mother died five years later.
• Sam left Delaware County, Indiana and moved across the state to Lafayette in Tippecanoe County. Here he met a young Irish girl named Mary Kahl and they married when he was 24. Things were wonderful for the first few years of their marriage. They had five children, first four boys James, William, Harry and George and then daughter Jennie. The soap opera phase of their lives became apparent around 1870 when Sam was in his early 40s.
  • In 1871 Sam’s eldest son, nine year old James, died.
  • Sam’s 39 year old younger brother died late in that same year.
  • Sam and Mary’s last child, a daughter named Mary was born a few months later. Sam and Mary’s marriage was obviously troubled. Sam had a daughter by a woman named Jeannot in 1873, the year after Mary was born.
  • Sam’s wife Mary then died two year’s later at the age of just 37. Sam was a widower with five children and an illegitimate daughter. Then four year old Mary died the following year.
• From age thirteen to age thirty-nine Sam lost

1. His father
2. His mother, making him an orphan
3. His oldest son at the age of nine
4. His brother
5. His wife, leaving him a widower with five children
6. And then his youngest daughter at the age of four

• In the 1880 census Sam is found working with his younger brother Oliver. Oliver had a business selling ice. The children don’t appear anywhere in the census. Since son Harry is alive and well in Lafayette years later, it is easy to imagine that they stayed in the area. They apparently weren’t living with their uncle though.
• Sam married Rena Sneathen in 1885 when he was forty-eight. They boys were 21, 19 and 17, daughter Jennie was 15. It’s not clear what happened to Jeannot or her daughter Ida. Tragedy wasn’t done with Sam yet as Ida died when she was just twenty-one.
• Sam even died tragically. Twenty years after marrying Rena, while still working for Oliver in the Ice business, the sixty seven year old Sam was killed in a horse wagon accident.

Census

Samuel L. Cassman Census

Year	Source	Image
1870	1870 US Federal Population Census: Tippecanoe, Tippecanoe County, Indiana
1880	1880 US Federal Population Census: Lafayette, Tippecanoe County, Indiana
1900	1900 US Federal Population Census: Fairfield, Tippecanoe County, Indiana

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2} Gene Cassman. Cassman GED Gene Cassman. (GED File, Downloaded Aug 25, 2001).
2. ↑ Index to death record : Tippecanoe County, Indiana, 1882-1920 inclusive: Volume I. (Works Progress Administration, 1938)
   1904.
   Death Record
3. ↑ 1870 US Federal Population Census: Tippecanoe, Tippecanoe County, Indiana
   1870.
4. ↑ ^4.0 4.1 1880 US Federal Population Census: Lafayette, Tippecanoe County, Indiana
   1880.
5. ↑ Lafayette, Indiana Directories, 1885-88, 1891: Sam Cassman Entries. (Online Database).
6.   Sam Cassman Death Certifcate
   1904.
   Death Certificate
7.   Slevin, Ruth M. Tippecanoe County, Indiana Marriage Records: Book 4, November, 1850 through Book 9, September, 1861. (Fort Wayne Public Library, 1975)
   1861.
   Marriage Record
8.   1900 US Federal Population Census: Lafayette, Tippecanoe County, Indiana
   1900.
9. ↑ Death Certificate