Among the pioneer families of this county the Lewis family may be mentioned. In November, 1810, Mr. Lewis and wife and little daughter, nine months old, emigrated from Petersburg to Antwerp. They located on what is known as the “Lewis Farm.”
Their first cabin was twelve by fourteen feet without fire-place. At one end of the cabin was a stone wall, against which the fire was built, the end of the cabin being left open to let the smoke escape, and every night it rained or snowed it would put out the fire, and the family was obliged to go to the neighbors for fire, as there were no matches in those days. In the following spring a small room was added to afford sleeping-apartments for jobbers. In this rude structure eight persons lived and enjoyed life. After two years, Mr. Lewis built a log house, eighteen by twenty-five. This was much more convenient. Here Mr. Lewis and wife reared seven children to industry and frugality. They had to yard their stock every night, as wolves and panthers were very thick, and would often come very near the house.
Mrs. Lewis made all the clothes for her family out of flax and wool. It was difficult in those days to get money to pay even the taxes, and more than once land had to be sold to pay them; but time brought changes to this happy home. Next was a frame building, and ere they had enjoyed its comforts many years, Mr. Lewis was called to his long home, June 28, 1859, leaving the care of the family to his wife. He was about sixty years of age when he died. After a few more years the youngest in the family, a daughter, was called. She was the mother of four sons, two of whom still live. Of the remaining six children in the Lewis family, all are settled in life; two are in Illinois, one in Delaware, and two in the state of New York, and the daughter, now Mrs. Hall, is living on the old farm.
One of the sons was a soldier in the War of the Rebellion for three years, was a preacher for eleven months in Cahawba, Alabama. During the war the Lewis farm passed into the hands of Caleb G. Hall, and during the years of 1869-70, he built his present fine residence, a view of which, together with the portraits of Mr. and Mrs. Lewis, may be seen below. 1)Durant, Samuel W; Peirce, H. B. (Henry B.) History of Jefferson County, New York. Philadelphia: L.H. Everts & co. 1878.
Footnotes:
| ↑1 | Durant, Samuel W; Peirce, H. B. (Henry B.) History of Jefferson County, New York. Philadelphia: L.H. Everts & co. 1878. |
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