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Jasper County, Iowa
Historical and Genealogical Data Exchange
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Miss
Hannah Nichols The
part women played in assisting the early settlers cannot be underestimated.
By nature not as robust physically as their male companions, hardships
and privations leaned more heavily upon them, but the women of that day who came
with their husbands and families into the loneliness of what was then the
wilderness or the wild trackless plains were equal to the occasion. The pioneer
woman, whether married or single, helped dispel the gloom, to disseminate the
sense of hopelessness which occasionally fell upon the settlers in their
relentless labor. A woman of such
caliber is Hannah Nichols, who can claim a wide acquaintance and a host of loyal
friends throughout Jasper County, who, having passed her four score and sixth
mile-stone, is an interesting link between the present and the rifle-bearing
days of the first settler when hardships were the rule and pleasures the
exception. Miss
Nichols, who is a member of the Fugard family and who is making her home with
Noble J. Fugard, she being a sister of Mrs. Fugard's mother, was one of the very
early settlers of Jasper County. She
was born August 12,1825,in Ottawa County, Ohio, and she was the daughter of John
and Mary (McLoyd) Nichols, the father having been born in Virginia in 1790, and
the mother's birth occurred in the same state in 1791.
They came to Ohio in early youth and were married there, continuing to
reside there until 1836, when they moved to Henry County, Indiana, where Mr.
Nichols worked as a carpenter. In 1854 the family moved to Iowa and settled in
Henry County at first and in the fall of that year they came to Buena Vista
Township, Jasper County, and bought one hundred and sixty acres just a mile
north of Murphy, for which they paid fifteen dollars per acre for the prairie
land and twenty dollars per acre for the timber land.
At that time there were only five families in the township.
The death of John Nichols occurred on December 22, 1855, his widow
surviving until June 18, 1870, both dying on the home farm which they had
labored so assiduously to develop. There
were seven children in their family, named as follows:
Abigail, born July l, 1816, died in early life; Nancy, born October 10,
1818, died in Jasper County, Iowa, in 1863; she was the wife of Joshua Delhorn;
Amy, born June 26, 1821, died in childhood; John, born October 7, 1822, died in
1901; Hannah, of this review; Mary, born May 1, 1828, died the following year;
Rebecca, born October 15, 1831, died April 23, 1863; she was the mother of Mrs.
Noble J. Fugard, mentioned above. For
the past eleven years Miss Nichols has made her home with Mr. Fugard and wife,
the latter being her niece and they have been pleased to minister to her every
want, but being hale and in possession of her faculties she is far from being a
burden in her declining age, and is a woman of remarkable memory, consequently
her reminiscences of pioneer days are interesting and instructive; she is quite
active. She lived on the same farm
from 1854 to 1904, a half-century, when the place was sold and she moved to town
with the Fugard family. She has
never married. Her life has been
filled with good deeds and she has always been known to have a very amiable and
genial disposition, which has endeared her to all who have come into contact
with her. The Past and Present of Jasper County, Gen. James B. Weaver, Editor-In-Chief, 1912 B.F. Bowen Co., Indianapolis, IN, p. 656. |
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