Barber County Kansas
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Barber County Kansas |
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Jesse Leonard Pelton, 23, married Cynthia Murry, age 19, at Ottokee, Ohio. Four of their eleven children died at an early age. When Agnes was 7, she went to the creek to play in the water's edge - an alligator gar bit her hand, and she died of blood poisoning.They heard of the Sharon Valley in Barber County and its promises, so they came in a covered wagon and settled near Sharon in 1881. Jesse had fought in the Civil War, so they had some financial help from his pension.
A year later their twelfth child, Harvey, was born. Then the youngest girl, Cynthia Hanna, climbed to the top of a cupboard, found and ate some poison, and died. They raised seven of their twelve children.
Alice married Vernon Mitchell, a Barber County man, and lived on a farm northwest of Sharon for a while, then moved to Arkansas.
Jesse Pelton was very active in the Sharon community. He was Justice of the Peace, an Elder in the Christian Church, and one of the organizers and secretary of AHTA.
Cynthia Pelton was a Homepathic Doctor and was kept busy in the community tending to ailments, injuries, births, and was a friend and good neighbor to all. She spent her last years after the death of her husband in 1922, with the Harvey Pelton family at Medicine Lodge. Occasionally she would go visit her son Leonard's family at Caldwell.
Jesse Pelton gave each of his children 80 acres of land if they stayed home until the age of 21, or they could pay $50 for the land for each year they left home before the age 21.
Only two children settled and stayed in Barber County. Albert married a widow, Carrie Hill of Boston. She had 3 daughters - Georgi, Elizabeth and Jenny, ages 14, 11 and 7 years. He stayed on the home place with his parents.
Harvey lived all his life in Barber County. He married and raised his family at Medicine Lodge. Since he left home before he was 21, he paid his father $200.00 for his 80 acres of land, east of Sharon. This is now owned by Orville Pelton of Attica.
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