Smith, Martin

The following data is extracted from Genealogy and Biography of Ontario County, New York.

Martin Smith, son of Asa Smith, was born in Ormstown, Canada, March 23, ,808, and came with his parents when he was a small boy to Manchester, Ontario county, New York. He was the eldest of fourteen children, of whom Edmund, Frederick, Rufus and Elvira, of Manchester, and Franklin D. Smith, of Phelps, are living. Martin Smith was a farmer at Manchester. He married Welthea Wells, born at Penfield, Monroe county, New York, July 15, 18,0, and came with her parents to Manchester when she was about four years old. Her sister Jane married Jonathan Fisk; and Delia married Alanson Fisk, both of Arcadia, Wayne county, New York. Her father, Peter Wells, was born and brought up in Farmington, New York, where his father settled soon after the revolution, coming thither from Massachusetts. Her mother, Clarissa (McLouth) Wells, was born in Farmington, July 5, 1784. She was left a widow at the age of twenty-eight years and had three young children. She resolutely undertook to support herself and children, taking charge of a farm of one hundred acres and conducting it successfully. She lived on her farm to the time of her death at the advanced age of eighty years. This farm is near Port Gibson and is now (1910) owned by Judson Throop. Her father, Lawrence McLouth, was highly educated and spoke several languages. She was the eldest of a large family. Her grandchildren remember with pleasure the anecdotes of her youth and the story of her plucky life after the death of her husband. She used to tell how on a cold winter evening the children saw what they thought was a colt looking in the window, but it proved to be a wolf. Children of Martin Smith: Peter, born June 5, 1833, died March 23. 1835; Clarrissa, June 3, 1837, died May 26, 1905; Fidelia, October 15, 1838, died July 2, 1869; William, October 5, 1840, died June 12, 1842; Mary J., August 27, 1842, now (1910) a resident of Michigan; Margaret, August 5, 1845, died June 3, 1846; Emma, June 3, 1849, now (1910) of Michigan; Isaac N., May 19, 1851, mentioned elsewhere; Lewis, June 20, 1853, died February 17, 1862.

Isaac Newton, son of Martin Smith, was born in Manchester, May 19, 1851. He attended the district schools until eighteen years of age, when he spent two winters at the Marion Collegiate Institute in Marion, Wayne county, New York. He then taught school in winter and followed farming in summer for four years. In 1878 he bought a farm in what is now (1910) the village of Manchester, where he now (1910) resides. In 1892 the Lehigh Valley railroad yards were located here and the round house and coal pockets are on a part of his farm, taken for the purpose. At this time he built a steam saw mill and conducted it until it was destroyed by fire ten years later. He immediately rebuilt the mill, however, and installed improved machinery, and has continued in business successfully to the present time. In politics he is a Prohibitionist, in religion a Baptist.

He married, December 31, 1873, Adah Harriet Buck, of Hudson, Michigan, born April 13, 1852, daughter of George and Harriet (Smith) Buck. Children: Edgar Newton, born October 27, 1874, died January 8, 1888; Luman Lewis, April 6, 1878, died November 15, 1910. married Estella P. Haner, resided in Manchester Village.

Source: Genealogy and Biography of Ontario County, New York

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