Buck, George

The following data is extracted from Windham County, Connecticut History.

David Buck removed from Massachusetts to the part of Killingly now embraced in the town of Putnam, where he conducted a farm and also carried on the trade of a joiner. He was known as an enterprising and successful business man. His children by a first marriage were three sons, David, Jonathan and Aaron, and four daughters, Mrs. Josiah Dean, Mrs. Benjamin Cutler, and two who married Resolved Wheaton. By a second marriage was born a son, David, and a daughter, Eliza, who became Mrs. Henry Adams. Aaron, of this number, was born on the homestead farm in Killingly, upon a portion of which he settled and resided during his lifetime. He married Annie, daughter of Asa Lawrence, of Killingly, whose children were: Lucy, wife of Calvin Leffingwell; Rosamund, wife of Calvin Boyden; Mary, married to Jesse Herendein; Annie, wife of Caleb Howe; Erastus, Elisha, Augustus and George.

The last named of these brothers, and the subject of this biographical sketch, was born October 13th, 1810, in Killingly, and until his twentieth year devoted his time to the work of the farm. He enjoyed but limited opportunities of education, and soon found employment in a cotton mill. This not being altogether to his taste, he became one of the leading builders and contractors of the day. For ten years he was employed by Messrs. M. S. Morse & Co. and Messrs. G. C. Nightingale & Co., in connection with the construction and improvement of their property, after which he embarked in building, and dealt to some extent in real estate at the same time. For twenty years he has been the trusted guardian of the real estate and other property owned by Thomas Harris in Putnam.

Mr. Buck has been more or less prominent in affairs connected with his county, was for three terms county commissioner, for five years selectman of the town, and served for the session of 1878-79 as a member of the Connecticut house of representatives. In politics he was first a federalist, afterward became identified with the free soil party, whose principles he espoused with much earnestness, and is now a strong prohibitionist. Since the age of eighteen he has practiced total abstinence, and made it one of the guiding principles of his life. He joined the Congregational church in North Killingly at the age of twenty-one, and later became a member of the Putnam Congregational church. The earliest edifice of the latter church he was largely instrumental in erecting, and did much to advance the interests of the society. Mr. Buck in 1831 married Phila Williams, of Ashford, Connecticut. He was a second time married in December, 1867, to Sarah Maria, daughter of Colonel Erastus Lester, of Plainfield.

Source: Windham County, Connecticut History

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