My Genealogy Hound

Robert Staton, M. D., is among the very foremost of the professional men of the county, and his reputation as an able practitioner extends far beyond the limits of this section. He is a North Carolinian, his birth having occurred August 10, 1823, and he is a son of B. Staton of that State, who died in 1834. Dr. Staton was educated in his native State, his school tuition being 5 cents per day and from the time he was nine years of age he made his own way in the world, and paid for the schooling which he received. At the age of nineteen years, he began the study of medicine under Josiah Lawrence, M. D., and afterward entered the university of New York City, it being now known as the Bellevue Hospital Medical College, and in the month of April, 1845, began practicing his profession in North Carolina, but in July, 1849, came to Union County, Ark., and in 1867, to Ashley County, where he now lives. December 25. 1863, he joined Company A, Chamber’s battalion, but was afterward detailed to the medical department, and served in the capacity of druggist, during the remainder of the war, his company being disbanded April 15, 1865. He came to his present location December 24, 1870, and here owns a good farm of 102 acres, on which he raises an average amount of cotton and corn. He was married October 13, 1847, to Miss Barbara A. Hadley, of North Carolina, a daughter of W. P. Hadley, an Englishman, and their union has resulted in the birth of six children: Benjamin B., Cecilia E. (wife of William Leason, a mechanical engineer of Johnson County, Tex.), Hattie E. (wife of F. M. Hopkins), and William T. (married to Miss Mattie O. Sawyer, of Ashley County). Those deceased are: John Robert (who filled the position of sheriff, in a county in North Carolina, and died June 5, 1887), and Mary (who was the wife of G. W. Sawyer, and died July 20, 1879, leaving three children, two of whom are deceased). Prior to the war Dr. Staton was a Whig, but since that time he has been a Democrat, and socially he is a member of the A. F. & A. M., his wife being a worthy member of the Baptist Church. She was reared by Gen. Edwin P. Gaines, whose title was received in the Seminole War, his death occurring in New Orleans of cholera, in 1884. Dr. Staton has a picture of his wife that was painted, when she was seventeen years of age, by a noted French artist, A. Gibert, of New Orleans, at a cost of $250.