My Genealogy Hound

Herbert W. Graves of Sterling, Chicot County, Ark., was born in Windham County, Vt., on February 13, 1843, and is a son of Alphus and Fannie (Goodell) Graves, who were natives of Massachusetts and Vermont, respectively. The father was a minister of the Congregational Church, was a graduate of Union College in New York, and also attended the East Windsor Theological Seminary, Conn., and was a prominent and loved minister of that denomination for a period of forty-five years, the greatest part of that time being passed in the States of Iowa and Minnesota. He has now retired from his labor, and resides in Memphis, Tenn., and is seventy-four years old, and the mother of the subject of this sketch is only two years younger. Herbert W. Graves passed most of his youth in Iowa, having moved there with his father at the age of eleven, and attending good schools, where he received a thorough education. At the age of twenty-one Mr. Graves began life for himself, and gave his attention to mercantile business. After clerking three years he formed a partnership with his former employers. In the fall of 1867 he emigrated to Chicot County, Ark., where he resides at the present writing. Upon his arrival in this place he opened a mercantile business at Columbia, and at the expiration of one year was elected county clerk of Chicot County, and held this important office for ten years. When he moved to Sterling he opened up an extensive mercantile business, and carries a splendid stock of goods. He also owns valuable farm property at Sterling and in the State of Louisiana, and is engaged in planting and mercantile business at both places.