My Genealogy Hound

Dr. Thomas G. Welch is a member of the medical firm of Welch & Summers, of Elm Springs, Ark., and was born in Madison County, Mo., in 1837, being a son of Henry R. and Eleanor M. (Hooser) Welch, who were born in Tennessee and Kentucky in 1810 and 1818, and died in Missouri in 1847 and 1874, respectively. They were worthy people, farmers by occupation, and were the parents of two sons and five daughters. Dr. Thomas Welch was reared in Cape Girardeau County, Mo., and after attending the common schools entered the Bloomfield Academy, which institution he attended for some time, acquiring a good, practical, business education. After reading and practicing medicine for some time he entered the American Medical College at St. Louis, Mo., and began practicing his profession in Ripley County, Mo., moving to Randolph County, Ark., in 1871. Afterward he removed to Washington County, and since 1885 has been a practicing physician of Elm Springs, and has a large and lucrative practice. In 1869 he was married, in Ripley County, Mo., to Miss Sarah I. Rife, a native of Tennessee, born in 1847, and by her became the father of eight children, three boys and five girls: H. Aora, W. Aretes, Annie, Gussie, Maud and Claud (twins), Emma and Lelia. Since 1873 Dr. Welch has been a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, being ordained deacon in 1877, and elder in 1884 and the last year. Each month he preaches once at the following places: Elm Springs, White Oak School-house and Smith’s Chapel. He is Deputy Grand Master in the A. F. & A. M., and in his political views is a Democrat. During the late Civil War he was in Jeff. Thompson’s State Guards, and after it was disbanded joined Marmaduke’s cavalry, and was captured in Kansas and taken to St. Louis. He was afterward sent to Cincinnati, and thence to Johnson’s Island, where he was kept until the close of the war.