My Genealogy Hound

JOSEPH BOWERS, farmer, P. O. Hamersville, was born in Dauphin County, Penn., September 19, 1819. His parents, John and Margaret (Weaver) Bowers, were of German descent. Mr. Bowers left the parental roof and started to make his own living at the early age of sixteen years. He embarked at Pittsburgh on the steamer Oswego as cabin boy; the boat froze np on the first return trip from Louisville at Hanging Rock, and he had to walk to Pittsburgh. On the opening of navigation he shipped on the Dolphin as bar-keeper, and continued three years, then went to school a short time in Pittsburgh, then worked awhile in a blacksmith shop, and then worked at steamboat building for a couple of years, the most of the time in the finishing shop. All this time he was preparing himself for an engineer. He shipped for his first trip on the steamer Lilly as assistant engineer, and continued in the Wabash trade about three years on different boats. He then went on the Lower Mississippi trade, and was on the Mattamora when she sank in Cyprus Bend. He was in the Government service during the Mexican war on the steamer William R. McKee, on the Rio Grande, for nearly a year. He then went back to the Mississippi trade, where he continued on the different rivers of the South up to within a short time of the rebellion. During the civil war, he was enrolled as an engineer in the United States service, but was not called into active service. During his long and eventful career as a steamboat engineer, not a single life was lost by the carelessness or incapacity of the officers. Mr. Bowers was married in 1850 to Rahab Higgins, daughter of Wesley Higgins, a native of Brown County, and soon after, in 1854, settled in Clark Township, where he has since resided. He was in the huckster and grocery business for several years, and then bought his farm and went to farming. He raised three children, all girls — Emma B. (wife of Charlie De Vore), Sarah Ada (wife of George W. Moore), and Dora M.