My Genealogy Hound

Thomas Smith, who is a most highly esteemed resident of Holly, Michigan, where he owns 27 acres of land within the corporate limits, and also 60 acres, well improved, in section 27, Holly township, is a survivor of the Mexican War. He was born in Allegany County, New York, December 25, 1825, and is one of the family of 11 children born to Curtin and Orilla (Gillett) Smith, both of whom were born in New York. Five of these children still survive, one of whom resides at Saginaw, Michigan. Curtin Smith was a drummer in the War of 1812, although his business through life was the peaceful one of farming.

When our subject was 14 years old, his parents removed to what is now Wyoming County, New York, and settled in the vicinity of Gainesville, where he remained until he was 21 years of age, when he came to Michigan. The year 1845 found him in Holly township, Oakland County, and in the fall of that year he went into a lumber camp in the northern part of the Lower Peninsula, and on the spring drive of logs came down to Saginaw, which was then but a village. There he assisted in a sawmill for a time and then went back to Holly township where he worked on the farm of James K. Patterson, and in the following fall went to Pontiac and hired out to drive a team for Amasa Green during the winter, in the employ of a distillery. Early in the following spring he went to work at the sawmill at Pontiac, but in April of that year, with a companion, enlisted for service in the Mexican War, being under that old hero, Gen. Winfield Scott. By the time the regiment reached Vera Cruz, our subject was obliged to enter a hospital where he remained four months, when he attempted to rejoin his regiment, then at the City of Mexico. Illness made him again give up and after two more months he went to Pueblo, and finally to the City of Mexico, not reaching there, however, until after the place had been taken. He rejoined his regiment and a month later was sent with it some 75 miles farther west, where it was stationed until the signing of the treaty of peace. Returning to Vera Cruz, he took a steamer at New Orleans, sailed up the Mississippi River and was finally discharged at Cincinnati, Ohio, in August, 1848.

After this adventure, Mr. Smith returned to Holly township for a short time and then started back to Gainesville, New York, to see his parents, and also visited at Scio, Allegany County, New York, and worked there for a time in the timber and in a sawmill.

On December 31, 1849, Mr. Smith was married to Rozetta Hazard, who was born and reared in Allegany County; she died June 13, 1899, of paralysis, aged 71 years. Their four children were: Arthur D., born September 13, 1850, who was married and then removed to Muncie, Indiana, where he is a fine mechanic, engaged in the railroad shops; Eugene, born August 2, 1855, was killed at Flint, Michigan, February 23, 1884, aged 28 years, when performing his duty as brakeman on the Pere Marquette Railroad, leaving a widow and daughter who reside in Chicago; William H., born September 1, 1858, who resides near his father, being engaged in farming; and Agnes, born September 11, 1868, who married Ambrose Shields, and they reside with our subject on the farm in Holly township, — they have two children, Eugene, born April 9, 1888, and Forrest, born January 22, 1898. William H. Smith, our subject’s second son, has followed railroading for 22 years, spending four years at Chicago in the yards of the Lake Shore & Eastern, nine years on the Pere Marquette and four months on the Northern Pacific, four years at Battle Creek with the Grand Trunk and then back to Chicago, where his first wife, Isabel Fisher, died, leaving four children: Madge, born November 2, 1883; Frank, born December 1, 1885; Bessie, born August 11, 1892; and Donald, born May 14, 1894. As his second wife, he was married to Mrs. George Garfield, formerly Addie Seldon, of Omaha, Nebraska; she had one child by her first marriage, — Gussie, now deceased.

After their marriage in 1848, Mr. Smith and wife located on the farm in New York, which Mr. Smith operated four years, but in 1855 with his wife and son he came to Holly township, Oakland County, Michigan, having in the previous year purchased a farm here, trading his land warrant and paying the balance. He located in section 27, since which time he has disposed of some of the land to the cement company, but still retains 60 acres. This he cleared and has carried on general farming, in the meantime improving it with fine buildings, drainage and fencing.

Mr. Smith has always been a Democrat. Fraternally he has been a member of the Masonic lodge at Holly for 38 years. In religious views he is liberal. He enjoys the advantages of the Rural Free Delivery, Route No. 2, from Holy, and was one of the prime movers in securing it and other advantages. He has lived a long life and has been permitted to see the wonderful changes which have come to this section, since his first advent here, and takes a great interest in them.