My Genealogy Hound

ADAM WELLS, P. O. Wahsburg. Mr. Wells is one of the most prominent citizens and largest land-holders of this township, was born in Virginia July 4, 1805. His father was Benjamin Wells, a native of Maryland. At the commencement of the Revolutionary war, he enlisted on the side of the colonies, and during his term of service suffered the loss of his left hand. This withdrew him from active labor, and, as he was a farmer, the duties of the farm fell mostly on his boys. He came to Ohio in 1810, locating on the place now owned by John Manus, in the “Bush Woods,” where he resided about five years. He then purchased a farm on Straight Creek, where he resided till his death, which occurred about 1847. He married Mary Rice, who died shortly after the Revolutionary war closed. His second wife was Polly Aultz, a native of Germany, who bore him six children. None of the children by his first wife ever came to Ohio. Adam Wells, the subject of this sketch, accompanied his parents to Brown County when but five years of age. As schools were very scarce during his boyhood days, and the subscription very high, he did not have the advantages of an education, but was forced to toil early and late to assist his father in the making of a new home. When twenty-four years of age he went to Cincinnati, to work in a pork establishment, for the purpose of earning money to buy himself some clothes, of which he was greatly in need. He has been engaged in farming in Brown County all his life, and at present owns about five hundred acres of land, mostly under cultivation, in Franklin Township. Mr. Wells is in his seventy-eighth year, and never suffered from a day’s sickness until about a year ago (1881). He is a successful agriculturist, and well respected by one and all. He married Betsey Rice, a native of this county, who was the mother of six children, three sons and three daughters. Mr. Wells’ second and present wife was Rhoda Stansbury, also a native of this county. She is the mother of twelve children. Of the eighteen children born to Mr. Wells, thirteen survive — Henry (a physician of Franklin Township), Sallie (wife of J. L. Carbery, a farmer of Franklin Township), Roanna (wife of Jefferson Lindsay, of Williamsburg, Clermont Co., Ohio), Jacob, George and John (farmers of this township), Joseph, Bettie (wife of Henry Miller, a blacksmith and tobacco-raiser), Charlie (married and residing in Brown County, near the Ohio River), James (in Georgetown), and David and Gideon (the latter a great reader and a boy of promise). Mrs. Wells is still living and in her seventy-seventh year. Adam Wells never sued a man, or has been sued; never was a witness before a jury or Justice of the Peace: never on a jury but once, and has always abstained from contracting debts; he is well known in Brown County, and enjoys the good will of all.