My Genealogy Hound

JOHN WESLEY BARNS, farmer, P. O. Georgetown, a prominent farmer of Franklin Township, was born at Monongalia, Middleton (now Fairmont) County, Va., Monday, July 16, 1810; His father, William Barns, was a native of Maryland, and of Irish descent. He was a physician by profession, and came to Ohio at an early day. He was a resident of Adams County for about ten years, and made a specialty of curing cancers and consumption. In December, 1830, he located in Brown County, Ohio, where he ministered to the physical wants of his many patients till the “fell destroyer” ended his earthly labors. He died August 11, 1833, aged fifty-four years and five months. Mr. Barns’ mother was Jane Graham, a native of Philadelphia, Penn. After her husband’s death, Mrs. Barns removed to Georgetown, and subsequently to Cincinnati, where she resided with her daughter till her death, which was caused by the removal of a tumor, weighing eighty-seven pounds. She died July 22, 1842, aged fifty-four years and six months. The subject of this notice assisted his father in the latter’s medical practice, and early learned the chair-maker and painter’s trade. He located at Georgetown in 1840, and for ten years worked at both of his trades. During this time, he painted the cupolas of both the Methodist Episcopal Church and the Brown County Court House. At his wife’s suggestion, he purchased 132 acres of land on Straight Creek, near the Ridley & Arnheim pike and has since added thirty-three acres. Sometime after buying this farm, he purchased a grist mill at Williamsburg, in Clermont County, which he ran two or three years. As his wife was then in failing health, he came back to the farm, where he has since resided. Mr. Barns was formerly a Whig, Know Nothing, Republican, and is now an earnest and outspoken advocate of Prohibition. During the war. Mr. Barns was also a member of the Union League. He is a consistent member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He was married, January 27, 1835, to Sarah Roudabush, a native of Goshen, Clermont County, Ohio; departed this life September 26, 1881, aged seventy-two years one month and four days. She was the mother of five children — Eleanor J., born February 19, 1836, died July 27, 1838; Corydon Augustus, born April 1, 1840, at commencement of the war, joined Company C, Eighty-ninth Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry, and died of small pox at Danville Prison, Virginia, December 30, 1863; William McKendrie, born May 17, 1843, also in Company C, Eighty-ninth Regiment, and now running the grist mill formerly owned by his father, in Clermont County, Ohio; John Roudabush, born September 9, 1847, and now farming the old homestead. Mr. Barns takes a great interest in bees and bee culture, and is agent for many of the best beehives.