Biography of John Thompson who settled near Catlin, Illinois, in 1831

 

John Thompson

H. W. Beckwith, History of Vermilion County (Chicago: H. H. Hill, 1879)

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John Thompson, deceased, was born in Erie county, Pennsylvania, on the 21st of May, 1797. He was a youth of spirit and adventure, and though only sixteen years of age, served as a courier in the war of 1812. When the Americans crossed into Canada at Niagara, on the night of the 12th of October, 1812, and seized the heights of Queenstown, he volunteered to go with the assaulting column, and as the fruit of his daring, ever after bore on his left arm an ugly saber scar. He taught school, and traveled extensively in the United States, passing over thirteen of them and the upper British provinces before he was twenty-seven years old. About this time (1824) he was married to Ester Payne, in Dearborn county, Indiana, where he had located the

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year before. In the fall of 1831 he removed to Vermilion county, Illinois, and settled two miles north of Catlin, where he died, on the 13th September, 1861. He was an early assessor and county commissioner; farmed, taught school, and always in business, --a man of sound judgment, large experience and practical talents. His sons were Louis M., Sylvester D., Philander (dead), John P. (dead). Daughters: Melissa, wife of Sale S. Ray; Martha J., wife of Maj. Wilson Burroughs; Mary H., wife of Rev. Isaiah Villars; and Harriet, wife of Dr. John J. McElroy.