DAVID W. ORR was born in Sumner county, Tennessee, March 17, 1826. His father was Greenberry Orr, widely known as "Berry Orr", who came to Illinois in the fall of 1828. He stopped two years in Morgan county, and then moved to Mount Sterling township, near the village, which was then in Schuyler county. He made some improvements on 160 acres of Government land, which he sold, and one year later moved to what is now section 34, Pea Ridge township. They had twelve children, born in Tennessee, and left two behind and buried one on the way. Their journey was made in one of the old-style prairie schooners, drawn by three horses, and were six weeks on the way. They arrived in Morgan county, November, 1830, and at Pea Ridge the night of the great snow storm. Their new log house had not been well chinked, and he was obliged to take up the puncheon floor to get dirt to make mud for the walls, in order to keep out the fearful storm. They reached here with very little means, but he was fortunate in getting work in wood hauling, and when his farm came into the market he was able to obtain his deed for 160 acres. It was part prairie and part timber. He built a house here, where he died, February, 1850, aged sixty-five. He let his widow with eleven children. She had been Mary Brown of Tennessee. His children all had to work hard in life, and had but very little schooling. One of their employments was to beat the hominy mortar, which Mr. Orr obtained by trading a shot gun. The nearest doctor was at Jacksonville, and they were obliged to go there over the paths that the Indians had trod.

David remained at home until after his father's death, and August 1, 1850, he was married to his first wife, Mary Jane Pells, who died a year and a half later. April 6, 1854, he was married to his present wife, Patience H. Osborn, daughter of Lewis and Amelia (Corwin) Osborn, of Ohio, where she was born, reared and educated. She was a teacher there and in Illinois before her marriage. Her father was a Baptist minister, and he died in Hancock county, while on a visit, in his eighty-fifth year. His wife died in 1875, aged seventy-one, leaving four children. Mrs. Orr being the only one now living. She is a niece of Tom Corwin, of Ohio, and is a relative of the family of General Halleck. Mr. Osborn owned the farm on which his daughter, Mrs. Orr, lives, for fifty years. He had no regular charge for some ten years prior to his death, but preached occasionally. Mr. Orr left the old homestead of his parents in 1858, and moved to Hancock county. He has lived in Kansas and Missouri, and came back to Illinois and settled on his present farm of 112 acres, in 1874. This has forty acres of timber. He has been doing general farming. Mr. and Mrs. Orr have four children: John M., now a resident of Anthony, Kansas; Mary Halleck, at home; and Lewis H., residing in Mount Sterling. Mr. and Mrs. Orr had reared this son to farm life, and hoped to have him with them on the farm during their declining years, but he preferred the life of a mechanic; hence of late years they rent out their land. He has made much money out of corn and hogs, and who breeds some horses. He has a stallion of Leviathan stock, which is turning out well.

He has served the town as Road Commissioner, and both he and his wife are Missionary Baptists.