Return to Chautauqua County Gen Web page.
The PETTIT Family
Old photos of the PETTIT family; and other (maybe) interesting
and amusing things - Versailles, Cattaraugus County, NY
A Photographic Scrapbook
http://www.justus.ca/versailles/pettit.htm
See here also many other family names with Photo links -
Brown, Hawley, Wooley etc Chautauqua Co ties
Dr JAMES Pettit, Son of Eber M., and Dr Pettit's Pile treatment
http://www.antiquebottles.com/buffalo/nov99/page2.html
Eber M. Pettit had moved from Cordova to Versailles in 1837.
There he ran a station on the Underground Railroad. Fugitive
slaves came to Versailles from his father's house near Fredonia,
and then journeyed to Black Rock and to Canada. He was to later
record his experiences in a book called "Underground
Railroad Sketches", published in 1879. He helped establish
the Thomas Indian School on the Cattaraugus Reservation and was
their superintendent for many years, never taking any money for
his services. He also owned the Versailles Botanic Mills with a
man named Star, then with Dr. Barker. Barker settled in
Versailles in 1840 and ran his father's tannery and store before
joining up with Pettit. Later, Eber's son, James M., would be a
supplier of botanic drugs (also a merchant and lawyer) situated
in Perrysburg and then Fredonia (by 1868), where he occupied his
grandfather's house in Cordova. As a botanic drug supplier, Eber,
and later James M.,
would provide a handy and inexpensive source of raw materials for
the Pettit's products.Etc
Slavery
"She Would Not be Whipped, She Would Rather Die"
http://www.wm.edu/Whitman/slavery/analogue4.html
The Underground Railroad in the Southern Tier
http://www.develop-wny.com/regional/undrail.html
NY people involved;
http://www.nyhistory.com/ugrr/people.htm
Did you know?
Chautauqua County, NY In the southern half of Chautauqua
County are buried the following: B.F. Goodrich (founder of the
Goodrich Tire Company), Reuben Fenton (former governor of New
York State during the 1860s and founder of the present day
Republican Party) and Catherine Harris, a black woman who
maintained a station for the Underground Railroad during the
Civil War era.
The grave sites of these individuals can be found in Lake View
Cemetery in Jamestown, NY. Heading into the northern part of the
county, the grave of Dr. Charles Welch, founder of the present
day Welch's Grape Juice Company, is located in the Westfield
Cemetery, Westfield, NY. The marker of Amos Sottle, who is noted
to be the first white settler in Chautauqua County (and who was
also famous for the unusual fiddles he made of a horse's skull
and leg bones) can be located at the intersection of Routes 5 and
20 in Irving, NY.
http://www.seawaytrail.com/98ARCHIVES/article_gone.htm
Submitted by Dee Davidson, 2001