BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES, BELMONT COUNTY, OHIO

"History of the Upper Ohio Valley" Vol. II, 1890.

Presented by Linda Fluharty from hard copies provided
by Mary Staley & Phyllis Slater.


Page 532

C. F. HANDEL, the subject of this sketch, was born in Wurtemberg, Germany,
August 28, 1840. Four years later his parents came to the United States and
settled at Pasco Station, Ohio. Learning the printer's trade in Wheeling,
he removed to Cincinnati, Ohio, where he worked at his trade until the
outbreak of the late war. Heeding his adopted country's call, he was among
the first to enroll himself on the roster of the Ninth regiment of the
Ohio volunteer infantry, whose fortunes he bravely followed through the
trying scenes of the battles of Rich Mountain, Fairfax Ferry, Mills's
Springs, Shiloh, Perryville, Chickamauga and Resaca. Having been honorably
discharged in the year 1864, he went to New York, where he followed his
trade for one year, after which he returned to Ohio and established a
grocery business at Pasco, his father's old home. Mr. Handel remained at
Pasco until 1871, then removed to Wheeling, where he became a member of
the firm of Klein & Handel, wholesale dealers in notions. In 1883 he
again moved, this time to Bridgeport, Ohio. He established a grocery
house here which he still presides over, and under his guidance does an
increasingly prosperous buisness. Mr. Handel married Miss Elizabeth
Breidenstein in 1870. Miss Breidenstein was the daughter of Caspar
Breidenstein, one of the most prominent and honored of Bridgeport's
Pioneers. Two sons, Willie and Albert, are the result of this union. The
qualities that made him a true, courageous soldier, a successful business
man and an upright citizen, won him the regard of his fellow townsmen, and
in 1886, their vote placed him in the city council. A member of the republican
party, yet respected by all parties. The family are members of the German
Lutheran church of Wheeling.