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From Commemorative Biographical Record of the Counties of Rock, Green, Grant, Iowa and Lafayette Wisconsin, publ. 1901- page 784-786
HON. JAMES WILSON SEATON is a native of Oneida county, N.Y., born May 28, 1824, in the town of New Hartford, four miles south of Utica, at a place then known as Kellogg's Mills. The family resided in Utica while Gov. DeWitt Clinton was digging the Erie canal. In 1829 they removed to a place called Sauquoit, seven miles south of the city of Utica, one of those bright, sunlit villages which everywhere dot and adorn the Empire State.
Sanquoit is located on both sides of a lovely creek of the same name, which flows into the Mohawk river in the town of Whitesboro. The valley is the seat of many large enterprises and diversified manufacturing industries. The inhabitants are for the most part wealthy, refined and enterprising, many occupying elegant homes, gained by their prudence and foresight. The valley was first settled, near the end of the eighteenth century, by men of iron nerve and strong wills, who came with their families from New England, most of them being soldiers of the Revolutionary war, and still retaining their old flintlock muskets and cartouche boxes as mementos of the "times that tried men's souls." Nearly all selected farms, either in the fertile valley, or on the sides and summits of the tree-covered hills which bordered the valley on either side. As a consequence, to meet the exigencies and social wants of the farming community, a village sprang up on the banks of the stream, meandering between the hills on an old Indian trail, and was naturally given the Indian name, Sadahquoda (by which the creek was known to the natives), which the settlers modified to the more euphonious sound of Sauquoit (pronounced Saquoit). The village was divided into two parts, known as the Methodist and Presbyterian Corners respectively, each denomination having large and commodious churches built in the primitive style of architecture. The Methodist church boasted of a steeple and bell, which its Exangelical neighbor had not. In addition to church privileges each side had a school house, tavern, store, blacksmith shop, and places for other trades; a flour and saw mill was patronized in common by both sides, as was also a large factory called the Franklin cotton mill; there were two cemeteries for the dead , but only one post office, which, by the grace of John Quincy Adams and other Whig Presidents, was persistently and continuously held on the Presbyterian side.
The subject of this sketch learned his alphabet in the school house on the Methodist side, in the year 1830. Ten years later, at the age of seventeen, he was a "schoolmaster" in charge of the same school. In 1841-42-43 he taught school in West Exeter, Otsego county, and Taberg, Oneida Co. He afterwards attended the Oneida Conference Seminary, at Cazenovia, Madison Co., N.Y., and had for classmates such distinguished men as Gen. Joseph R. HAWLEY, now United States Senator from Connecticut; Bishop Edward G. ANDREWS, of the M. E. Church, and his brother, Charles ANDREWS, now Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of New York; Leland STANFORD, the late millionaire Senator from California; Gen. SLOCUM, who won distinction in the Civil war; and many noted ministers of the M. E. Church. In 1845-46 he taught select school at Lee Center, in Oneida county, and afterwards studied law with E. G. PARKHURST, in the city of Rome, N.Y. The office adjoined that of COMSTOCK & STRIKER, a noted law firm at that time, Mr. STRIKER being one of the early projectors of the Michigan Central railroad, and COMSTOCK, district attorney of Oneida county.
In 1847 Mr.. SEATON took Greeley's advice, and came West to grow up with the country. After voyaging around the lakes to Milwaukee, and making a trip across the State by hack, in company with Hon. Orsamus COLE, he arrived at the "Wisconsin House," in Potosi. It was a hot, sultry day in July, and the dusty, yellow ochre of the mines, covering everything, gave a jaundiced appearance to the general aspect of the country. The people wore ochre-colored hat and breeches, the towels at the hotel were ochre-stained, the hotel girls seemed to have a saffron hue, and every room and floor in the house was sanded with ochre. There were bacon and roast beef with a yellow cast for dinner; beefsteak, coffee and hot bread covered with Babbitt's saleratus for supper; he slept in an ochre colored bed, and for breakfast had ham and eggs of the same hospitable hue. After this he went into the law office of COLE & BIDDLECOM, wrote briefs, and read novels, newspapers, Blackstone, Kent's "Commentaries" and "Martin Chuzzlewit" for the next two months, and was admitted to the Bar of Grant county, in October of the same year. Judge Charles DUNN was upon the Bench, and Samuel CRAWFORD (late Judge of the Supreme Court of the State), Chief Justice COLE and George W. LAKIN (of Milwaukee) were the examining committee. After getting his diploma Mr. SEATON opened a select school in the brick school house at Potosi, then just completed. The next year he bought out Lucien B. LEACH, in the Potosi Republican, which he edited and published until 1855, when the paper was sold to E. R. PAUL, who removed it to Dunleith (now East Dubuque). Mr. SEATON did not abandon his literary work, however, but has ever since been a contributor to various publications. For forty-five years or more, he has been a correspondent of the county newspapers, and his articles are read by more people than those of any other local writer, especially those which have appeared in recent years, in the Lancaster Teller. His contributions to the History of Grant County (1881) formed one of the most interesting chapters of that publication; his descriptions of the duel on the ice, DeTANTABARATZ, the Senator, and other early settlers of the mines are samples of his best literary efforts. His "History of the Bench and Bar of Grant County" is also an able article, which has been often quoted and referred to by the best writers and public speakers of the State. Mr. SEATON was elected the first town clerk of the town of Potosi, when the State was admitted into the Union, in 1848, and served ten years in that capacity. During the same time he held the office of justice of the peace and town superintendent of schools, being the only man in the State, as he thinks, who was so highly honored as to hold three offices at one and the same time. At a special election in May, 1853, he was elected to the State Senate, in place of J. C. SQUIRES, resigned and served during the impeachment trial of Judge HUBBELL; was elected to and served in the Assembly during the years 1859 and 1860; was a number of years member of the town and county board, and served one year as chairman of the latter body, being on the building committee with Hon. George W. RYLAND, when the present courthouse, jail and county poor house were constructed. He served two or three terms on the financial committee of the county board with such men as W. P. DEWEY, John SCHREINER, of Lancaster, and E. BAILEY, of Platteville (the last named was killed by a mad bull). While the committee were examining claims against the county, Sheriff CLICE gave them a sumptuous dinner in the jail, but the committee audited his claims against the county, regardless of the fact that they had been regaled upon his roast turkey and oysters. In 1855 Mr. SEATON engaged in mercantile business at Potosi, with his brother, T. R. SEATON, and continued same until 1879, at which time he sold out and resumed the practice of law, which he still continues, in connection with the fire insurance business.
The most important event in our subject's life was his marriage. This occurred at Cassville, Wis., June 15, 1850, when he was united by Charles L. LA GRAVE, Esq., to Miss Amanda F. BUSHEE, daughter of Brayton and Mary BUSHEE, early settlers of the mines. Mr. BUSHEE built one of the first stores in that part of Potosi known as Lafayette, and conducted business there for some time. He afterward removed to Cassville, and continued the mercantile business, as well as smelting at that place, where he died in 1846. Mrs. SEATON was educated at St. Mathias Academy, at Potosi, and was an estimable lady of many virtues. She died June 6, 1900, and the following "Tribute to a Noble Woman," by one who well and personally knew the deceased, appeared in the Grant County Herald of June 21, 1900. It was much appreciated by the friends and family of Mrs. SEATON, who still deeply feel the great and irreparable loss of one who was the light and life of their once pleasant, but now desolate home.
Among the vast multitudes of people that inhabit our sphere, there are some who, like the sweet violet, modest, unassuming, hidden in verdant shades, diffusing their fragrance to those only who are so fortunate as to discover these sylvan retreats, never seek public applause, but in their innocence and purity shun the searching eye of the public. It was thus that Amanda F. SEATON, wife of the Hon. J. W. SEATON, who lately departed this life, lived, and was respected for more than forty years among the rugged hills in Potosi. Possessed of a gentle disposition, she was imbued with that innate tact to never lose a friend. All those who ever were so fortunate to be drawn in the circle of her home were life-long friends. A model mother, she reared her five children with a gentle hand and a God-fearing mind. All but one survived her. She, lovely Mary, generally known as "Pet," passed to the "unknown beyond" many years before her mother. It was the loss of this dear daughter that first broke down this good woman; from the shock she never fully recovered. Loyal to the core of her heart to the Union, she proudly braved the displeasure of her surroundings when dark treason, not only beyond Mason and Dixon's line, but in many towns and hamlets of the North, sought to destroy our National Union. Like Barbara Fritchie, she unfurled our flag out of her window and flung it to the breeze when disloyal processions passed beneath. She was a lady in the fullest sense of the term - a mother and wife faithful to her family; a patriot faithful to her country; a Christian true to her religion. All who came in contact with her were fully impressed with her excellent qualities; her family, neighbors and friends will miss her; she left a vacant space not easily to be filled.
"Of reason firm, of temperate will,
Endurance, foresight, strength and skill;
A perfect woman, nobly planned,
To warn, to comfort and command."
This biography generously submitted by Carol Holmbeck