My Genealogy Hound

CHARLES LYON is a son of Alexander and Olive (VanBerger) Lyon, and was born February 12, 1819, at Oxford, Chenango county, New York. His paternal grandfather, was a native of Washington county, this State, but emigrated to Chenango county where he died. Charles Lyon’s maternal grandfather, who was a native of Holland, emigrated to America and settled in Canandaigua, this State, where he resided until his death. He was a patriotic man and served his country well and nobly, doing his full duty as a soldier during the War of the Revolution. He married Hannah Knapp. Alexander Lyon (father) was born in Chenango county, N. Y., in 1776, and removed to Tompkins county, this State, in 1825, where he died. He was a farmer by occupation, and during the exciting times following the disappearance of William Morgan, he was an intense anti-Mason and afterward affiliated with the Whig and Republican parties, never taking an active part, however. In religion he was a consistent member of the Baptist church and held the office of deacon for a score of years. He was married but once, and had born to him thirteen children, ten sons and three daughters.

Charles Lyon was educated in the common schools, and afterwards tilled his father’s farm in Tompkins county until the autumn of 1844, when he emigrated to Pennsylvania and engaged in the lumber business. In 1848 he returned to New York, locating in Jamestown. In politics Charles Lyon was a Whig until the formation of the Republican party, in 1856, when he became a member of that party and still continues firmly grounded in the faith. His first vote was cast for Gen. William Henry Harrison, of “Tippecanoe and Tyler too” fame, the grandfather of the present president, and he has steadily voted the straight Whig or Republican ticket ever since. His standard of character is above the average and he has the reputation of fully living up to that standard, exemplifying in his private and business life all that a good citizen of the best republic in the world should be.

On September 11, 1839, Mr. Lyon united in marriage with Hester A. Chapin, a daughter of Roderick and Sarah (Clough) Chapin. She was born in 1817. Her paternal grandfather, Roderick Chapin, was a native of Washington county, this State, and was of English ancestry. He removed to Chautauqua county and lived with the father of Mrs. Lyon, who came to this county and settled in the town of Kiantone (then Carroll), in 1828, when there were not more than four houses south of the creek that runs through Jamestown. He was a farmer and extended his usefulness to mankind by officiating as a preacher in the Methodist Episcopal church. In the year preceding the War of the Rebellion, he was a stanch and uncompromising abolitionist. Mrs. Lyon was one of a family of seven children. To their union have been born three children, two sons and one daughter: Chapin J., who died at the age of forty-four; Septimus, who married Charlotte Howard, and is now a painter and paper-hanger in St. Charles, Iowa; and Sarah, who resides with her parents.