My Genealogy Hound

WILLIAM J. COBB, a prosperous merchant and retired agricultural implement manufacturer of Jamestown, is a son of Adam B. and Thetis (Bishop) Cobb, and he first saw the light of day February 17, 1823, in Elizabethtown, Essex county, New York, where his father was married. Zachariah Cobb, grandfather of the subject of our sketch, was a native of Connecticut, but early in manhood emigrated to Essex county, this State, where he followed farming until his death. During the Revolution, like Putnam, he left his plow and with musket on his shoulder, remained in the Colonial service until the contest was decided, and again, at the breaking out of the second war with England, he went to the front. He married a Miss Brady and reared a family of four sons and three daughters. Elijah Bishop (maternal grandfather) although of English extraction was born in New Milford, Connecticut, 1760. While young he emigrated to Vermont and later came to New York where he died. He was a man of considerable ingenuity, which he employed to good advantage. During the war of 1812 he served as major with distinction. When interested in politics he was identified with the democrats. He was twice married, his first wife being Dorcas Holcomb, who bore him eight children, of whom Elijah Bishop and the mother of William J. Cobb, are the only ones now living. Adam B. Cobb (father) was born in 1801, in Essex county, and when thirty-two years of age, with his family, came to this county and died in Jamestown, in 1883. Like his son he was a whig and afterwards a republican. For a number of years he was associated with his son, William J. Cobb, in the manufacturing business, but several years before he died he disposed of the business. He was a member of the Congregational church in which faith he died. In 1822, he married Thetis Bishop, who was born March 4, 1800, and who bore him four children: William J., Norval B., now dead, who served on the Union side during the Rebellion; Sheldon B., (dead); and Lucy, who is the wife of William Broadhead, and resides in Jamestown.

William J. Cobb received his early education in the common schools of his home, and early in life engaged with his father in the manufacture of agricultural tools, from which he retired about twenty-five years ago and since then has been engaged in the grocery business. An enthusiastic republican he is also a patriotic citizen, and enjoys seeing the government properly conducted, and is with his wife an active member of the Methodist Episcopal church. Mr. Cobb has a very pleasant home which it is hoped he will yet enjoy for many years.

On Dec. 23, 1846, Mr. Cobb married for his first wife Miranda Woodward, a daughter of Reuben Woodward, a resident of Chautauqua county, who was the mother of two children: Ordello W. was a merchant tailor of Jamestown, but is now in the insurance business, and was married to Clara Brooks; and Orlando W. (dead). The youngest son, George D., a conductor on the electric street cars, is a child by Mr. Cobb’s second wife, and is also married, his wife being Vesta A. Fox. After the death of the first Mrs. Cobb, he married Mrs. Martha T. (Simmons) Clements, with whom he had a very happy home for many years. Martha T. Cobb died June 11, 1891.