My Genealogy Hound

TRIMBLE, HARVEY, farmer and stock raiser, Sec, 6, P. O. Carrollton. Not many of the veteran pioneers of Greene County are left to tell the story of frontier hardships, but among those whose settlement in Greene County occurred in an early day, we mention with more than ordinary notice the name of Harvey Trimble, born in Nicholasville, Kentucky, on the 17th of November, 1810. His father John Trimble a native Virginian who moved to Kentucky in an early day, from his earliest years he followed agricultural pursuits; he married in Kentucky Miss Polly Guy also of Virginia, of this marriage eleven children were born, of whom our subject was the fifth, and of whom we have only space to say that he grew up amid pioneer associations. In 1832 he moved to Missouri, and thence to Greene County in 1834 as a permanent resident, but the year 1833 had witnessed his marriage in Greene County to Miss Margaret A. Rice, a daughter of Jefferson and Nancy Rice. In his own language there was plenty of hard work to be done and he had little capital, but strong will and some little energy, and he now set resolutely to work to obtain a livelihood in Illinois; for several years he lived in a rough round log cabin, and necessarily lived an economical life; the regular bill of fare, except on Sunday, was principally corn dodgers or corn bread; when Sunday came, warm biscuit, a rare treat for old and young; oftimes it happened when the wheat became more generally grown young Trimble put in considerable time hanging to the end of a sheet, and kept in rapid motion for the purpose of winnowing or separating wheat from chaff; to be more particular, two men holding a sheet kept it in rapid motion while a third held aloft an old sieve, the contents of which were chaff and wheat violently shaken in the hands of the operative, in its fall the sheet kept in constant motion served as a separator of the chaff from the grain; in after years horse mills came into vogue for the grinding of grain and vast numbers congregated awaiting their turn, and enjoying themselves meanwhile; we have related the above in order to show what industry and economy will accomplish from poverty. Mr. T. has become comfortably situated in life, and is now the owner of 240 acres of valuable farm property; elsewhere we have spoken of Mr. Trimble’s marriage, his wife Miss Margaret H. Rice, was born in Kentucky; of this marriage twelve children were born, of whom eight are living: Georgianna, Jane, Aggie, Napoleon Bonaparte, Susan, Ellen, Lafayette and Augusta; deceased, John R., Jefferson R., Thomas P. and James H. (twins). For ten years Mr. T. worked as a tanner at which he served four years apprenticeship.