My Genealogy Hound

Samuel D. Norton, a prominent citizen of Mount Pleasant Township, was born in Grant County, Ky., August 17, 1834, and is the son of Archibald and Nancy (Nichols) Norton. The father was a native of Grant County, Ky., born in 1797, and died in the same county about 1847. He was a farmer, and as he started in life with very little means, was obliged to work at the weaver’s trade at night, in order to get a start. The mother of our subject was also a native of Grant County, Ky., born about 1799, and died in her native county in 1855. Her father, as well as the father of Archibald Norton, was an early pioneer of the county. The Norton family originally came from Virginia. Our subject is the fifth of ten children, eight of whom are now living. He received a fair education in the schools of Grant County, and was not yet fourteen years of age when his father died, but still remained on the old homestead, and worked for his mother until twenty years of age, when he came to Clark, Scotland and other counties of Missouri, and after spending the winter returned to Kentucky, but the next fall moved back to Missouri, where he has since remained. He worked at the carpenter’s trade for about a year, and then engaged with an elder brother, John J., in the mill business in Scotland County, near where he now lives, and continued at the same business for about three years, when they traded the mill for the farm that our subject now owns. This was in 1860, since then our subject has lived on this farm, which consists of 240 acres of excellent land. In the early part of the war he belonged to Company A, of the enrolled militia of Scotland County, Mo., but in 1864 he enlisted in Company I, Thirty-ninth Volunteer Infantry, Federal service, and was mustered out in March, 1865. December 27, 1860, he was married to Mrs. Mary J. McGee, widow of Elijah McGee, and daughter of J. F. Timmons. She was born in Tippecanoe County, Ind., September 18, 1836, and by her marriage became the mother of eight children, all of whom are living: Nancy A., Eliza N., S. Grant, Samuel A., Joseph N., John H., George L. and Minnie. Our subject is a Democrat, and an active and enterprising citizen of the county.