My Genealogy Hound

STEPHEN MORGAN, one of the early settlers of Reuben township, Harlan county, Nebr., is a native of Ohio, and was born in 1844. James Albert Morgan, father of Stephen, was born in Genesee county, N. Y., in 1816. He first moved to Ohio, and thence, in 1846, to Cold Spring, Jefferson county, Wis., where he was employed in agricultural pursuits until 1878, when he came to Nebraska. He was a class-leader for years in the United Brethren church, and in politics was a representative republican, having held several important township offices under the auspices of that party. In 1842 he married Miss Jerusha Payne, who was born in Ohio in 1822, and who was a school teacher. She bore him ten children, of whom the fifth, seventh and eighth died in infancy. The others were — Elizabeth and Mary (both now deceased), Stephen, Daniel, William, Franklin A. and Lincoln Grant.

Stephen Morgan was but two years of age when he was taken to Wisconsin by his parents. His years were passed on the home farm until the breaking out of the Civil war, when he enlisted in Company H, Thirteenth Wisconsin infantry. He took part in a number of the principal engagements and in many skirmishes, but was ruptured in a railroad wreck near Richmond, Va., and has drawn a pension ranging from $4 to $14 per month from the date of his discharge, having been mustered out December 24, 1865, at San Antonio, Texas. He returned to Wisconsin and farmed until 1871, when he came to Nebraska, locating first in Lincoln, Lancaster county, where he resided a year and a half. In 1872 he came to his present home, where he has passed through all the vicissitudes of pioneer life, the country at that time being a wilderness and infested with Indians, but abounding with game. Some eight or ten buffalo have fallen victims to Mr. Morgan’s prowess, and smaller animals in untold numbers. When he came here he was $170 in debt, but was skilled in his vocation, was industrious and economical, and now owns a tract of three hundred and twenty acres of good land, well stocked and improved with one of the finest dwellings in the country.

The marriage of Mr. Morgan took place in 1868, to Miss Addie Storm, who has borne him four children, namely — Leo Leslie, born January 11, 1870; Albert P., born July 22, 1875; Ada Pearl, who died March 2, 1885, when but two months old; and Daisy Gertrude, born December 28, 1886.

In politics Mr. Morgan is a republican. He has served one term as supervisor, two terms as justice of the peace, and has been a school officer since 1875. He is a post commander in the G. A. R., while Mrs. Morgan is president of the Woman’s Relief Corps. Mr. Morgan was also president of the Harlan county agricultural society in 1887, and enumerator of the two hundred and fifty-second district of the first supervisor’s district of Nebraska of the eleventh census, in 1890.