My Genealogy Hound

SAMUEL J. RICE, retired, P. O. Sardinia, was born in Jackson Township November 13, 1818. He is a son of Capt. John Rice and Jane McNight, the former a native of Philadelphia, Penn., and the latter of Ireland. Capt. Rice was born near the scene of the Declaration of Independence, and on the very day of that memorable event. His father, James Rice and family, came from Ireland prior to the American Revolution. Mrs. Rice, nee McNight, was born in Ireland, and came to America with her parents, when but a child. Capt. Rice had charge of a cavalry company in the war of 1812, and also served in the frontier of Ohio and Indiana, and participated in the engagement of Tippecanoe. In 1816, he came to this county and settled in Jackson Township, and in 1820 located in Washington Township, where he purchased a farm of 126 acres. He was a man of decided pro-slavery sentiment, and radically adhered to its doctrines and principles. He was prominently identified with the political history of the township and county. He was a man who ever pursued his convictions of right and justice, and was eminently esteemed. His death occurred September, 1843. Mrs. Rice followed him in 1854. Samuel, the subject of this sketch, is the second son of a family of thirteen children. Alfred Rice, the eldest, left home in 1823, and went to St. Joseph, Mo. In 1856, he removed to Kansas, and was one of the framers of the constitution of that State, by the pro-slavery party. He was a Captain in the Confederate army, and subsequently served as Sheriff of Atchison County, Mo., two terms. Nothing of his whereabouts was known till in July, 1864, when our subject accidentally met him at Fort Laramie, Idaho. Our subject was reared to manhood on a farm. July 9, 1861, he enlisted in the Fourth Independent Ohio Cavalry. He served one year and a half in the Fourth, then was transferred to the Seventh Regiment United States Volunteer Cavalry. He trained and drilled Company D, and served as Sergeant, and subsequently recruited a company in Cincinnati, and became its First Lieutenant. He had command of Company E, of the Eleventh Regiment United States Volunteers, at Fort Laramie, till the close of the war, when he was discharged, with his regiment, at Omaha, Neb. He returned home and engaged in constructing pikes, bridges, etc. January 2, 1844, he was married to Miss Serepta Marshall, a daughter of William and Rebecca Marshall. Mrs. Rice was born in Lewis County, Ky., February 14, 1827. They had three children — Rebecca J. (wife of Cornelius Holmes), Sarah E. (wife of H. U. Beck), and Eliza M. (wife of E. H. Ranney. Mr. and Mrs. Rice reared one child — James Q. Marshall. Mrs. Rice is a member of the M. E. Church. Mr. Rice is a Republican, and has been active in local politics.