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Below is a family biography included in Portrait and Biographical Record of Seneca and Schuyler Counties, New York published by Chapman Publishing Co., in 1895.  These biographies are valuable for genealogy research in discovering missing ancestors or filling in the details of a family tree. Family biographies often include far more information than can be found in a census record or obituary.  Details will vary with each biography but will often include the date and place of birth, parent names including mothers' maiden name, name of wife including maiden name, her parents' names, name of children (including spouses if married), former places of residence, occupation details, military service, church and social organization affiliations, and more.  There are often ancestry details included that cannot be found in any other type of genealogical record.

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GEN. AUGUSTUS DECATUR AYRES, late of Romulus, outlived the allotted time of man, dying full of years and honors September 8, 1885, at the age of seventy-six. His parents, Zebulon and Sarah (Scudder) Ayres, were natives of New Jersey, coming to New York in 1815. They settled on a five-hundred-acre tract, and the original homestead is still in the family. Zebulon Ayres was born at Providence, N. J., January 22, 1775, and his wife, Sarah Scudder, was born in that state December 20, 1780. They were united in marriage December 31, 1803, and became the parents of nine children, of whom one daughter, Mrs. Nancy Hannah, is the only one living. The eldest child, Eliza Maria, died in infancy. Sally Marie died at the age of twenty-two years. Augustus Decatur is our subject. Richard Scudder died in the year 1842, aged thirty-two, leaving no family. Louise married Denton Gurnee, of Romulus, and died when about eighty years of age; she had one daughter, now Mrs. Charles A. Munn. Rebecca married Isaac Allen, and died in 1870. Nancy married Francis H. Hannah, who resided in Hinsdale, Ill., but who carried on a lumber business in Chicago. He died in 1887, and the widow still resides in Hinsdale. They had three daughters. Josiah died at the age of nine years. Anson G. died at Hinsdale, Ill., in 1894, leaving two children: Mary Louise, Mrs. Welby Carlton, of Hinsdale; and Frank, a hardware dealer of Hinsdale, and the only male member of the family now living to carry the name down to posterity. The parents of our subject died on the old homestead.

General Ayres, the subject of this sketch, was the eldest son of the family, and retained the old homestead, buying out the other heirs. September 24, 1862, the General was married to Belle E. Hannah, sister of Francis H. Hannah, and daughter of Elihu L. and Anna (McCann) Hannah, of St. Clair, Mich. Mrs. Ayres was born at Erie, Pa., but at the time of her marriage to General Ayres was living with relatives in Nebraska City. There were no children born of this union.

As a land surveyor the General surveyed many farms in Seneca County. He was a member of the old military national guard, being an officer in his company, and was raised to the rank of Brigadier-General in the state troops by Governor Macy. In politics he was first a Whig, and on the organization of the Republican party allied himself with it, and remained a faithful adherent until his death. He was in bearing modest and unassuming, but his worth was appreciated by the public, and he was kept more or less in public view. His father and mother were recognized as pillars of the Presbyterian Church, and he took up the work where they left off, and was a worthy successor to worthy workers. He contributed to the building of the church at Romulus, and was one of the first to select and pay for a pew when the church was completed. This seat is still retained as a family relic. He was a member of this church for fifty years.

There was none of the sluggard in the composition of General Ayres, as he was always at work and kept at it to the end. The last thing he did before the closing of life’s drama was to visit the reapers in the field to oversee some necessary repairs. The farm on which he resided contained one hundred and forty acres, and besides this he was also a stockholder in the railroad at the time of its building. Until the last he retained full control of his business affairs, and when his light went out the feeling of gloom was perceptible in the entire community. The footprints he left on the sands of time are worthy of being followed by the generations to follow him.

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This family biography is one of the numerous biographies included in Portrait and Biographical Record of Seneca and Schuyler Counties, New York published in 1895. 

View additional Seneca County, New York family biographies here: Seneca County, New York Biographies

View a map of 1897 Seneca County, New York here: Seneca County, New York Map

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