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EARLY SETTLERS OF SANGAMON COUNTY - 1876
By John Carroll Power

These biographies were submitted by a researcher and evidently abstracted from the 1876 History of Sangamon County, IL. Errors could occur, so one should always verify the correctness by obtaining copies of vitals and performing all necessary research to document what is contained herein.



WASHBURN, WILLIAM, was born Jan. 24, 1813, at Westminster, Windham county, Vermont, and was raised in Orange county, in the same state. In 1832 he went to Seville, Medina county, Ohio, and taught school there one year, and in 1833 went to Shelby county, Kentucky, where he taught nearly seven years. He was married there August 20, 1839, to Elizabeth R. Harding, who was born in that county August 27, 1820. She is a niece of Mrs. Harriet Harding Talbott. See Talbott. Mr. and Mrs. Washburn had one child in Kentucky, and moved to Sangamon county, Illinois, arriving Nov. 1, 1840, in what is now Gardner township, where five children were born. Of their children--

OLIVIA R., born August 20, 1840, in Kentucky, died in Sangamon county, aged two years.

WILLIAM H., born July 9, 1842, in Sangamon county, was married there Dec. 21, 1875, to Alice Jane Hurt, and lives in Philadelphia, Cass county, Illinois.

LUCIUS H. lives with his parents.

JAMES OTIS died Feb. 9, 1861, in his fourteenth year.

MARY L. and HARRIET E. reside with their parents, two and one-half miles southwest of Farmingdale, Sangamon county, Illinois.

The Washburn family in the United States all come from John Washburn, who emigrated from Eversham, Worcester county, England. He was in Duxbury, Massachusetts, as early as 1632, and returning, sailed from England with his family April 12, 1635, O. S. He brought two sons, John, Jun., and Philip. John, Jun., married in 1645 to Elizabeth Mitchell. They had seven sons and four daughters. It is from these that the whole Washburn family in the United States sprang. William Washburn has the genealogy of his own branch of the family in a continuous line from John Washburn, of Eversham, England, to his son, John, Jun., and his son, Joseph, first, and his son, Joseph, second, and his son, Seth, first, and his son Asa and his son, Seth Washburn, second, who was twice married, and had eight sons by the first, and seven by the second marriage. William Washburn, whose name heads this sketch, is his second son by the first wife. William's brother, Asa R., married in Morgan county, Illinois, to Barbara Craig, moved to Sangamon county in 1852, and died at Putney, Vermont, Sept. 12, 1867, while there on a visit for his health. He left a widow and three children in Curran township, Sangamon county, Illinois.



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