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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.



MOURER, WILLIAM, was born about 1807, in Berkley county, Va. His parents emigrated to Muskingum county, Ohio, where his father died. In In 1823 or '4 he went to Washington county, Maryland, where he was married Dec. 12, 1833, to Jane I. Ensminger, who was born May 8, 1815, in that county. They had one child in Maryland, and moved to Springfield, Ill., arriving in the fall of 1836, where they had four children. Of their five children--

GEORGE W., born Oct. 29, 1834, in Washington county, Maryland, and brought up in Sangamon county, Illinois. He enlisted in Springfield, Aug. 27, 1862, for three years, in Co. E, 114th Ill. Inf. At the organization of the regiment, he was promoted to Quarter-Master, and was with the regiment until after the battle of Nashville, in Dec., 1864, when he was honorably mustered out on account of physical disability. He is now a farmer, and resides with his mother, five and one-half miles southeast of Springfield, Ill.

ALICE J. and MARGARET E., twins.

ALICE J. married, Nov. 18, 1857, to Samuel N. Shoup. See his name.

MARGARET E., MARYLAND and VIRGINIA reside with their mother.

EUGENIE G. married John N. Gatton. See his name.

Mr. William Mourer formed a partnership with Benjamin Ferguson, as carpenters and builders, soon after coming to Springfield. Their first work was the building of the American Hotel, at the southeast corner of Adams and Sixth streets; when finished, the finest hotel in the State of Illinois. They were contractors for part of the work on the State House, then in course of construction, now the Sangamon county Court House. After the death of Mr. Ferguson, Mr. Mourer continued in the business for about seventeen years. In 1850 he took the contract, and built the north and south porticos to the State House. He bought a farm, and moved in the spring of 1853 to Woodside township. While discharging the duties of grand juror, he was taken violently ill, of pneumonia, and died in Springfield, June 10, 1867. His widow resides five and one-half miles south of Springfield, on the farm where they settled in 1853.



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