Abel Browne Family

From Hoppes, Lester C., History of Hoppes Family and Our Ancestry, including some of the better-known families in America.
Corbin, Kansas, 1925:

Abel Brown was born in Mason County, Virginia in 1775 (1786 HSB) and there grew to manhood and was married. His wife, Polly Frazier, was of Scotch-Irish descent. To Abel and Polly were born the following children:
Robert, Jan. 16, 1811;
Preston, 1813;
Franklin, 1815;
Hamilton, 1817;
Mary Ann, 1819;
Elizabeth, 1821;
Martin, 1823;
William, 1825;
Minerva, 1827;
Abel, 1829;
Julia 1831.

The journey to Indiana was made in 1832 with horses and wagons, and Mr. Brown’s chief occupation for years afterward was teaming. He drove a four-horse team to a big Conestoga wagon, with the ends of the bed bowed up to keep the load from dipping as they went up and down some of the steep hills. Mr. Brown freighted from Pendleton, Huntsville, and other nearby towns to Cincinnati, hauling farm products, grain, cured meats, wool, furs, pelts and hides to Cincinnatti and bringing back salt, coffee, tea, etc. coton goods and other articles of merchandise and necessities which could not be produced in central Indiana.
Abel Brown took up 80 acres of wooded land between Big and Little Prairies, three miles south of Andersontown (now Anderson) and left most of the work of clearing the place to his sons while he attended to his teaming business.
(Big and Little Prairies were so-called because they were tracts of land free from timber and on which tall marsh grass grew in profusion. Little Prairie was a tract of perhaps not more than 10 acres and was swampy and pretty much like a peat-bed. During the dry season fire would often get into this region and burn for days at a time, consuming great quantities of the peat-like soil, leaving great holes in the ground. Big Prairie lay perhaps a mile or more away and was larger inrea.)
Their first home was a typical pioneer log cabin, but after the purchase of a second tract of 59 acres east of his first place he put up, on the first place, a good substantial but plain house , and there spent his last years comfortable situated. He died in 1865 at the age of 90 years, his wife having preceded him in death in 1847. Abel Brown was one of the prosperous farmers of central Indiana and did well in all his undertakings. In politics he was a Jacksonian Democrat

Robert Browne, Abel’s eldest son.
Robert Brown was born January 16, 1811, in Virginia. and came to Indiana with his father in his 21st year, and for five years devoted his attention to clearing and cultivating his father’s land. In 1837 he married and settled on the 59 acre tract we have already referred to, which he later purchased from his father. This tract he cleared and builded himself a little one-room log cabin 16x18 feet in extent with a loft reached by a ladder. It was built in the primitive fashion of the day and place, covered with oak clapboards four feet ling, which he himself rived from the timber, the boards being held in place by weight poles which were kept in place by “knees” and lower poles fastened with wooden pins.
In the cabin was a puncheon floor split out of fine white ash and kept white by the constant care of Mrs. Brown. This floor too was fastened down by wooden pins. The fireplace, large enough to hold a three-foor back log and a four foot front log was built of stone, and the stick chimney was daubed with mud. This was the home of the family for years until 1854, when Robert built a story-and-a-half residence, the first frame house in that community. Its style was due to Mrs. Brown’s objection to t two-story house.
Robert eventually acquired 128 acres of land and cleared, fenced and otherwise improved it, and his was called one of the splendid farms of Madison County. He was noted among the many good hunters of the region and killed a number of deer and wild turkey.
He was married in 1837 in Fall Creek Township, Madison County, to Margaret, daughter of William and Millie Proby, born in Pasquotank County, North Carolina.
Robert Brown died in his 69th year, and his wife survived him two years and passed away July 30, 1882. Politically, Robert was a Republican. He and family were members of the Methodist Church. Mr Brown was a hardworking, industrious, thrifty man. It is said that hios corncrib was never empty due to his foresight and prudence.
The children of Robert and Margaret Brown were as follows:
Mary Jane, b Sept 1, 1839;
Lorenzo D. b May 7, 1841;
William A. b April 25, 1842;
Margaret A. b March 8, 1844;
Alfred b Feb 13, 1846.

Alfred, the youngest son of Robert and Margaret Brown, was born in Madison County, Indiana, February 13, 1846 and grew to manhood amid frontier surroundings. Due to his own ambition along certain lines he received a better education than was possible in the pioneer days on the frontier. His first two terms were passed in a log cabin school house with seats of slabs, held up by wooden pins. Afterwards a frame school house was constructed, which offered much better facilities. The boy attended every winter until he was sixteen, working on the farm during the summers. At the age of seventeen he enlisted in the service when the call came for volunteers to help suppress the rebellion, and on October 3, 1863, he was mustered in as a private in Company B, 130th Indiana V(olunteer) I(nfantry) under Captain Ephraim Doll. After more than two years’ service, without missing a day from his company, he was honorably discharged December 16, 1865, at Charlotte, NC.
He was in the Atlanta campaign and in the battles of Burnt Hickory, Kenesaw Mountain, Buzzard’s Roost, Peach Tree Creek, Franklin, Bashville and Wilmington, marching through the northern and eastern states of the Confederacy. At Nashville Alfred was struck on the shin by a spent ball, which did not prove to be an injury of much consequence. On one occasion he had just left the picket l;ines and was eatin breakfast with a comrade, Jacob Ellis, from Anderson, when the latter was struck down, but Alfred escaped injury. On his return from the war Alfrted Brown resumed his work on the homestead, and after his father’s death, bought out the other heirs and made the place his own. To the original 59 acres he added 19 and later sold the whole tract. He then bought 120 acres of partly improved land in Stony Creek township and lived there until he brought it all under cultivation, then sold it.
His next enterprise was to purchase in company with Levi DeLaughter 260 acres in Greene Township. He also owned three dwelling places in Anderson, and was for some years located there, engaged in contracting. lfred Brown married (1st) Miss Parley A. Stanley, who bore him the following children:
Elmer E. b June 25, 1869;
Valeria C. b January 4, 1871;
Elder E. b July 19, 1872, who died September 15, 1873.

For his second wife Alfred married on September 1, 1877, Barbara Ann Souders, born in Ohio July 5, 1861, daughter of Peter and Catherine (Mort) Souders, who were of German descent. Peter Souders owned a farm in Ohio, where he was held in high esteem by all who knew him. He died in Ohio in June, 1861. His widow married William Brown, brother of Alfred.
The children born to Alfred and Barbara Ann Souders Brown are:
Garrett b Nov. 21, 1881, d Dec. 23, 1881;
Blanchie b Feb. 15, 1883 d Sept 25, 1883;
Chester Arthur b Fall Creek Twp. Nov 7, 1884;
Oscar Roscoe b Oct 14, 1886 Anderson, IN located in Kansas City, Mo. 11915; died Sept. 1975
Married Letha Iva Gildersleeve 20 March 1909, she died 24 February 1967
Ch: Paul Lewis Brown 24 Mar 1910-15 Aug 1992; m Betty June Watson Sept 1948
Ch: Paul Christy Brown b 30 Jun 1951 (informant)
m 1) Christine-----
ch Stephanie Michelle b 27 Oct 1974
Melissa Renee b 10 Sep 1977
Steven Barrett b 28 Feb 1983
Adam Lewis b 2 Oct 1986
2) Barbara Elinor Triplett 7 July 1997
Jewlie Ann Brown b 17 Dec 1949
B arbetta Lou Brown b 8 Nov 1947
Wesley Carl Brown Sep 1912--2003
Verabelle Lee Brown 1914--1985(?)
August Volney b Aug 17, 1889;
Stella Marie b Aug 3, 1892;
Palmer Lee b January 16, 1897.

In 1911 Alfred Brown and his wife, with the three youngest children moved to San Bernadino, California. Later [his son] Chester Arthur went west and located in the same city.. Mr. and Mrs. Brown are members of St. Paul’s Methodist Episcopal Church of San Bernadino. Palmer Lee, the youngest son, is a highly esteemed member of the staff of workers in the California State Bank of that city.

From Hoppes, Lester C., History of Hoppes Family and Our Ancestry, including some of the better-known families in America. Corbin, Kansas, 1925: