Mrs. Hannah Amanda Coryell
Hannah A. Briggs was born December 26, 1839, in Adams County. She was the youngest daughter of George Briggs and Rachael Blake, his wife. Her father was a farmer residing two miles east of West Union. As a girl, she was bright and quick and readily acquired all the education her opportunities offered. Her aunt, Mrs. Harriet A. Grimes, wife of Noble Grimes, resided in West Union, and our subject spent much of her childhood and girlhood at the home of her aunt who bestowed on her that wealth of affection and guiding care which she would have bestowed on her own child had she been blessed with one. Aunt Harriet Grimes was a mother to Hannah Briggs, more to her than her own mother, because she spent most of her time with her aunt. She attended school in West Union and soon qualified herself for a teacher in the Public schools, an avocation which she began as early as the age of sixteen. Her elder sister Mary went to Minnesota in 1852 and became a missionary there.
George Briggs, his wife and daughter Harriet went to Minnesota in 1858 and afterward made that their home. From that time until her death on February 8, 1874, Aunt Harriet Grimes took the place of Miss Briggs' mother. Miss Briggs was born with a faculty of pleasing those about her. As a young girl, she obtained and held the affection of all who knew her. Placed in any situation, no matter how trying or perplexing, she knew what to do at once and did it without any ostentation or display of any kind. When young, she instinctively knew the best and most pleasing service she could render her women friends of mature age and she always rendered it voluntarily and without ever being requested. Hence, she was always popular with and loved by those of her own sex of mature age. As a young woman, she had all those charms of character, those virtues of ideal womanhood that most attract the other sex. She had admirers and suitors, but she gave her hand and heart to John Wiley McFerran, who had been her teacher in the Public school at West Union, and who was a practicing lawyer at the West Union bar They were married June 27, 1858, while she was on a visit to her parents in Minnesota. They took up their home in West Union where they spent nearly four years of ideal happy married life. In this period there were born to them three children—a boy who died in infancy; Minnie, the wife of Dr. William K. Coleman, and John W., who died at the age of seven years. But the happiness of her early married life was rudely disturbed by the Civil War. In December, 1861. her husband went to the front as Major of the 70th O. V. I., and was destined to lay down his life for his country which be did on the third day of October, 1862. Thus Mrs. McFerran was left alone with two young children to fight the battle of life, and here the noble qualities of her mind and heart came out. Every one sympathized with her and every one respected and loved her She, of course, received her proper pension at once and on the twenty-seventh day of September, 1866, she was appointed postmistress at West Union, and held that office until October 26, 1860,, when she resigned.
On the twenty-fourth of November, 1869, she was married to Judge James I,. Coryell. He was a widower with three grown children, and to his son, who always resided with them, she was a mother in every sense of the term. She and the Judge lived happily together until his death. January 7, 1892. Thereafter, until her last illness, she and her step-son, William Coryell, resided in the Coryell home. She departed this life. November 3, 1898. She made her home a place of delight for those who belonged in it and a pleasure for those who visited it. Her friends were all those who knew her. If she had an enemy, he or she would be ashamed to own it. No one ever did own to harboring unfriendly or unkindly feelings toward her. She carried sunlight with her wherever she went. But her strong point was the house of affliction and sorrow. There all her great qualities shone to the best advantage. She was a woman of very few words, hardly any words at all, but she did not need words to express her sympathy. Her acts were more expressive, more eloquent and more appreciated by the recipients of them. If she went into a sick room and there was anything she saw could be done, she did not ask permission to do it, she simply did it and did it in such a way as to make those about her feel that the doing of it came from her heart. If she went to the house of mourning and thought of anything she could do, she did it without words. She had this faculty from a girl. It may be said to have been born with her. All of her good works were done without self-consciousness. They came from the goodness of her own heart and they went to the hearts of those who observed them.
From History of Adams County, Ohio from its Earliest Settlement to the Present Time - by Nelson W. Evans and Emmons B. Stivers - West Union, Ohio - Published by E. B. Stivers - 1900