Hamilton Dunbar
Andrew Dunbar, father of the subject of our sketch, was born in Winchester, Virginia. His wife was Deborah Mitchell, of the same place. They were married in Winchester, Virginia, about 1779, and several of their children were born there. They emigrated to Lewis County, Kentucky, in 1794, when their son, Hamilton, born August 28, 1782, was twelve years old. Here Andrew Dunbar adopted the business of trading along the river with a large canoe between Alexandria, Ohio, and Maysville, Kentucky. One night his boat capsized, and he was lost, leaving a widow, four sons and three daughters. At the time of his father's death, Hamilton was living on the home farm near Concord, Kentucky. Not long after the family moved to Adams County, Ohio. As it was a custom in those days that every boy should learn a trade, Hamilton selected that of a carpenter and followed it in Adams and adjoining counties. He entered the land east of West Union, on the Portsmouth road, where John Spohn formerly resided. He was married January 14, 1808, at West Union, Ohio, to Delilah Sparks, born January 1, 1792, in western Pennsylvania, a daughter of Salathiel Sparks. Mrs. Dunbar died at West Union, Ohio, August 14, 1828, and is interred in Lovejoy Cemetery. They were married at the residence of the bride's father in the property east of West Union where Thomas Huston formerly resided and afterwards owned by Hon. J. W.Eylar. Soon after their marriage, Hamilton Dunbar purchased the lot just opposite and west of the stone Presbyterian Church and built the residence thereon in which he continued to reside until his death. The house is now occupied by Vene Edgington. Mrs. Dunbar's brother, John Sparks, was a banker in West Union, and died there in July, 1847. His wife was a sister of David Sinton, of Cincinnati, Ohio, the well known philanthropist.
George Sparks, her brother, died in West Union in 1842, leaving two sons, Salathiel and George. The children of Hamilton Dunbar are as follows: John Collins, born December 2, 1808, and died the following year; Ann, born November 21, 1809, and became the wife of Peter Bryant, of Kentucky, July 16, 1837, and died July 19, 1894; Grace, born December 6, 1812, became the wife of David Murray, April 22, 1829, and died in Georgetown, Ky., April 18, 1833; Agnes, born August 27, 1815, married April 3, 1838, John L. Cox, and is now living in Abilene, Kansas; L. William Willson, born November 16, 1817, and now resides at Locust Grove, Ohio; David Dunbar, born February 4, 1820; George Franklin, born August 3, 1822, and died at Ripley, Ohio, June 13, 1872; Johanna, born July 4, 1824, married Jesse Fristoe in 1843, and died at Manchester, Ohio, May 10, 1866; John Sparks, born December 6, 1827, died at Sigonney, Iowa, June 14, 1866. In those days people believed in the old scripture command to multiply and replenish the earth and practiced it.
Mrs. Hamilton Dunbar married at the age of sixteen and became the mother of nine children in the succeeding twenty years. She was a pattern of all domestic virtues known at that time, and died at the age of thirty-six. Her husband survived her seven years, but did not remarry. Hamilton Dunbar did work for Judge Byrd, while the latter was a resident at West Union. He built the manager's house at Union Furnace in Lawrence County. He built a dwelling house at Union Landing for Thomas W. Means, and another dwelling house at Hanging Rock for Andrew Ellison. In West Union, he built a house for Peter Schultz, being the home where Auditor Shinn died in 1851, of cholera, and afterwards, used by J. W. Lafferty for a carding mill. He also built the house now occupied by W. V. Lafferty on Main Street, opposite the old Bradford Tavern. At the time he worked in West Union, carpenters went into the woods, cut down the timbers for cross-beams, sills and upright posts and hewed them with broad axes, got out the studding and rafters and roofed with lap shingles. As to all of the houses built by him, the work was done in this manner.
He also built the forge house for Sparks and Means, at Brush Creek—Forge Furnace. He also did the carpenter work on the home for Col. John Means, below Bentonville, and now owned by A. V. Hutson. But every carpenter has his last contract and Mr. Dunbar had his in the Hollingsworth House on Main Street in West Union, Ohio. He began work on that in June, 1835, and had begun on the excavation. John Seaman had taken the contract for the excavation and had worked all day on Saturday, June 27, 1835. He lived east of the village some two miles and had gone home that evening. He was in the prime of life and vigor. He had made all arrangements to go forward with the work on the following Monday, but that night he was taken with the cholera and died on Sunday, the 28th. He was the father of Franklin Seaman. Hamilton Dunbar had overseen the work on the Hollingsworth contract on Saturday, as usual, and had attended the Methodist Quarterly meeting on that day. He retired to bed in good health. Later in the evening, he was attacked by the dread Asiatic cholera and died Sunday morning at four o'clock. He went out with the rising sun. At that time it was customary to bury a cholera patient in a few hours after death. He was buried that afternoon at the Lovejoy graveyard. In those days there were no hearses, and the body of the deceased was taken out in a road wagon. The few mourners who attended the interment followed the wagon afoot. Nelson Barrere, of Hillsboro, was in West Union at that time and attended the funeral.
Hamilton Dunbar was the first victim of the scourge that year. He died in the house built by him directly opposite the old stone Presbyterian Church.
He was six feet high, of a large frame, weighed 180 pounds, had blue eyes and a fair complexion. He joined the Methodist Church a few years before his decease and was zealously attached to it. He was a man of great firmness of character and his family loved and respected him. With them his word was law. He was a Whig in politics and devotedly attached to his party, as earnest in politics as he was in all other things. His political guide was the Liberty Hall and Cincinnati Gazette.
His sudden taking off was a great blow and loss to the young community then only thirty-one years old, which has not been entirely for gotten after a lapse of sixty-three years.
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