William F. Willson, M.D.
William F. Willson, M. D., was a citizen of Adams County from 1836 to 1851. He was born near Fairfield. Rockbridge County, Virginia, September 9, 1815, of staunch Presbyterian, Scotch-Irish stock. His father was James A. Willson and his mother, Tirzah Humphreys. He was educated in the schools of his native county. When he was twelve years of age, an event took place which determined the whole course of his life. About twenty-five or thirty years prior to this, a farmer named Steele in Rockbridge County had died leaving a few negroes and a large sum of debts. By an agreement between the Widow Steele and her husband's creditors, they agreed to wait until the increase of the negroes would pay their debts. Among the Steele negroes at the time of his death was a likely young woman. She contracted a slave' marriage with a negro. Harry Moore, the property of a neighbor, and had given birth to sixteen children before the time came for the sale required by the creditors of Steele. The wife of Harry Moore and his sixteen children from a babe in arms to grown youths were put on the block, with twenty-three other negroes, and sold. Harry Moore was compelled by his master to be present and to hold his small children in his arms while they were roughly handled by the brutal traders and to see the persons of his daughters, women grown, indecently exposed on the block. Young Willson knew all of Harry Moore's children and had played with them many a time. He was a great friend of Harry's as a boy is often friendly to his inferiors. Young Willson came to the scene first as Harry was holding in his arms a four-year-old child, which was being auctioned off. The great tears were streaming down Harry's cheeks, and the child seeming to understand the situation, was weeping also. Willson looked on the scene and the flood gate of his tears was opened. He being free to go where he chose returned and hid himself to conceal his sympathy and grief. As soon as he could dry his tears, he came back to the scene, but could not contain himself and wept afresh. He had been brought up to believe slavery was a divine institution ordained of God and sanctioned by Holy Writ, but he then and there resolved it was a wicked and cruel institution and that he would never live in a state which tolerated it, after he was free from his father's dominion. He so informed the latter, and though the father tried to dissuade him and persuade him to remain in Virginia as the support of his old age, he would not give up his resolution. It was strengthened by a subsequent private interview with his friend, Harry, who told him God would bottle up his tears against his old mistress who sold his wife and children away. William Williamson at that time became an Abolitionist and anti-slavery and remained such till his views were carried out in the midst of the Civil War. He had an uncle who had located in West Union, Ohio, in 1816, and to him he determined to go as soon as he was of age.
In December, 1836, he started for Ohio, traveling to Charleston, West Virginia, by stage; thence down the Kanawha and Ohio Rivers by boat to Manchester, where he landed January 3, 1837. He walked from Manchester to West Union by the old road up Isaac's Creek and over Gift Ridge. At the Nixon place, he sought refuge from a heavy rain, but ran into the small-pox and retreated in an undignified manner, the only time in all his life he did anything unbecoming the dignity of a Virginia gentleman. At West Union, he was welcomed at the house of his uncle. Dr. William B. Willson, who had married Ann Newton, a daughter of the Rev. William Williamson. Here he found sympathy with his views on the institution of slavery, for both his uncle and aunt were pronounced in their anti-slavery sentiments. He taught school in West Union in the old stone schoolhouse. which stood where John Knox now resides, for twenty-two dollars per month. He read medicine with his uncle who was then the only physician in the place and who resided in a dwelling formerly standing on the site of the present residence of Jacob Plummer. In May, 1839, he located in Russellville, Brown County, to practice medicine, but in July, 1839, he witnessed a brutal fight on the streets, which the bystanders seemed to enjoy, and he concluded that that was no place for him and left. In August, 1839, he located at Rockville. Ohio, and remained there until August, 1840, and some of the most pleasant hours of his life were spent there. He enjoyed the society of James and John Loughry, James McMasters. Judge Moses Baird, Rev. Chester and their families. At that time, Rockville was more prosperous than it ever was before or has been since, because at that time there was a great deal of boat building going on there and the stone business was flourishing. In May, 1840, his uncle, Dr. William B. Willson, of West Union, was suffering from quick consumption and was compelled to give up his practice. At his request, Dr. William F. Willson came to West Union and located to take up his practice. His uncle died July 21, 1840, in the fifty-first year of his age. When he came to West Union, Dr. Willson brought with him his letter from the Presbyterian Church at New Providence, in Rockbridge County, Va., and lodged it with the church in West Union, where he attended regularly. Among the worshipers was a niece of Gen. Joseph Darlinton, Adaline Willson, with black hair and black eyes and very comely to look upon. The Doctor fell in love with the young lady and on the twenty-eighth day of October, 1840, he was married at the residence of General Darlinton by the Rev. John P. Vandyke, then the minister of the Presbyterian Church at West Union. There were present at this marriage Gen. Joseph Darlinton, his sister, Mrs Margaret Edwards, Mrs. Ann Willson, the Doctor's aunt, and her daughters, Eliza McCullogh and husband, Addison McCullogh, Miss Amanda Willson (since Mrs. Hugh Means), Miss Sophronia Willson, Davis Darlinton and wife, Newton Darlinton, Doddridge Darlinton and wife and Mrs. Salathiel Sparks, then a widow, and directly after the wife of Gen. James Pilson. Of that company but one survives. Mrs. Hugh Means, of Ashland, Ky.
In 1845, Dr. Willson and his wife. Mrs. Ann Willson. his aunt. Addison McCullogh and wife and Mrs. Noble Grimes withdrew from the Presbyterian Church at West Union and joined the New School. A church was organized at West Union and Doctor Willson and Addison McCullogh were made elders. From December, 1848. until April, 1849, Dr. Willson conducted a drug business at Pomeroy. Ohio, but with the exception of that period from May, 1840, until April, 1851, he practiced medicine at West Union. From the spring of 1849 till April, 1851, he was associated with Dr. David Coleman in the practice, under the name of Willson and Coleman. In the spring of 1851. the Doctor's health broke down, and he retired to Grimes' Well to recuperate, and was there during the cholera epidemic of 1851 in West Union.
In the fall of 1851, he located at Ironton, Ohio, where he continued to reside the remainder of his life. In Ironton, he connected with the Presbyterian Church in 1852, and the same year was made an elder which office he held until his death. He represented his Presbytery in four different synods. He attended four general assemblies as a delegate and four more as a visitor.
While Doctor Willson would not live in Virginia and while he and his people there differed about slavery, yet he loved to visit his old home in that state. In April, 1843, he took his wife there and they remained till June. They traveled the whole way in a carriage.
In 1846, he and his wife again visited his childhood home in Virginia, traveling the entire distance upon horseback.
In 1853, he was called to Virginia by the sickness of his mother, traveling by river to Guyandotte and thence by stage the remainder of the way. He had hoped to see his mother alive, but when he reachd there she was dead and buried. There were a number of young negroes about the place and the Doctor asked that one be given him and he selected a boy of nine named Sam and took him with him to Ohio, solely for the purpose of giving him his freedom. Sam was as full of fun and glee as a young healthy animal and had a natural genius for cookery. Notwithstanding the Doctor's abhorrence of slavery, he consented to be a slaveholder for a week in order to get Sam out of Virginia. He kept Sam for seven years and taught him to read and write and cipher and gave him such further instruction as he could. In 1860, he sent him to Cincinnati to learn the carpenter's trade. Sam could sew and do any housework as well as any woman. He always kept himself neat, clean and well dressed. Whenever the Doctor visited Cincinnati, Sam would buy a number of things for "Miss Adaline," as he called Mrs. Willson. Those articles were usually ladies' clothing or apparel and he could always select them with consummate taste and anticipate Mrs. Willson's wants. Sam always took good care of himself. He never married and is now living in New Orleans.
The Doctor, on the occasion of the last visit to his father in Virginia prior to the Civil War, had a great argument with his father, who was strongly pro slavery in his views and in favor of the Rebellion of the South. In this discussion, the Doctor predicted the Civil War and all its dire consequences to the South, including the abolition of slavery, but his father could not be convinced. They separated never to meet on earth, as James Willson died in 1864, but the Doctor lived to see all his predictions verified. During the war he was very kind to his Southern male relatives who, with the exception of his father, were all in the Confederate army and several of them prisoners at Camp Chase. To those who were prisoners, he sent money, clothing and necessaries, but at the same time no one was more loyal or devoted to the Union cause than he.
After the war he practiced his profession in Ironton until the infirmities of age compelled him to desist.
The Doctor and his wife were loved by the entire community, but especially was their church devoted to them. On the twenty-eighth of October, 1890, the fiftieth anniversary of their marriage was celebrated by the congregation of the First Presbyterian Church in Ironton, and it was a most notable occasion which would require an article as long as this. Of those present at their marriage, all had passed away except Mrs. Hugh Means, Miss Sophronia Willson and Rev. Newton Darlinton. The two former were present on the fiftieth anniversary.
From 1890 until 1898. the health of the Doctor gradually failed. He was subject to vertigo and was liable to fall at any time and he had to give up his profession, but all the time he was the same cheerful, agree able person he ever had been. He always welcomd his friends and made them feel refreshed and rejoiced that they had called. He loved to speak of those dear friends who had gone before, but never repined. On the eleventh of February, 1898, his wife passed away and he survived until the twenty-ninth of May, when he, too, received the final summons and answered it. After the death of his wife, an invalid in bed most of his time, unable to walk or stand alone, requiring an attendant all the time, he never complained. He often spoke of the great change which he felt was coming, but to him it was but passing from one room to another. He was ready at the Master's call and it came silently and gently. He passed from sleep to its twin, Death, and the chapter of his life was closed. He was a fine example of the old-fashioned Virginia gentleman, kind and courteous to everyone and quick to appreciate what would please those about him and gratify them. In Ironton, when the good men of the city were named, Dr. Willson's name was always first. Everyone felt that he was a sincere and fine Christian gentleman. The world is better that he lived. His life was a most excellent sermon, preached every day, and felt by those with whom he associated.
His old friends in Adams County have all passed over to the majority, but his memory among the younger is like a blessed halo, pictured about the Saints, of which he is undoubtedly one.
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