James Hedges
James Hedges was my father's brother, born in Virginia in the year 17--, of a family of nine sons and two daughters. His father was named Charles Hedges, born in Berkley County, Virginia; his mother, Rebekah Hedges also of Berkley County, and the two were first cousins before man and wife; but their descendants have helped to people Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and to the third and fourth generations are found in nearly every state stretching from Patapsco Bay westward, southwestward, northwestward to the Gulf of California, the Golden Gate and the bright blue waters of Puget Sound. James Hedges was by profession a surveyor, and in his day in that direction accomplished a marvelous amount of work. Intuitively he was a woodman and a pioneer. In the pursuit of his profession he came into Ohio; several of his brothers also came. They first settled at St. Clairsville in Belmont County, but James, as a government surveyor, came on into the county watered by the Mohican, and entered lands where now is built the city of Mansfield. All this occurred prior to the war was declared James Hedges was sheriff of Belmont County and his brother, Josiah Hedges, was clerk of the courts of that county. My father, Ellzey Hedges, their youngest brother, was deputy to each, as there was need of his services. Josiah Hedges was also a merchant in that early day and both my uncles were men of affairs. When the tocsin sounded James Hedges laid aside the Jacob's staff and compass and took a sword instead and was commissioned first a lieutenant and afterward a captain in the regular army of the United States. His service was with General William Henry Harrison, and it was substantial and of value. The war over, he resigned his commission and resumed the employments of peace. But passing, I have omitted to state that Mansfield was laid out prior to the war and a few settlers had erected their cabin homes on the town plat. The war very nearly but not entirely destroyed the settlement. So James Hedges, coming back after the war to the town he had protected in 1807, was thereafter until his death a heroic figure in the county of Richland. He was tall, broad-chested, large framed, a massive man, his eye was bright and clear and keen and far sighted. His mental equipment was excellent. He was a generous man, generous in all things, but specially so in bringing about a condition of things when any man coming into the new county from the older states or foreign countries, it mattered not whence he came, if he brought with him habits of industry and a heart of honesty, might successfully establish a new home. In Gen. James Hedges the humble and lowly always found a faithful friend. He was a modest man, as a rule preferring others to himself for political preferment, though he was elected and served in the Sixteenth, Seventeenth, Twentieth, Twenty-first, Twenty-second, Twenty-third, Twenty-fourth, Twenty-sixth, and Twenty-eighth General Assemblies of Ohio, and few men in Ohio rendered more valuable service than he. He was a supporter of Madison and Monroe, a follower of John Quincy Adams and Henry Clay, the close friend of William Henry Harrison and of Zachary Taylor and Winfield Scott. In 1825-26, when Ohio held her first state board of equalization, James Hedges was a member thereof. Among his colleagues was William Rufus Putnam, of Marietta, and Matthew Simpson, of Cadiz, uncle of the Bishop Matthew Simpson of the succeeding generation. He was devoted to the growth and prosperity of Mansfield, an active factor in all things which tended to make the town. When railroads were first thought of, he was quick to see and prompt to aid in their construction, and Mansfield and Richland County took an advanced position in this regard and were far in front of other cities and towns in Ohio. This heroic old man on the 4th. day of October, 1854, came to the end of his life and lies buried in our beautiful cemetery, and his resting place is within view of his home, under whose hospitable roof in the days agone were gathered some, aye many, of the men of mark whose deeds largely made Ohio great. In a second article I may write of his associate in projecting Mansfield, of that pioneer of pioneers, that heroic personage whose life was a sacrifice to his country in guiding the army of the northwest further on to the frontier, where the American soldiery fought and won a second time their independence of British rule and savage cruelty -- Jacob Newman.
From The Richland Shield & Banner: May 11, 1895, Vol. LXXVII, No. 52