ALVIN TRUMAN BRANT, sixth child and fourth son of John Hancock and Mary Elizabeth (Collard) Brant, was born near
Troy, county seat of Lincoln county, Missouri, August 4, 1876. This was the centennial year of the Republic and
was likewise the year in which occurred one of the most bitterly contested presidential elections in our national
history, a circumstance to which Alvin T. Brant owes his middle name which is not the one originally bestowed upon
him by his father.
On June 27, 1876 (only a little over a month before Alvin Brant's birth), the Democrats, meeting in St. Louis,
nominated Samuel J. Tilden of New York for President. John Hancock Brant, an old-line Democrat, an ardent supporter
of Tilden, named his son Alvin Tilden Brant, the middle name being for the Democratic candidate. Opposing candidates
were Governor Rutherford B. Hayes of Ohio, candidate of the Republicans, and the venerable philanthropist, Peter
Cooper of New York, candidate of the "Greenbackers."
The campaign was a bitter one. The election was attended with unusual excitement. Actions following the election
were unprecedented. The vote was close and for weeks the result was uncertain. The usual method of counting the
electoral vote was discarded, there being so many disputed returns. An act was passed, prepared by a committee
of seven members from each House of Congress, made up of an equal number from each political party. This act provided
that the two Houses should meet in the Hall of Representatives, and where there was more than one return from any
state, a commission of fifteen members should decide which was the true and lawful one. This commission was composed
of five each House of Congress, and five Associate Justices of the United States Supreme Court, the associate judge
longest in commission being the presiding officer.
The joint convention of Congress to count the electoral vote began its sessions on February 1, 1877 and concluded
on the following March 2. Questions arose as to votes of Florida, Louisiana, Nevada and Oregon. The commission,
by a vote of eight to seven, decided all of the contests in favor of the Republican candidates, who were thereby
declared duly elected, receiving 185 electoral votes to 184 cast for the Democratic candidates.
Mr. Brant's father was so disgusted with the outcome and so incensed because Tilden allowed himself to be counted
out, that he immediately repudiated his young son's middle name of Tilden and changed it to Truman, for the late
Robert Truman Hicks, so long cashier of the First National Bank in Pittsfield and among the leading bankers of
this section of Illinois. His name had descended in turn from his paternal grandfather, Truman B. Hicks of the
War of 1812.
Alvin T. Brant, on March 5, 1899, married Carrie Lenora Galloway of Pleasant Hill, with Justice John R. Galloway
officiating, and Julia Adams and Nola Brant (later Mrs. Harry V. Craigmiles) as official witnesses.
Carrie L. (Nora) Galloway was a daughter of Augustus Labaum (Dick) Galloway and his second wife, Maria E. McConnell.
The father was a pioneer of Pleasant Hill township to which he came with his parents, James and Ursula (Lewis)
Galloway, in the spring of 1832. His birth had occurred in Lincoln county, Missouri, September 4, 1829. His father,
a native of Kentucky, had settled on the Missouri border in pioneer times. His mother was a descendant on one side
of the noted Warner Hall Lewises of early Virginia and on the other of that John Lewis who found refuge in America
from persecutions in Ireland and became the first settler in the wilderness region that is now Augusta county,
Virginia. Ursula (Lewis) Galloway was a daughter of Samuel Hardin Lewis and Mary Barnett and a great granddaughter
of John Lewis who settled Augusta county. She was reputed to have been the first white child born in Missouri Territory
after that great domain came into American control in 1804.
A. L. Galloway, father of Mrs. Brant, was familiarly called Uncle Dick by all who knew him. He was a prosperous
farmer in the Pleasant Hill community and also studied law and practiced in the justice courts of his time. He
grew to manhood amid the environments of a frontier life, for in his early youth Pike county was still largely
an undeveloped region, with only here and there the log home of a pioneer. He died February 4, 1898.
Mr. Galloway was twice married. On November 24, 1859, in Pike county, he was married to Sarah Brant, who was a
sister of Alvin T. Brant's father, John Hancock Brant. She was formerly of St. Louis. They had six children, three
of whom died young. Those who reached maturity were Lyman H., Ann P., and Minnie L. Galloway.
Lyman H., the eldest, married Laura Fischer, who died leaving one child, Bertie, who became the wife of Newton
Shinn of Bosworth, Missouri. They had two sons and one daughter. The daughter Hazel is deceased, as is also the
mother. The two sons are employed in government work, one in Chicago, the other in Washington, D. C.
After the death of his first wife, Lyman H. Galloway on March 19, 1882, with the Reverend Frank H. Lewis officiating,
married Clara C. Dodge, a daughter of Clinton (Guy) Dodge and a granddaughter of Dr. Hezekiah Dodge, the noted
early-day physician at Baytown. They had two children, Scott and Beatrice (Bee) Galloway. Scott married Jessie
Thomas, youngest daughter of Dr. J. Smith Thomas and Molly S. Wells, she a daughter of Perry S. Wells, one of the
prominent landowners and early settlers of Pike county, formerly from Kentucky, whence he removed to Missouri and
later to Pike county, Illinois.
Scott and Jessie (Thomas) Galloway had four daughters, Pauline, Delphine, Scottie and Virginia Bee Galloway, all
of whom are married.
Beatrice Galloway, daughter of Scott and Clara (Dodge) Galloway, on October 10, 1905 married Harry Bush, a Nebo
business man, son of George and Mary Lee Bush and a native of Belleview, Calhoun county.
Lyman Galloway died March 3, 1903, aged 42 years, five months and 20 days. He is buried in Crescent Heights cemetery
at Pleasant Hill. His widow, who was Clara Dodge, is still living.
Ann P. Galloway, second of the A. L. Galloway children, married James Curtis Yokem and at her death left one child,
Fay Yokem, who married, first Sidney LaDow (son of Jasper Newton and Frances McElfresh LaDow), and second, Elmer
Martin of Pleasant Hill. The record of Ann P. Galloway's descendants is given in the preceding chapter. Ann (Galloway
Yokem died December 27, 1893 and is buried in Crescent Heights cemetery.
Minnie L. Galloway on January 30, 1889 married James E. DeCamp and they had three children, two of whom died young.
The death of one of them, Bertie A. DeCamp, occurred December 28, 1891, at the age of six months and three days.
Lora DeCamp became the first wife of Russell Bybee, son of Charles and Sarah (Gresham) Bybee, and they had two
children, Inez and Carl Bybee. Inez Bybee married Dean Webster, and they have four children. They reside on the
bluff road between Atlas and Pleasant Hill. Carl married Florence Dunham, a daughter of Kelly Dunham.
After the death of his first wife, A. L. Galloway was married in Calhoun county on April 26, 1875 to Maria E. McConnell,
daughter of John and Mary (Sidwell) McConnell, both of whom were natives of Kentucky and early settlers in Missouri.
They removed to Calhoun county during the Civil War and Mrs. Galloway was reared for the most part in that county.
Following her marriage she came to her husband's home in Pleasant Hill township.
By this second marriage of Mr. Galloway there were born four children: Clara Myrtle, who died the day she was a
year old; Milo E., Carrie Lenora and Mayo L. Galloway.
Milo E. Galloway on April 5, 1899 married Daisy LaDow, daughter of Jasper Newton and Frances (McElfresh) LaDow
and sister of Sidney LaDow of previous record. They had two children, Truman and Mary. Truman married Ruth Barton
and they moved to the Dakotas where, many years ago, when they were living at Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Truman
mysteriously disappeared, nothing ever having been learned as to what became of him. There were no children.
Mary Galloway, daughter of Milo E., married Charles Woodworth and they reside in Bloomington. There are no children.
Milo Ellsworth Galloway died January 7, 1936 and is buried in Crescent Heights cemetery.
Mayo L. Galloway on November 8, 1906 married Tessie M. Hoover, daughter of William and Mary Weidman Hoover. They
have four sons, Harold, Richard, Robert (Bobbie) and Glen. Harold married Billie Marshall (deceased) and they had
one daughter, Ann Galloway. Harold and Ann live with his parents. Richard married Opal Trotter and they have one
son, Larry. Richard lives on the Mayo Galloway farm and teaches school at Atlas. Robert is in school at Macomb,
Illinois. Glen is in Pleasant Hill high school.
Mayo L. Galloway has long resided in Pleasant Hill. He has been in the lumber and merchandising business there
and is a former supervisor of Pleasant Hill township.
Alvin T. and Carrie L. (Galloway) Brant had four children: Milo Galloway, Thelma Irene, Beulah Marie and Alvin
T. Brant, Jr.
Milo Galloway Brant, born at Pleasant Hill January 6, 1900, died at Decatur, Illinois, October 6, 1918. He is buried
in Crescent Heights cemetery.
Thelma Irene Brant, born November 15, 1903, married John Harold Voshall, October 9, 1924. He was a native of Nebo,
a son of Edgar F. and Kathryn (Criss) Voshall. The ceremony was said by the Reverend Fenton Bartine, with J. L.
Laugharn and Beulah Brant as official witnesses. They located in Kinderhook, where both taught school. While they
were residents of Kinderhook, the first of their two sons, Richard Harold, was born September 30, 1926. The second
son, Robert Brant, was born in Levering hospital, Hannibal, Missouri, April 4, 1931. The father, J. Harold Voshall,
is superintendent of the Pittsfield grade and Pittsfield Community High schools, and the family now resides in
Pittsfield.
Beulah Marie Brant, born January 19, 1908, was for three years head of the home economics department in the Pleasant
Hill schools, and had training in Illinois Woman's College at Jacksonville, in the University of Chicago and in
Western Illinois State Teachers' College at Macomb. On October 20, 1932, she married John E. Sommers, son of Henry
Sommers of Bluffs, in Scott county, Illinois. At the time of his marriage, he was foreman in the office of the
Pike County Republican in Pittsfield. He is now employed with the Jacksonville Daily Journal, and the family resides
in Jacksonville. They have one son, Joseph Brant Sommers, born July 26, 1936, in Pittsfield.
Alvin T. Brant, Jr., born July 6, 1916, married Wilma E. Riley in Pittsfield, November 11, 1937. The Reverend Russell
E. Booker of the Pittsfield Christian church said the ceremony. The bride was a daughter of Albert and Lota Mae
(Lidgard) Riley, who reside on a farm near Pittsfield. Mr. and Mrs. Brant reside at Marion, Illinois, where he
is a lighting engineer with the Illinois Public Service Company, with which he has been connected for four years.
The Brants have one child, a son, Jerry Dee, born at Carbondale, Illinois, January 1, 1939.
Mr. and Mrs. Alvin T. Brant, Sr., moving from Pleasant Hill to Pittsfield, have been residents of the latter city
for many years. They have a beautiful home at 115 South Jackson. Mr. Brant, besides managing his own farm interests,
has for many years been farm manager and adviser for the extensive Strauss interests.