Three Canfield brothers came from Scotland before the Revolutionary War, one settled in New York, one in Virginia and our ancestor settled in New Jersey but came to Ohio in the early days. My great grand father, James Ellsworth Canfield, married his first wife in New Jersey, evidently, and had three children: Albert, Job, and one died young. These two boys went from Ohio to Michigan and then back east somewhere. After their mother died their father married Mary or Elizabeth (maybe she had both names) Mongtomery who came from Ireland They were married in Ohio and had seven children, John Montgomery (my grandfather), William, Ebenezer, Ellen, Phoeboe, Elizabeth and Marian. My Grandfather (John) was born in or near Columbus, Ohio June 16, 1824. He married Eleanor Johnson in the 1850s. She was from LaRue, Ohio, born in or near Marion, Ohio. Her father was Ole Yonson, who came from Sweden and her mother, Elizabeth, was German and possibly a little English. "Aunt Lizzie" said if there was any English in our family it had to come through her as the Canfields came from Scotland, that is our family. Early Canfield history from the archives in Washington, D.C. state that the early Canfields were British landed Gentry and Yeomanry and some authorities think they came from Normandy and that they were French.
After John and Eleanor were married they left LaRue, Ohio, and went to Illinois and lived there several years. Aunt Ella Canfield was born there. In the late 1850s, John went to New Lancaster, Kansas, and staked a claim there. He built a cabin on the farm and sent for his family. By that time she had Ella, Sophia, and Byron and maybe Clemar who was born in 1860 we think. Grandma's family went in a covered wagon along with Grandpa McNelly and his big family in their wagon but Grandma rode Ella's horse most of the way. Grandpa's sister, Mary, also started but she didn't like it so she stopped at an Inn, worked for her board until she got a chance to trade her wagon for a train ticket back to Ohio. In later years she did go to Kansas. Grandma's sister, Caroline, who was married to Taylor Hewitt and his brother, Ed, who lived with them also went to Kansas with them in a covered wagon but after the war started they went back to Ohio but Grandma stayed after Grandpa went in the service. In 1860 her little ________ daughter, Sophia, choked to death from diptheria. She was buried in New Lancaster cemetery. Grandpa went in the service and was gone three years. When he first went Grandma was afraid of the bushwhackers and the Indians so at night she would put her children out the back window of the cabin and then they would all spend the night hiding in the cornfield. After some time she decided she couldn't do that all the while so she would greet the Indians with a big pan of apples when they came after water from her well.
After the war was over Grandpa was home but he was sickly as he had been in Andersonville Prison and contracted dysentery while there from which he never really recovered and it was really the cause of his death in 1894.
In 1867 or 68, their seven-year-old son Clemer fell out of a cherry tree, was badly injured, contracted fever and passed away. He also was buried in New Lancaster Cemetery.
Caroline (Johnson-Hewitt) and her family later came back to Kansas and lived there till they died. Caroline had a big family, the youngest one was Rebecca, born in 1875, married to a man by the name of Day and they lived around New Lancaster or Butler, MO. Caroline lost two children with pneumonia on the way back to Ohio when she went. Her husband died soon after Grandpa did but his brother, Ed, continued to live with the Hewitts until he was an old man and passed away. Grandma's mother lived to be very old but her father died in middle age. She had a sister Mary and brother William who never married and another brother who had a son named Porter Johnson. He never married either but went to Houston, Texas, and died there. Caroline died April 22, 1918.
Grandpa's mother also went to Kansas from Ohio and lived with Grandpa's family until she was very old and died there and was also buried in New Lancaster Cemetery. He had a brother William who went to Kansas, started to St. Louis and was never heard from again. This was during the Civil War. He was a photographer. His sister, Elizabeth, lived in Osawatomie and she had three girls. His brother, Marion, had a family and lived in Leavenworth. His brother, Ebenezer, also lived in Leavenworth and he coaxed Grandpa's son, Byron, to leave home when he was 19 and go to Leavenworth. Byron met and married his first wife there and they had one daughter, Lillian, in 1885. She married a Mr. Lee and they had a boy and a girl. In 1908 they moved to Pueblo, Colorado. She used to write to Aunt Lizzie. I have one of her letters. Marion and Ebenezer Canfield both died in the old soldier's home at Leavenworth.
When Clarence Canfield, Grandma's youngest son, was young he contracted polio and was bedfast for years. When he could get out of bed he wore dresses, then was on crutches for five years. The only doctor near was an old Quack and anyway they didn't know how to doctor polio then. A good doctor came to New Lancaster later but the damage was done by then. His name was Dr. Potts and my mother had him when I was born. Grandma had two premature babies who didn't live, one before Aunt Lizzie and one between Grace and Clarence, otherwise, would have had fifteen children.
Grandma and Grandpa's troubles were not over when the children had grown up. Their farm joined the Lee family who were friends of the Youngers who in turn were close friends of the James brothers. The Lees were known to be a bad lot and one of the boys had killed his girlfriend by forcibly performing an abortion on her in a wagon, then bringing her home to die. In the early 1890s the Lees claimed that the line fence on Grandpa's farm was over on their land. Grandpa had it surveyed and the court said the line was all right. That night my father and Aunt Lizzie had been to a dance and didn't get home until late and my father hadn't gone to sleep yet when he noticed a light around the corner of the L-shaped house. When they investigated they found straw piled up against the kitchen wall and it was all on fire. The eleven-room house was burned completely and not much was saved. A few pictures were but all the family history was burned. (NOTE: It was told to this researcher that one important thing Eleanor Johnson-Canfield saved before the house burned down was one of the drawers from her old treddle sewing machine. In that drawer, she had stashed away a little bit of cash, and didn't want it burned up.) It was evident that the Lees had set the fire for spite. Since most of the family had left home by that time, Grandpa just built a small house. Sometime after Grandpa died Grandma moved to Paola, Kansas, and my father (Erston Canfield) and one of his brothers, Byron, I think, lived on the farm and watched it. Then in 1899, January 31, my father married and my mother and he started housekeeping there and in 1901 I was born in that house, the only grandchild born on the Canfield farm.
My mother was always afraid of the Lees. When my father had to haul grain to Paola she kept a kettle of boiling water on the stove to throw on them in case they came to molest her but luckily they never did. In 1902 they, my parents, bought another farm and moved there. She told me the old man was crippled and told her once when he came after eggs to her place that he had been shot in the leg in the Civil War, but she knew he had been stealing chickens when he got shot by a neighbor.
Sophia, Clemer, Carrie and Clarence had brown eyes. The others had blue. Grandpa Canfield had brown eyes. Grandma had blue.
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