JOEL L. ELLEDGE, son of Boone and Rebecca Elledge and grandson of Charity Boone, was born in Boone township, in
Harrison county, Indiana, August 27, 1822. He was one of the sons who came with his father to Griggsville township
in 1836.
On December 21, 1843, in Pike county, Joel Elledge married Miss Lucinda Wade, a daughter of Josias Wade and Frances
Dorson. She was born in Kentucky August 14, 1825, and was five years old when her father brought her to Pike county,
Illinois, in 1830.
Josias Wade the Elder was a soldier in the old Indian wars and was with Daniel Boone on one of the expeditions
against the Indians in the Ohio country. He was with Gen. William Henry Harrison at the battle of Tippecanoe, in
Indiana Territory, in 1811, when the celebrated Chief Tecumseh's warriors were defeated and the town of his brother,
the Prophet, destroyed.
Josias Wade was a native of Virginia, where he was born prior to the Revolution. He married, first, Miss Dorcas
Brown, who died in 1805. They had five children, namely, Richard Wade (early Pike county settler), born December
26, 1796; Hezikiah, born July 14, 1798; Anna, born February 21, 1800; Dolly, born March 17, 1802; and Josias, Jr.,
(also an early Pike county settler), born May 21, 1804.
Mrs. Wade died in 1805, and in 1809, in Kentucky, Josias Wade married again, his second wife being Miss Frances
Dorson. They had 12 children, namely: Noble Wade, born May 11, 1810; Milly, born May 27, 1811; Elizabeth, born
April 17, 1813; Parentha M., born February 1, 1815; Behrlem, born December 25, 1816; Bruntz, born December 15,
1819; Zachariah, born June 4, 1823; Lucinda, born August 14, 1825; John Taylor Wade, born January 13, 1828; John
Wesley Wade, born January 30, 1829. Two sons, Alexander and William, died in infancy.
The Wades were prominent in the early history of what is now Flint township. In the very early days, Josias Wade,
Jonathan Husband and William Turnbull, all of whom came early to that section, owned the same coffee mill, in which
others of the scattered settlers also ground the family supply.
On Section 19, near Flint Creek, on a log in the wild forest (there being no house in the vicinity), the first
settlers met in 1846 to organize a school. Present at that meeting were Josias Wade, William Thackwray, James Crawford,
Richard Sweeting, James L. Thompson, James G., and David Pyle, E. A. F. Allen, Francis Wade, Jonathan Husband and
William Turnbull. Peter Kargis presided over the deliberations of this first public school meeting. The first school
in the township was taught by William Turnbull, James G., and David Pyle and James L. Thompson, who "spelled"
one another in the school room, giving their services without compensation. The school was held in an old log house
which was bought and paid for by the few citizens of the period.
Francis (Frank) Wade, mentioned above, belonged to another family, being an English emigrant who came from Nottinghamshire,
England in 1834, located in Trenton, New Jersey, came thence to Pennsylvania, and in July, 1838 landed at Philips
Ferry, in what is now Flint township.
Richard Wade, first-born of Josias Wade's 17 children, born in 1796, resided in an early day on the north side
of the river road between Bateman's Gap (now Griggsville) and Philips Ferry. Asahel Hinman, in an historical article
printed in 1876, recalled that Richard Wade was located at that point when the Hinman family arrived at Philips
Ferry in 1829.
Josias Wade, the younger, was born in Franklin county, Kentucky, May 22, 1804. His father, the first Josias, had
located in Franklin county, at Frankfort, when a young man, coming there from Virginia. It was there he married
Frances Dorson, a native of Kentucky and of Welsh descent. Josias, Jr., 1825, in Kentucky, married Miss Cynthia
Owens, a daughter of William and Sarah Owens of Logan county, in Kentucky. She was born in North Carolina, November
16, 1806, of English parentage. They had eight children. In 1827 the family moved to Missouri and Mr. Wade there
engaged in farming, but becoming dissatisfied, after three years removed to Illinois and settled in Section 7,
Flint township. Mrs. Wade died in July, 1863, and on December 20, 1870, he again married, his second wife being
Miss Hannah C. Lyon, a daughter of David and Patty Lyon. She was born in 1827, the year in which her parents moved
from Susquehanna county, Pennsylvania, to what is now Griggsville township in Pike county, Illinois. Josias Wade
died at Griggsville, March 14, 1896.
Among the children of Josias Wade were Richard, Mary Ann (Polly), Austin, Josias Brown, Coleman and Louisa Jane
Wade.
Richard Wade, eldest son of Josias Wade and Cynthia Owens, was born in Logan county, Kentucky, April 10, 1826,
being four years old when his father brought him to Pike county. In Pike county, on January 25, 1849, he married
Miss Mary Paullin, with Elder C. Regan officiating. She died in December, 1849, leaving a son who survived but
a few months. On September 9, 1852, Mr. Wade again married, his second wife being Lucy Ann Bennett, of Ohio birth
and a daughter of Emmanuel Bennett and Martha Burdick. They had eight children. Mrs. Wade, born February 26, 1832,
died January 10, 1923, aged 90 years, 10 months and 15 days.
Mary Ann (Polly) Wade married James A. McGee, in Pike county, September 3, 1848. They were married by elder C.
Regan.
Austin Wade, son of Josias and Cynthia (Owens) Wade, was born in Pike county July 23, 1832. On September 27, 1855,
he married Mary A. Pyle, daughter of Joseph Pyle of Naples, a brother of Catherine Pyle who married John Boone
Elledge, son of Benjamin Franklin Elledge and a grandson of Boone and Rebecca. They had eight children, two of
whom died young; the others were Willard, Elizabeth, Arthur, Duraine, Ferber and Homer. Mr. Wade resided seven
years in Morgan county, Illinois, and two years on the Pacific coast.
Coleman Wade and his brother Austin were long prominent in Flint township. Coleman was born in Pike county July
7, 1837. On January 20, 1859, he married Miss Rachel Pyle, sister of Mary Pyle who married his brother Austin.
They had six children, one of whom died young, the others being Lillian, Ernest, Raymond, Clifford and Irene.
Louisa Jane Wade married a Farrell and resided in Anderson county, Kansas, where she died.
Bruntz Wade, a son of Josias Wade and Frances Dorson, was born in Kentucky December 15, 1819. On March 19, 1846,
in Pike county, he married Mrs. Rosannah Jones. On August 22, 1860 he was again married, his second wife being
Miss Margaret E. Spence, a daughter of Robert Spence. Bruntz Wade died at Pine Bluff, Jefferson county, Arkansas,
April 7, 1877. Mrs. Wade died January 2, 1898; buried at Griggsville.
Zachariah (Zack) Wade, noted in Pike county history, was the seventh child and fourth son of Josias Wade of the
Indian wars, and a brother of Joel Elledge's wife, Lucinda. He was the first to discover the medical properties
of the famous Perry Springs, once of national celebrity and the most noted resort in the West.
Zachariah Wade was born in Kentucky June 4, 1823, and coming to Pike county in 1830 he lived to see a vast wilderness
transformed into a fruitful field. In 1849 he married Mary Morrison and they had a family of one boy and two girls.
In politics he was a staunch Republican; he served three terms as supervisor from Perry township, and was also
school trustee and road commissioner. He and his wife were members of the M. E. church. On April 23, 1889, at Perry,
Mr. Wade married Mrs. Sarah Stone, a daughter of Dan Stuart.
In the early 1850s Zack Wade was ill in health. He was "run down" and emaciated; he thought he had not
long to live. Prescriptions of the early doctors failed to mend his condition. He knew of certain springs that
gushed on the lands then owned by Benjamin F. and John S. Dorsey. From the Indians had come down a tradition that
these springs were "mighty medicine." They had long been known to the Indian tribes. One of them, known
as Magnesia Springs, gushing through a rock in great quantities, had been called by the Indians "spring in
the rock." Three springs, vastly different in character, flowed within an area of a few square rods. They
were known as Magnesia, Iron and Sulphur Springs. Their waters were strongly impregnated with magnesia, lime, iron,
potassa, soda, salt, etc. These springs were unaffected in their flow by dry or wet weather and varied but little
in temperature regardless of the season, ranging from 50 degrees in summer to 48 in winter.
Hearing of the Indian tradition that still persisted in the settlement, Zack Wade occupied a rude log cabin near
the springs and partook of their waters. He began to recover his health. He drank of the springs until he was fully
healed. Meanwhile, others in ill health, learning of the Zack Wade "miracle," sought the springs. Around
them arose other cabins, occupied by those who drank of the healing waters. The fame of the springs grew and spread.
In 1856, Zack Wade built a hotel at the springs. It was an enchanting spot in the eastern part of Perry township,
near a creek among the hills west of the Illinois river, and at the confluence of several deep ravines. The surrounding
country was very broken, the hills steep and covered with beautiful forest growth. Soon, invalid began to come
from far places, seeking the "mighty medicine" of the Indians.
B. A. Watson, grandfather of Dr. A. B. Carey and Miss Helen Carey of Pittsfield, eventually, beginning in 1865,
developed the springs into one of the finest natural resorts in America. Coming from Springfield, Illinois, where
he had been engaged in the manufacture of confectioneries, he expended $100,000 in the erection of a large hotel
and other buildings and in beautifying the grounds. Born in Tennessee in 1818, a son of W. W. and Maria (Cape)
Watson, natives respectively of New Jersey and Kentucky, he emigrated to Illinois at the age of 18. In 1845 he
married Emma R. Planck and they had seven children, the eldest daughter becoming the wife of the late Dr. A. B.
Carey, Sr., long a practicing dentist in Pittsfield. Mrs. Watson died in 1870. Mr. Watson was postmaster at Perry
Springs for many years.
Zack Wade, with "one foot in the grave," as he expressed it when he began using the medicated waters,
lived thereafter for nearly half a century, dying at Perry on January 25, 1901, when past 77. He was survived by
his wife and three children, namely, Edward C. Wade, Louisa E. Lucas and Sophia J. Thornberry.
The elder Richard Wade was trail-blazer for the far-flung Wade family in Pike county. He was the first comer, coming
with his wife Nancy in 1826 and settling on the river road up from Philips Ferry. He had married in Kentucky. His
first wife died in the pioneer settlement on May 6, 1838, at the age of 38. Rebecca Burlend, English emigrant of
1831, whose story of the early settlement was reprinted as a Christmas edition of the Lakeside Classics in 1936,
attended her as she lay dying, resorted to her herbs which she had learned to use so effectively among the English
peasantry. Nancy is buried in Bethel cemetery, on the Griggsville-Detroit road, hers being the second burial of
record that was made in that old cemetery, where the first church in Newburg was founded by the Methodists in 1835.
On November 10, 1839, Richard Wade took another wife, Mrs. Hannah Pearcy (Piercy), widow of John Pearcy who died
May 1, 1835, at the age of 45. The stone that stands at the grave of John Pearcy is the oldest stone in Bethel
cemetery, marking the earliest known burial there.
Richard Wade died September 3, 1855; he is buried in Bethel cemetery. He left as his heirs his widow, Hannah Wade,
and John C., Henry B., George H and Benjamin Wade, and Joseph Harvey.
Hannah Wade, widow of Richard, died September 2, 1859. She is buried beside her first husband, John Pearcy, in
Bethel cemetery, while Richard Wade rests beside his first wife, Nancy. Hannah Wade had five children by her first
husband, among whom by will she divided her property, share and share alike, to Polly (Piercy) Anthony, Algernon
Piercy (his heirs), the heirs of Sarah Piercy who married Elijah Lane, Margaret (Peggy) Piercy who married Henry
B. Wade, and Nancy Piercy who married Jonathan Perry. (Note: On the tombstone in Bethel the name is "Pearcy,"
while on the marriage records of the children the name is spelled "Piercy.") Algernon Pearcy is buried
at Bethel; he died January 8, 1845, aged 27. He had married Rebecca Burns.
John C. Wade, son of the first Richard, was born January 28, 1836, and died March 27, 1900. He is buried at Bethel.
He married Rebecca A. Goble. At his death he was survived by the following heirs, in addition to his widow, namely,
George Wade, Dora (Wade) Edwards, Frederick Wade, Philip Wade, Martha Wade, Sidney Wade, Herbert Wade, Lloyd Elliott,
Nina Elliott and Emmor Elliott, all of Griggsville. Philip S. Wade, born February 1, 1877, died on February 20,
1901, and is buried beside the parents at Bethel. Rebecca (Goble) Wade, born April 4, 1833, died November 7, 1919,
and is buried beside her husband in Bethel. Two children, James A. Wade who died September 25, 1864, aged one year,
and Charles E. Wade who died April 17, 1866, aged four, are buried at Bethel.
Henry B. Wade, Pike county pioneer, was brought to Pike county when there were but thirteen families in the entire
county outside of the little log settlement at Atlas. He came with his parents, Richard and Nancy Wade, in 1826,
when he was six. He was born in Kentucky June 13, 1820. He married Margaret Piercy in Pike county, August 1, 1839,
with John Neeley, early Detroit justice, officiating. Mr. Wade died October 10, 1867, leaving a widow and the following
children: Richard, Thomas, Hampton, Sarah Ann, Mary Jane, Nancy Ellen, Margaret Alice, Luella, Henry C. and Frederick
Wade. The widow, Margaret (Piercy) Wade, born December 17, 1821, died October 19, 1885. The two pioneers lie in
Bethel cemetery. With them is buried the daughter, Mary, born September 22, 1850, died May 23, 1870.
George H. Wade married Caroline Rupert in Pike county February 7, 1866, with Judge Nicholas Crenshaw officiating.
Benjamin F. Wade, a son of Richard and Nancy, was born in Alton, Illinois, July 23, 1827. Reared on a farm, he
experienced in early days all the hardships of pioneer life. A soldier in the Mexican War, under Colonel E. W.
B. Newberry and General Zachary Taylor, he participated in the battles of Palo Alto, Resaca De La Palma, Monterey
and Buena Vista. In 1852 he went to California, experiencing all the hazards of the overland trail. There he engaged
in mining for four years. Returning to Pike county, he was married September 10, 1850 to Jane Elliott, a daughter
of John and Esther Elliott, pioneers of the Griggsville neighborhood. She was one of ten children. Her parents
came from Wheeling, Virginia, to Ross county, Ohio (where Jane was born), and thence to Pike county, Illinois,
Esther Elliott, the mother, born in 1792, died in Pike county July 20, 1865 and is buried in Bethel.
Jane Elliott, who married Benjamin F. Wade, was a sister of Moses Elliott, so well known in early Griggsville history.
He was born in Wheeling, Virginia, March 18, 1819, the eldest of the ten children. He was married in Pike county
October 2, 1853 to Jane Perry, a daughter of Joseph and Elizabeth Perry, both of whom are buried at Bethel, he
having died March 12, 1850, aged 80, she dying September 12 the same year, aged 73. Jane Perry was born in Ireland
August 24, 1815, and came with her parents to Canada in 1834 and to Pike county in 1840.
Benjamin F. Wade and Jane Elliott had four children, Lucy J., Martha E., John K. and Dorcas H. Lucy J. died August
6, 1851, aged two months and 22 days; she is buried at Bethel.
Benjamin F. Wade died December 28, 1859. Jane Wade, his widow, died July 21, 1891. Her will, made in 1890, disposed
of her property to two daughters and a son, Martha Ellen Newport, Dorcas Hester Lytle and John Kolston Wade. Benjamin
F. and Jane are both buried at Bethel, where sleep many of the Wade clan, kinsmen of Lucinda (Wade) Elledge.
Bruntz Wade, a son of Josias of the Indian wars, born December 15, 1819, married Mrs. Rosannah Jones, in Pike county,
March 19, 1846, with J. B. Donalson, then probate justice of the peace, officiating. On August 22, 1860, Mr. Wade
married again, his second wife being Margaret E. Spence, a native of Jefferson county, Ohio, and a daughter of
Robert Spence. They had one daughter, Mrs. Sylvester Vandament. Mr. Wade by his first wife had three children.
He died at Pine Bluff, Jefferson county, Arkansas, April 7, 1877. In his will, made in 1874, in which he named
Jefferson Orr as executor, he designated as his heirs his children, Frances McCallister, Emily Wade and Rosanna
Wade.
Richard Wade, son of pioneer Henry, married Hannah Nettleton, in Pike county, March 4, 1866, with Rev. J. H. Dimmitt
officiating.
Thomas Wade, a son of Henry B. (Harry Wade), born in the county April 7, 1840, was raised on a farm three miles
south of Griggsville. On September 25, 1857 he married Mary Ellen, daughter of Mrs. Elizabeth Ellis of Detroit
township, and they had three children, Thomas, Albertie and James. Mrs. Wade died September 25, 1848 and in April,
1876 he married Frances Linville. Mr. Wade at one time owned a half-interest in the old Florence horse ferry. He
served in the Civil War, in Company H, 73rd Regiment, Illinois Volunteer Infantry, and participated in the battle
of Stone River. He died July 19, 1930, aged 90, and is buried at Bethel. His death came suddenly, at the home of
his daughter, Mrs. Oscar Daniels, in Detroit township.
At the edge of the wild woodland, in beautiful Bethel cemetery, sleeps the Wade ancestor, Pioneer Josias, he of
the Indian wars. Once, when outraged Kentuckians pursued marauding Indians across the Ohio river, Josias and Daniel
Boone fought the savages from behind the same log, in the wild Ohio country. Later, Josias was with Harrison at
Tippecanoe, and still later he engaged as a soldier in the second war with Britain. His grave is designated as
that of a soldier of the War of 1812.
Josias of the Indian wars was born in Virginia November 15, 1767. He died in Pike county April 15, 1844, aged 76
years and six months. In the row in which he lies buried are also the graves of his eldest son, Richard, and Richard's
first wife, Nancy; the grave also of his grandson, Benjamin F. The grave of Josias is one of the oldest in Bethel
yard; only three marked burials are older, those of John Pearcy who died May 1, 1835, Nancy Wade, wife of Richard,
who died May 6, 1838, and Manley A. Thomas who died March 3, 1844.
John W. Wade, son of Josias Wade, Sr., was born in Kentucky in 1829 and early became a resident of Pike county,
where he engaged in farming. On February 14, 1850 he married Vibilla Taylor, a daughter of Simon H. Taylor, who
emigrated to Pike county in 1825. They had five children, three boys and two girls. One of them, Charles Wade,
born January 4, 1854, on April 8, 1877 married Fannie M. Hobbs.
In Bethel cemetery, adjacent to the burials of the Wades, is the grave of Rebecca Burlend, who immortalized the
Blue Creek country and the region peopled by the early Wades, in her narrative of pioneer life in the interior
of North America, first published in England in 1848. Beside Rebecca, lies her husband, John Burlend, and near
are the graves of numerous others of the early settlement who walked the scenes of her story.
Lucinda Wade, fourteenth child of the Indian fighter, the elder Josias Wade, was born in Kentucky August 14, 1825.
Marrying Joel L. Elledge in Pike county in 1843, she became the mother of one child, a daughter, Rebecca Frances
Elledge, who was born February 3, 1845.
Rebecca Frances Elledge married Adam Hofsess, in Pike county, December 27, 1866, with Justice Elijah Cole officiating.
He was a son of John Hofsess, an early settler in Pike county.
Joel Elledge died soon after his marriage, and on January 2, 1849, his widow, Lucinda (Wade) Elledge, married Eli
Hobbs, a son of Solomon Josiah Hobbs and Mary L. Young. His father, Solomon Hobbs, was a son of Hinson Hobbs, famed
in old Kentucky history, an Indian fighter in the days of Daniel Boone and founder of the first Baptist church
in Louisville, Kentucky. He lived in the days of St. Clair's Defeat in the old fort that stood on the site of present
Cincinnati, Ohio, and it was there that Solomon Hobbs, Pike county pioneer and father of Lucinda (Wade) Elledge's
second husband, was born on October 14, 1791.