Asa Brightman Hatch, BiographyPorter County biographical sketches . . . .
Transcribed biography of Asa Brightman Hatch
ASA BRIGHTMAN HATCH, a prosperous and representative farmer and well-known and highly respected citizen of La Fayette County, Mo., is pleasantly located upon section 32, range 27, township 49, where he cultivates a valuable farm of one hundred and fifty-four acres. Mr. Hatch was born in Aurora, Erie County, N. Y., February 10, 1828, and was the son of Wilder and Hannah (Tabor) Hatch. The paternal grandfather of our subject, and in whose honor he was named, was Asa Hatch, a native of New Hampshire, and a soldier of the Revolutionary War, who served his country faithfully in her struggle for national independence. He was by occupation a farmer, and immediately afwr the close of the war settled in Jefferson County, N. Y., and removed after a time to Erie County, finally locating in Steuben County, where he passed away, deeply regretted by all who knew him. His estimable wife was Sarah Wilder, who reared four children: Susan, Jeremiah, Wilder, and one other whose name is not recorded. In religious belief the grandparents were both Presbyterians and earnest Christian people.
The father of our subject, Wilder Hatch, was a native of New Hampshire, and removed with his parents to New York, where he lived in Jefferson and Erie Counties. Raised upon a farm, he engaged in the duties of agriculture as the business of his life, and deciding to try a new field of labor went to Walworth County, Wis., in 1840. During the latter part of the gold excitement in California, he started for the Pacific Slope, in search of the glittering treasure of the Golden State. Many years have passed and never a word from him has ever reached his family, who have long mourned him as dead. AVilder Hatch was twice married, and by his first wife became the father of a daughter, Sarah, and one son, Wilder. The second wife was the mother of our subject, and bore her husband but one living child. She survived her husband's disappearance a number of years, and at the age of sixty-three died in 1856, in Porter County, Ind. She was a most estimable lady and a member of the Baptist Church. Her father, Earl Tabor, the maternal grandfather of our subject, was in e&rly life a Connecticut farmer, and removed to Saratoga, N. Y., and from there to Erie County, where he died at the age of eighty years.
The wife of Earl Tabor, Susannah Brightman, became the mother of these sons and daughters: James, Bradford, Plnebe, Susannah, Hannah, Jesse, Helen and Fannie, who gathered a bright; merry band around the family hearth nearly a century ago. Grandmother Tabor was the daughter of an English officer, who received his commission from King George the Third, of "Merrie England." Asa Brightman Hatch was reared upon a farm, and like his paternal ancestors, has followed the occupation of a tiller of the soil all his life. He has been a bread-winner from almost his earliest remembrance, and had but very little opportunity to gain an education. He accompanied his parents to Wisconsin, and remained there eleven years, and at the expiration of that length of time went with his mother to Porter County, Ind., and resided there until the fall of 1865, when he located in Missouri, and purchased two hundred and forty acres of land. For twenty-eight years he has lived in his present neighborhood, and has been closely associated with the upward growth and progress of his part of the county. Our subject was married to Lavinia Arundel, a native of Pennsylvania, and a daughter of John and Eliza (Patterson) Arundel, of Scotch parentage. Mr. and Mrs. Hatch have been the parents of five children, three of whom survive: Viola is the wife of Ira Sigman; Charlotte is the wife of Samuel Dunn; Maude is the youngest. Cora E. died at twenty-three years of age. Mr. and Mrs. Hatch are Unitarians in belief, and are ever ready to assist in all worthy enterprises. Mr. Hatch was in early days a member of the Free Soil Party, but in later life has been an ardent Republican, and an earnest advocate of the principles and platform of the party which now receives his vote. A self-made man, conscientious, upright, energetic and faithful in the performance of duty, he enjoys the respect and confidence of a large circle of true friends, who thoroughly appreciate his sterling integrity of character.
Source: Chapman Brothers. 1893. Portrait and Biographical Record of Lafayette and Saline Counties, Missouri. Chicago, Illinois: Chapman Brothers. 641 p.
Page(s) in Source: 562-563
This biography has been transcribed exactly as it was originally published in the source. Please note that we do not provide photocopies or digital scans of biographies appearing on this website.
Biography transcribed by Steven R. Shook