CURTIS KING

KING, BLACKWELL

Posted By: Theresa E. Smith (email)
Date: 1/2/2007 at 13:47:58

SOURCE: "The Times of the Rebellion In the West" by Henry Howe published in 1867 (PAGE 200-203)

We turn from such a sad, melancholy dereliction of duty to the more pleasant contemplation of a sketch of the faithful FATHER KING, aged eighty-two years. It is drawn by one who knew and probably loved him. This father in the Greybeard camp makes a good picture of a Western pioneer. He may, indeed, be termed a "representative man."

The venerable CURTIS KING, "high private" in Company H of the celebrated 37th Iowa, the regiment of "Silver Greys," or "Greybeards," has deservedly attracted much attention, alike from his great age, elevated character and exemplary patriotism. the following authentic particulars, obtained by an interview with him, can not fail to be read with interest:

"FATHER KING" as his friends love to designate him, is six feet and an inch in height, of massive and well knit frame, genial presence, careful and kindly speech, good health and spirits, and will be eighty-two years of age on the 10th of May next. He is able to perform his military duties with alacrity, and has sustained the fatigues of guard duty with much less inconvenience than many younger soldiers. While those who were his juniors by scores of years, have been rendered invalids through patrol duty at night, this veteran of more than four-fifths of a century, has unintermittenly returned to his post with cheerfulness and comfort. For this extraordinary power of endurance, at so advanced an age, he is indebted to a constitution derived from a family remarkable for strength, vivacity, stature, and longevity, and to his healthful habits of toil and religious sobriety.

Prior to the Revolution his grandfather King left Ireland and with his wife and six sons emigrated to the colony of Virginia, where, in the valley of the Rappahannock and in Culpepper County, he located on a mile square of land, leased from Colonel Carter. On this tract the children were reared, married and brought up their families. THENCE KING, youngest of the six sons and the father of CURTIS, died at the age of fifty years from the bite of a copperhead - a fact which does not help to lessen the son's detestation of our more venomous modern copperheads.
CURTIS'S father fought under Washington through the Revolutionary War and was guarding prisoners at Winchester when relieved by the return of peace. Among the first emigrants to the free soil of Ohio, was Curtis's only brother and two of his five sisters, while he and three sisters, remained with their widowed mother on the old farm. At the age of nineteen, Curtis obtained the consent of the rest of the family to transfer their residence to the Great West, and after a journey of eight tedious weeks over the rugged mountains, they rejoined their friends at Hillsboro in Highland County, Ohio.

It is worthy of remark, that in Virginia, neither the wealthy gransire, nor any of his descendants ever used slaves. Curtis rented a cottage for his mother and his three sisters, but before long he found the latter married and himself and mother alone. He thereupon, as he states, considered what he should do to make her happy, and concluded to marry a certain attractive young widow, of thirty-six years, "of good report, pious, and well-disposed." He was then not 20 years old. Locating his wife and mother together, he devoted himself arduously to "trying to make a living," and "found the labor of his hands blessed abundantly, so that before long he was comfortably fixed in his sphere of life." Then new territories were discovered beyond the Mississippi and he was still led after them and was successful in his locations, and continued on the gaining land abundantly. In the town of Danby, Hendricks County, Indiana, his mother died and was buried at the age of one hundred and three years. Her name was OBEDIENCE and she was the daughter of COLONEL BLACKWELL of Virginia, a connection of the family of John Randolph, of Roanoke. Subsequently Curtis and his increasing family removed to Richland Township, Wapello County, Iowa near the Des Moines River, where they have now resided nearly sixteen years.

He has now been twenty-five years married to his second wife, who is just half his age, or forty-nine years, and was sixteen when united in marriage with him, he being then fifty-seven years old. By her he has nine sons and three daughters and by his former wife had six sons and three daughters --in all twenty-one children, 15 of them sons. The Irish ancestor, Curtis grandfather, lived to the age of one hundred and fifteen years, and was six feet and six inches in stature. Several of Curtis' uncles were seven feet in height and lived to extreme old age. His mother's father migrated from England to Virginia and here lived upon the rental of his ancestral estates in the old country. After his demise, the oldest son, CURTIS BLACKWELL, removed from America to England, to manage the estate of his father.

The venerable Iowan has been in active military service since the 25th October last. He may well be excused a feeling of pride in his personal history and antecedents, and a desire that the facts of his life and family, since they have excited curiosity and comment, should be correctly published. May he be spared to hail the return of peace and the restoration of the union!