Escambia County AlArchives Biographies.....Arends, John N. April 14 1824 - February 9 1890
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Ann Anderson alabammygrammy@aol.com May 20, 2004, 11:53 pm

Author: Brant & Fuller (1893)
    JOHN N. ARENDS, deceased, was a native of Aachen, Prussia, born April 14,
1824. His parents were respectable people of the middle class, and were able to
give him a fair education. At an early age he was apprenticed to a machinist,
and, in the usual thorough style of the old-time foreigner, mastered that most
difficult trade. So well did he apply himself that he became in after years,
when he had emigrated to this country, one of the finest machinists in the
south, sought far and near because of his thorough knowledge of machinery. While
still a young man he took a trip to Paris, France, where he worked at his trade
for some three years, in that time becoming quite proficient in the French
language. He could, in after years, therefore, speak the three languages,
German, French and English. Returning home, he and a brother-in-law started a
machine shop of their own. About this time, probably in 1848, he married his
first wife, Theresa Bouvet, a French lady, by whom he had four children. On
account of the dullness of the times, and hearing of the splendid advantages
offered good mechanics, he decided to emigrate to America, and in the spring of
1856 the family landed in New York city. Proceeding inland, they stopped awhile
at Cincinnati, Ohio. Times were hard and money hard to get when earned, as these
were the days of the state bank currency in the north. Learning of the many
advantages of the sunny south land, Mr. Arends determined to go south, and in
the fall of the same year the family moved to Mobile. Here Mr. Arends passed a
number of eventful years, engaging in business with considerable success, having
at one time one of the largest machine shops in the city. During the yellow
fever scourge of 1858 he lost his wife, she dying of that dread disease November
7th. Mr. Arends was married to the lady who now survives him, Mrs. Margaret
(Brady) Farrell, on the 26th of December, 1864, in the city of Mobile. Margaret
Brady was born May of 1832, in county Cavan, north Ireland. She was one of
twins, the eldest children of Thomas and Bridget Brady. The Bradys had been
residents of that part of the county for centuries. Thomas, the father of
Margaret, died while yet a young man, leaving a family of four children. The
mother died on the old homestead in 1875. Richard, the twin brother, Thomas, the
next, and Bridget, the youngest, now Mrs. McConnell, still live in county Cavan.
Margaret came to this country in 1849, with the family of an uncle. They lived
in Springfield, Mass. for a year, then moved to St. Louis, where in May of 1854
Margaret was married to Patrick Farrell. Two children were born to their union,
Phillip, who lived to be one of the brightest and most popular young men of
Brewton, only to be carried off by the terrible yellow fever scourge of 1883. He
died on the 23d of October, after an illness of but five days, the pride of a
devoted family. The second child, Annie, was married on the 4th of July, 1877,
to John T. Hairston, then railroad agent for the L. & N. at Brewton. Mr.
Hairston was born and raised in Macon county, Ala. Thence removed to Lowndes
county, where he learned telegraphy, coining to Brewton in 1874. He engaged in
the mercantile business in Brewton for some time, but not succeeding well, he
again went to railroading. While holding the position of night operator at
Flomaton, he was suddenly stricken with a fatal illness, and died April 17,
1882. To the marriage were born two children: Maggie S., who died in infancy,
and Lucile A., now a miss of eleven years, who, with her mother, lives with her
grandmother at Brewton. Patrick Farrell met death by drowning in Mobile bay, on
January 6, 1862. It is not known how it occurred. He disappeared, and after a
terrible suspense of three weeks to the widow, the body was found and, though in
an advanced stage of decomposition, was recognized. The marriage or Mr. Arends
and Mrs. Farrell occurred, as before stated, in 1864. One child was born-Aloise,
now the wife of James Sowell. In March of 1865 Mr. Arends moved his family to
Greenville, Ala., where he had been prevailed upon to accept the management of a
wire mill. This not proving lucrative, and being asked to superintend the
building of a mill at Brewton, Mr. Arends came to the latter place. This was in
1867, and he continued to reside here to the date of his death. He followed the
mercantile business much of the time, and was also postmaster of Breton for a
period of twenty years, from 1870. In 1881 he built part of the handsome hotel
property now standing, and opened it to the public as the Hotel Arends. Earlier
in life, Mr. Arends had sustained a stroke of paralysis of the facial nerves. On
the 6th of February, 1890; with no previous warning, he was suddenly visited by
a stroke of apoplexy. He lingered for fourteen days, when death claimed him the
9th of February, 1890. Mr. Arends was an uncompromising republican in politics,
and an ardent Catholic in his religious views. Three times every day faithfully
during his residence in Brewton, the tapping of the bell at the Arends home told
the people that religion with one of their citizens was an every-day affair.



Additional Comments:
from "Memorial Record of Alabama", Vol. I, p. 951-953
Published by
Brant & Fuller (1893)
Madison, WI

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