Caldwell County MO Archives History .....JAMES H. HILL OF HAMILTON TOWNSHIP  
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Karen Walker khw4@yahoo.com September 8, 2008, 4:13 pm

THE JAMES H. HILL OF HAMILTON TOWNSHIP IN THE SEVENTIES
	Narrator:  Mrs. Maud Harlow, Hamilton

     Mrs. Harlow is a granddaughter of James H. Hill, the above settlers in 
Hamilton township.  Care must be taken to separate this J.H. Hill from the 
James M. Hill who died 1934 in Hamilton.  They are not related at all.
     Mr. Hill was born in Cornwall Eng. and at 13, he with is parents went to 
western Canada.  He stayed there till the close of the Civil War.  He married 
a Canadian girl Margaret Mahancey, and they made a home on the western 
Canadian frontier, where the missionaries came who were working for the 
settlers and Indians.  He became well to do by middle age.  By bad luck, he 
lost it all.  Purchasing goods in N.Y. during the Civil War, he as a Canadian 
merchant, was caught in the depression and had to start over.
     He turned to writing and wrote for magazines and was active in politics 
and when well to do he was offered a seat in the Canadian Parliament.  Soon 
after the loss of his property, he heard of the find cheap land in Missouri 
and came to Caldwell Co.
     They lived at Kidder for some months at the Kidder hotel while looking 
around for a farm 1886.  At that time, Kidder was the leading town of the 
county.  They recalled that almost every night something was going on; there 
were other eastern people there and it was a congenial crowd.  All were 
refined and educated.  Mrs. Harlow heard her grandmother mention many of the 
Kidder families of that date:  Chubbucks, Metz, Shaw and Whitelaw.
     Mr. Hill finally bought what is now part of the John Switzer farm 
northwest of Hamilton.  He lived there till in the 80s when he sold out to 
P.A. Switzer.  He then moved to Cameron where he lived till his death.  His 
first wife died in the 80s and he married again 1889 to Mrs. Sarah A. Barnahy 
and she outlived him.  He and his first wife were both buried at the Kidder 
cemetery, where an infant child had been buried in their early days here.
     His first wife Margaret Mahancey had a middle name Klapstock which 
requires explanation.  Her father was a British general, and the middle name 
of his daughter was for a British general Klapstock.  Margaret Klapstock 
Mahancey was born July 27, 1884 in Ontario of English parentage, she was 
educated in a convent, according to the style of the better class.
     Mrs. Margaret Morton, daughter of the above settlers in Hamilton 
Township, was married to Captain Marcus Morton March 15 1867, and they spent 
their honeymoon in St. Joseph.  Mr. Morton has been frequently spoken of in 
these narratives, both in connection with the Civil War, and as a business man 
in Hamilton with his brother John M. Morton in the middle 60s on for several 
decades.  Their daughter, Mrs. Maud Harlow is the narrator. 
     Interview  1934.


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