Caldwell County MO Archives History .....PAXTONS IN MIRABILE TOWNSHIP 1850,  
************************************************
Copyright.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/mo/mofiles.htm
************************************************

File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Karen Walker khw4@yahoo.com September 4, 2008, 5:59 pm

THE PAXTONS IN MIRABILE TOWNSHIP 1850, LATER IN HAMILTON
	Narrators:  Miss Alma Howard and others

     James D. Paxton, pioneer in Mirabile township, Caldwell county came in 
the county 1850, when the country was very wild and barely settled.  The 
Paxton ancestral history is one of which the members were very proud.  They 
were of Scotch-Irish descent, coming as colonists to Pennsylvania, then in 
1745 to Rockbridge Co. Va., then in 1800 to Kentucky, then one son came 1850 
to Caldwell county Missouri.  James D. Paxton married Mary E. Ritchie, also of 
Kentucky.  This couple eventually owned 410 acres in the vicinity of the tiny 
town of Mirabile, where for three decades, they did their trading and went to 
mill.  They had salves on that farm or rather plantation.  Some of their 
slaves are still buried on the old burial plot where members of the Paxton 
family lay with their family slaves together.  This was the present farm known 
as the Thos. S. Virtue farm.  The members of the Paxton family were taken up 
from that old burying ground, a few years ago, and placed in the new Paxton-
Kemper lot in the Hamilton (Highland) cemetery.
     James D. Paxton was born 1806 and died 1863 on the old farm.  His wife, 
born 1815, died 1878.  They had children:  Sallie who married James M. Kemper, 
a merchant in Hamilton during the 60s, and they were the parents of Wm. T. 
Kemper, Kansas City banker and politician;  William R. who died unmarried; 
Robert D. who married Irene Pierson a former teacher in Hamilton; James R.; 
Thomas; and Benjamin.
     During the early 70s, the "Paxton Boys," a firm composed of Robert 
(commonly called Bob), William and James, ran a livery barn in Hamilton, which 
they purchased of Weldon.  This barn stood on north Main street, just north of 
the tracks, east side.  This livery barn is clearly recalled by Miss Howard 
who tells of the tall fence which surrounded the south end of it.  It was the 
old fashioned idea of having a livery barn on Main street, and always had a 
group of men in front.  In the time of the earlier Weldons, this barn was the 
stage coach stop.  This barn was burned down in the fire of 1884, when it had 
passed out of Paxton hands.
     At one time, too Bob Paxton lived in Hamilton and the home was the 
present Katherine Houghton house on south Broadway.  His business then was 
buying horses and he also had a fine stable of race horses which 
included "Warsign" noted as a runner.  Miss Howard was a neighbor, on the 
south, of the Paxton home.
     The Paxton name, as many other splendid early family names in Caldwell 
county, has gone from the list of Caldwell county citizens, but it will long 
be remembered because of the high type of people who bore it. 
     Interview  1933.


File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/mo/caldwell/history/other/paxtonsi294gms.txt

This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/mofiles/

File size: 3.3 Kb