Biographical Sketch of William Brinton SMITH (1893); Chester County, PA Contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by John Morris . *********************************************************************** USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE: Printing this file within by non-commercial individuals and libraries is encouraged, as long as all notices and submitter information is included. Any other use, including copying files to other sites requires permission from the submitters PRIOR to uploading to any other sites. We encourage links to the state and county table of contents. http://www.usgwarchives.net/ *********************************************************************** Source: "Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Chester County, Pennsyl- vania, comprising a historical sketch of the county," by Samuel T. Wiley and edited by Winfield Scott Garner, Gresham Publishing Company, Phila- delphia, PA, 1893, pp. 663-4. "WILLIAM BRINTON SMITH, an intelligent and prosperous farmer, residing in the suburbs of the borough of West Chester, was born in Parkesburg, Chest- er county, Pennsylvania, August 4, 1816. He is a son of James Smith, who was a farmer by occupation, and a native of Salisbury township, Lancaster county, Pennsylvania, born in 1788. He was a man of great energy, strong will power, and a stanch temperance man and an active politician in the whig party. He died at West Chester in 1872. His wife was a daughter of William Brinton, a descendant of one of the oldest families of Chester county. By this marriage he had a family of eight children, four sons and four daughters: Lydia A. (dead), was the wife of Ephraim Penrose, of Berks county: Charles, was a farmer in Lancaster county, where he died; William B.; Mary P., now deceased, who was the wife of John Forsythe, of this county; Parvin, deceased, whose family resides on the old homestead at Parkesburg; Thornton, now of Washington city, who entered the civil war near the beginning of that struggle and served for over three years. "William Brinton Smith married Ellen Starr, a daughter of Jeremiah Starr. She is of one of the oldest families of Berks county, and is of Irish lineage. To this marriage have been born a family of four children: Sibilla, wife of Joseph Cope, residing near West Chester; Elizabeth, wife of Samuel L. Brinton, residing near West Chester - who has five children - Clement, Francis D., Willard, Ellen and Robert; Helen Augusta (deceased), who married Curtis H. Warrington and had three children - Carrie, Ellen Starr and Hannah; Josephine Loraine (deceased), married to Francis War- rington, and had two children (both now dead), William and Henry. "William Brinton Smith was educated in the Penn Charter school of Phila- delphia, receiving a fair education for that day. On leaving Philadelphia he came to Parkesburg, and resided on his father's farm until his marriage in 1848, when he removed to Berks county, where he continued to farm until 1869, when he came back to West Chester, and was there until 1880, when he came to the present farm of eighty acres. In early life he was a whig in politics, having voted for William Henry Harrison, and on the death of that political organization he joined the Republican party, and has since been inclined to be independent. He is hospitable, well read, and an interesting conversationalist, and a member of the Society of Friends. "John Smith (grandfather), a tanner by trade, was a native of Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. He came to Chester county in 1794, and bought a farm in the vicinity of Parkesburg, where he died at an advanced age."