The Earle family : Ralph Earle and his descendants

Gen.] GENEALOGY. 255
been heard, and no tavern sign has ever creaked in the wind ;
inland
too far
for the old stage-coach, and where the weekly mail is carried
on horse-back by a small, but courageous boy, with the other inseparable
surroundings of such a place, yields the comforts of life, then,
truly, it has been their own fault if they have not supped their full
share of life's bounties. They reared a large family of sons and
daughters during these pioneer years, and between parents and
children the strongest affection has ever existed. Here, at least, has
been unbroken sunshine and abiding consolation. The brave heart
and the strong arm of the father, with the trusting faith and the
maternal instincts of the mother, triumphed over the cold of winter,
the heat of summer, the want, at times, of bread, and the danger of
the tomahawk of the savage. Through all their perils, they had an
abiding faith in Israel's God. If this faith was in fact a superstition,
to them it was a reality, and bore them fearlessly onward. Their
earthly pilgrimage is over, and together, across a lovely lake from
the house in which Chester died, and beneath the shadow of a plain
and unpretentious chapel, away from strife, and wrapped in the
mantle of solitude, they lie buried. Their spirits have fled from
their hiding place, and look out no longer upon the silent wilderness
or the unvexed flow of the great lakes and rivers of the North. Following
in their course, States have sprung into being from unorganized
territories ; great ships ride upon the troubled surface of the
majestic waters of the giant Northwest ; powerful cities, linked
together with clasps of steel, dot the surface of a land teeming with
life, and triumphant in the conquests of civilization. If their share
in producing these achievements is small ; if but little of the wealth
of which they were the heralds fell to their lot, let their surviving
relatives remember that they each died in the faith that a crown of
glory was laid away for them, richer than the mines of Nevada, and
imperishable as eternity itself."
2206-2. Alexander Welch, b. Aug. 24, 18 15.
2207-3. John D. Welch, b. Oct. 30, 1S19 ; m. Sept. 7, 1S48, in
Madison, Sarah H. {b. Aug. 19, 1824, in Delaware Co.,
N. Y.), dau. of Abraham Ogden ; d. Aug. 28, 1870; 2
ch.
220S-4. William Welch, b. Nov. 12, 1821 ; m. Sept. 26, 1850,
Jane W. (b. March 8, 1833, in London, Eng.), dau. of
William and Rosina Ann (Atchley) Petherick ; and is a
lawyer in Minneapolis, Minn. He is an amateur printer
and prints in his own house a small family paper, the
Home Diary, from which the notices of James Earl's
descendants are mostly taken.
2209-5. James Welch, b. Nov. 19, 1S23 ; d. July 20, 1824.
2210-6. Cleantha S. Welch, b. Sept. 10, 1825 ; m. April 26,
1847, at Madison, Wis., Peter Parkinson, Jr. (b. Jan.
22, 1813) ; d. April 6, 1863, at Madison, leaving 4 dau.
221 1-7. Elizabeth Welch, b. Jan. 20, 1827; d. Sept. 28, 1828.