Ashfield: Darwin L. Gray
05/27/2009 16:41
Darwin’s older brothers, William (b. 1811) and Robert (b. 1813), both died in a dramatic accident in Ashfield while in their teens. On May 25 1827, the boys accompanied their grandfather, David Lyon, and two of their uncles to the Pond west of the Ashfield Plain, to wash sheep. The event turned into a party, complete with liquor. Six people set out in a large canoe, along with two sheep, for a tour of the Pond. About ten yards from shore, the canoe sank, taking four of its passengers down with it. David Lyon, a sixty-three year old deacon of the local church, jumped into the Pond to save his younger son and his grandsons (his older son swam to shore), but he too immediately sank out of sight and drowned. William and Robert were the last to be recovered after an hour or so. The boys were reportedly “locked in each other’s arms.” (2)
Eli and Betsey left Ashfield later that year, moving to Washtenaw County, Michigan. After eight years in Michigan, the family moved to Toledo, Ohio for two years. (3) Finally, Eli moved his family to Algansee Township, Michigan, in 1836. Darwin is remembered in the history of Branch County as a farmer who had “limited educational privileges.” The history says Darwin began his life in Michigan as a “poor boy,” but “by thrift and industry he became a prosperous, successful and prominent man of the county, whose business reputation was unassailable.” Darwin was held in high esteem by his neighbors, and became a member of the local Baptist church and the Republican Party. Darwin married Julia Ann Archer Fales (b. 1834), a widow with five children, in 1869. They had three additional children. Darwin died at his home in Algansee in 1897, at age 75.
1. Henry Park Collin, A Twentieth Century History and Biographical Record of Branch County, Michigan, 1906, p.522.
2. Frederick G. Howes, History of the Town of Ashfield, 1908, p. 45.
3. Michigan Pioneer and Historical Society, Historical Collections Vol. XXVIII, 1900, p. 310.
