The following is a little family history written by grandmother,
Ethel John Downs Watkins. It was found in her scrapbook. It tells of her
parents, Harry Morton Downs and Mary Elizabeth Hayward, how they met as
children, their marriage and family. She gives the name of Mary Elizabeth's
mother as Mary Elizabeth, but it was actually Elizabeth Ann Clapton.
Elizabeth Ann Clapton was born abt. 1840 in Brown Co., Indiana, and was the
daughter of Jesse Clapton and Maria Followell. Mary's father's full name
was William Willard Hayward and he was the son of James Hayward and Hannah
Marion Fisher, of Livingston Co., New York. James went west in 1849 during
the Gold Rush and was never heard from again. Hannah came to Tippecanoe Co.
with her parents, Isaac and Martha Gee Fisher early in the 1850's.
The Downs family came to Tippecanoe Co. in the mid-1840's from Ross
Co., OH. Children of Harry M. and Mary Elizabeth (Minnie) Downs were:
Ethel John, born July 17, 1889; Clair Landis "Jake", born 1893; Avy Tuttle,
born 1895; Dora Agnes, born 1900; Theodore Thomas "T.T."; born 1902 and
Shirley, born 1913.
The story is not dated, but it was probably written sometime between
1950-1962. Grandma was married December 24, 1906, to my grandfather, Lewis
Napoleon Watkins, and they had twelve children. She died January 1962, he
in 1968. Both are buried in Battle Ground Cemetery.
===========================================================
Grandma's Story
Sometime in the early eighties of last century a young man with
curly black hair, grey eyes and brass toed boots, set out on the road to
school. He was afflicted with several ambitions, but the most ambition this
morning was to see how late he could be getting to school, so he strolled
along shying a rock here and there until he was amused suddenly to spy on
the same road to the same school, a girl with long black braids, a bright
yellow pinafore and pretty white panty loons running gaily on a head.
All at once he was filled with a new ambition, to tease and provoke
the girl running ahead, so he slipped up and gave a braid a slight yank.
Not getting much response from the first yank he tried again almost
upsetting the object of his torment.
Well, now once is enough to have your hair pulled, but two times is
too much. Turning quickly with black eyes ablaze, the young miss gave the
ambitious fellow a piece of her mind and proceeded calmly on her way to
school.
Abashed for a moment, but still ambitious, the boy finally arrived
at school, but the trend of his thoughts seemed to dwell on a pair of black
eyes and casting all other ambitions aside, he became filled with one big
and lofty one - that was to see the black eyes shine with a soft light.
And so to the amazement of his gentle mother the lad seemed to
become more interested in his school and hurried off each morning seeming
bent on studies alone.
Ah! Well! Time flew by as time will you know, and by methods
unknown to us another ambition had been accomplished and another had taken
its place to be the beau of the very prim young lady seemed to __?__ tho the
one great thing to be accomplished in his young life.
School out, he cast about for some way to become the object of a
young maiden's desires. Not having a Rolls Royce or a Willis or other fine
appointed car in those good old days, a red and black trimmed buggy drawn by
a prancing pair of white ponies were the envy of most the young lords and
the attraction meant to draw the eyes of the young ladies of the
countryside.
In some ways ponies are more attractive than young men, but when
they are being managed by a neatly dressed young man with a little black
mustache, such little things as a hair pulling are apt to be forgotten in an
invitation to ride in such style. And so another ambition is fulfilled, but
youth seems to be filled with ambitions so having become the beau of the
maiden a new ambition flared to become the husband was now the thing to
accomplish and having long since forgiven the hair pulling, the maiden
became the wife of her ambitious boy friend. But alas life has a way of
pushing us on for with his ambition accomplished our hero was faced with a
real necessity now for ambition, so earnestly he set to work to make a place
which they could call home.
But young boys are not the only ones with ambition. Very early in
her life, the maid we speak of began to look ahead to the time when she
could possess the things all women are created for, a home of their own and
babies to care for. So with all the strength of her lovely character she set
about to help her young husband to make a home and to accomplish the
fulfillment of the other ambitions, which you can see by looking around you.
Part 2
Near Sleeth Indiana (Carroll Co.) on the 21st day of March 1869 was
born a daughter to Williard and Mary Elizabeth Hayward. The daughter who
later became the wife of Harry M. Downs and the mother of the present
surviving members of this branch of the Downs family.
Mary Elizabeth's mother's maiden name was Clapton. Her father was
a blacksmith by trade and a minister of the church. He was also a Civil War
soldier. Mary E. lost her own mother when she was 18 months old and was
taken to raise by William and Minerva Muter (of Mary E.'s mothers we know
very little) who finally adopted her, changing her name from Mary E. Hayward
to Minnie Muter.
The greater part of Minnie Muter's girlhood was spent in Tippecanoe
County and the Battle Ground community. She attended school in the grade
school at that place. Mr. and Mrs. Muter were members of the U.B. Church in
Battle Ground and Minnie attended with them. Her adopted father was a
butcher.
At the age of 17 years she became the wife of Harry M. Downs.
Harry Morton Downs was born on the 2d day of September 1865 in
Tippecanoe County north of Lafayette near what is now the K & P home. He
was the son of James Andrew (should be Andrew James) and Mary Francis Downs.
His mother's maiden name was Tuttle.
While still a small child Harry moved with his parents to the Old
White place east of Battle Ground, but in the year 1870 they moved to what
we know as the Old Downs home, 1 mile east of Battle Ground, and he spent
his boyhood days in the Battle Ground vicinity.
On the 5th day of June 1886 Minnie Muter and Harry Downs were
married in Battle Ground. The first two years of their married life was
spent at his father's farm and then they moved to Battle Ground and Harry
worked at the butcher trade. Their first two children, both boys, died in
infancy.
I n the fall of 1888 they came to Lafayette and operated a meat
market, but they moved again to Battle Ground and in the summer of 1889 a
daughter was born. Mr. Downs continued in the buthcher business in Battle
Ground, and in 1890 they spent of the Downs farm assisting with the farm
work and cattle buying on a commission.
In the fall of 1890 they moved to Warren County and began working
for an uncle of Downs, Charles Moore, a prosperous farmer of the Pond Grove
community. They worked for Mr. Moore about 20 months when Mr. Downs started
farming for himself on a farm own by L.L. McGinnis, five years. In the
spring of 1897 they moved to the Taylor Station vicinity and farmed part of
the Sam Deardorff farm. They lived two years on this place and then moved
to the Monitor community in Perry Township. They now had three children,
one girl and two boys, and in April another girl was born.
The fall of summer of 1900 they again found themselves living at
Battle Ground and operating a meat market. In the spring of 1901 they moved
to the house where George Fleck now lives and assisted his father with his
farm work for a year, then rented the John Shaw farm one mile east of Battle
Ground.
In March 1905 they moved to the Hull place, then owned by John
Pearson. They farmed this place two years and then sold part of their
farming equipment and..
Ends here.