Charles H. Hatch

CHARLES H. HATCH fought as a soldier on the Union side in the Civil war, and forty years ago came to Kansas and entered a homestead in Edwards County. His business was farming for a number of years, and he still owns a large amount of farm land, but in recent years his home has been at Macksville, where he conducts a real estate and insurance business.

Mr. Hatch was born in Boston, Massachusetts, February 8, 1847. His paternal ancestors were Hollanders who came to America in the time of Peter Stuyvesant and settled in Connecticut. His father, Joseph A. Hatch, was born at Norwich, Vermont, in 1820, grew up there and became a machinist. He was also a locomotive engineer, and in 1854 moved west to Illinois and had the distinction of running the first locomotive engine over the Illinois Central Railway between Cairo and Ceatralia, Illinois. He died in Springfield, Illinois, in August 1862. He was first a Douglas democrat in politics but before his death was an active supporter of the first republican president. He was also affiliated with the Masonic Order and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows. Joseph A. Hatch married at Lowell, Massachusetts, Philura Tilden. She was born at Montpelier, Vermont, and died at Salida, Colorado. Charles H. is the oldest of their children. Eugene A. B. is a locomotive engineer with the Denver and Rio Grande Railway, being the oldest engineer in their service and lives at Salida, Colorado. Ina Rowena is a widow living at Salida.

Charles H. Hatch was about seven years old when his father moved to Illinois. He attended the public schools of Marion County in that state, and before his fifteenth birthday, in January 1862, he enlisted in Company H of the Sixtieth Illinois Infantry. He was mustered out, after a brief term of service, in December, 1862. In January, 1864, he re-enlisted, this time in Company D of the Thirteenth Illinois Cavalry, and was with that organization in many battles and campaigns until the close of hostilities. When the war was over he completed his education in a commercial college at Decatur, Illinois, and for three years was employed as a locomotive fireman with the Toledo, Wabash and Western Railway. For several years after that he was a stationary engineer in the Joliet Steel Works at Joliet, Illinois.

Mr. Hatch moved to a farm in Jefferson County, Missouri, in 1876, and from there in March, 1879, moved to Edwards County, Kansas, where he homesteaded a quarter section and took a timber claim the same size. There was only one other family to the southwest within twenty-five miles of him then. The prairies were dotted with wild horses and game, and in this remote region he went through all the vicissitudes of pioneer days. In fact, had he not regularly received his pension for his army service he might not have "pulled through." He finally developed his homestead into a good farm, and left it only at the call of the people who chose him probate judge of Edwards County in 1889, and he served in that office two years. He then returned to his timber claim, and after a period of farming rented his land and in 1892 engaged in the insurance and real estate business at Bannock. In March, 1908, he moved to Macksville and has continued in the insurance and real estate business there, owning an office building on Main Street and his own home in the town. He still has his homestead and timber claim, the former being four miles east of Truesdale and the timber claim a mile south of that. Altogether his farming interests comprise 1,240 acres. He is a stockholder in the Farmers Elevator at Fravel, Kansas.

Mr. Hatch served two years as under-sheriff of Edwards County. He is an independent republican and is a member of Macksville Lodge No. 371, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, and of Kinsley Post of the Grand Army of the Republic.

January 24, 1872, in Jefferson County, Missouri, he married Miss Mary A. Nelson, daughter of Jack and Maria Nelson, Jefferson County farmers now deceased. Mr. and Mrs. Hatch have two children: Edith M., wife of S. G. Manning, a farmer, cattleman, and in the insurance business at Mutual, Oklahoma, and Ida R., wife of D. W. Johnson, a farmer in Edwards County, Kansas.

Pages 2413-2414.