Henry Moyle.—The ranks of the vanguard that led the way to the opening and settlement of Butler county are rapidly thinning, and Henry Moyle, of Augusta, stands out conspicuously as a Butler county pioneer, who did his part in the sixties and seventies in laying the foundation of this empire, of itself, which now ranks as one of the foremost political subdivisions of the great State of Kansas. Henry Moyle was born in Cornwall, England, in 1846, and is a son of Matthew C. and Elizabeth (Treloar) Moyle, both natives of the mother country. They were the parents of the following children: Eliza Ann, deceased: John, deceased; Henry, the subject of this sketch; Julia, deceased; Mary, married Alexander Petrie, and they reside in Pasadena, Cal.

Henry Moyle emigrated to America with his parents in 1848, and they located at Gold Hill, N. C., where the boy was reared and received a fair education. He lived the peaceful life of the average boy until the great Civil war broke out, and naturally when the great struggle came on, his sympathies were with his own State, and he enlisted in the First North Carolina infantry, and fought beneath the stars and bars, following the vicissitudes of war for four years and ten days, or until the

hope of the Confederacy was placed in the catalogue of the world's lost causes. While in the line of duty Mr. Moyle participated in many of the important and hard fought battles of that great struggle. At the battle of Big Bethel Church, Va., he was seriously wounded below the right knee by a musket ball.

After the clouds of war had passed away he returned to his home where he remained until 1867, and on May 20, 1869, he came to Butler county, Kansas, locating on a claim near White Station on the Walnut river. This was long before the railroad was built. He erected a primitive log cabin on his claim and proceeded to break prairie for himself and his neighbors with ox teams, for which he received five dollars per acre while breaking for others. This proved to be a fairly remunerative vocation, but was a little over exercise if anything, both for the man and oxen. He remained on his claim until 1875 when he sold it and engaged in the hardware business at Augusta, a place which had assumed quite pretentious proportions by this time. However, when Mr. Moyle located in Augusta township in 1869, Augusta was not the hustling oil town that it is today. The entire residence and business district at that time consisted of one log house and C. N. James and Shamlever conducted a store in that building, which, by the way, is still standing but has been sheeted with boards so that it presents the appearance of a frame building, with the exception of its unusually thick wall, and it is now used as a residence. Mr. Moyle was one of the first hardware men to locate in Augusta, and later engaged in the grocery business which he conducted for thirty-four years. However, he has not confined himself entirely to a mercantile life, but about 1895 he began investing in farm lands extensively, which has proven to be a successful financial move. He and his sons now own 720 acres of valuable farm land which is located in the heart of the rich gas and oil belt of Butler county, the future possibilities of which can not be estimated at this time.

Mr. Moyle was united in marriage in 1870 with Miss Josephine Sanders at Augusta, Kans., and six children have been born to this union, as follows: Grace, married Arthur Skaer, Augusta, Kans.; John, Augusta; Matthew, married Pearl Purcell, and resides in Walnut township; Beulah, married R. Y. Alexander, Wichita Falls, Texas, and Harry and Anna, residing at home. Mrs. Moyle belongs to a pioneer Butler county family who came from Chillicothe, Ohio, in 1869.

During Mr. Moyle's business career he has found time occasionally to devote himself unselfishly to the cause of public affairs. In 1885 he was elected mayor of Augusta, an office which he filled with credit to himself and entire satisfaction to the electors of the city. Mr. Moyle has seen great changes in the life of Butler county since coming here, and perhaps has as rich a fund of early day reminiscences as any pioneer of the county, and he possesses the faculty of relating the stories of pioneer days in an entertaining way. When he came here there

was plenty of game such as deer, antelope and wild turkeys, and prairie chickens by the thousands. The great herds of buffalo, however, had drifted a little farther west and were in abundance not far from where Wichita is now located. He remembers, though, of one buffalo being killed in this county on Turkey creek, after he came here. He thinks, though, that that buffalo was just a little unfortunate and failed to heed Horace Greeley's warning to go west and escape the fate that overtook him. Henry Moyle will be long remembered as one of the grand old men of Butler county to whom future generations will ever owe a debt of gratitude for the part that he has played in laying the foundation for the enjoyment of the great institutions of today.

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