INTO THE WILDERNESS - PAGE 2
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- INTO THE WILDERNESS -


Axtell - Condit - Dilley

PAGE 3.

settlement being 16 mi. North, and French Creek settlement (now Franklin) 20 mi. East. AnĀ­other nearby settlement is now Mercer. Their first summer was spent in clearing a place for a home. A small log cabin was erected. Their first crop was a few bushels of oats and turnips. Subsistence was inadequate and David was selected to remain and care for their stock while the others returned to Washington Co. for the winter. He lived on little more than cornmeal, milk and game. The colony returned in the Spring. His wife traveled the one hundred miles on horseback, using a man's saddle and carrying her infant on her knee. They raised a large family, had good crops, spun their own clothing and provided well.The members of this colony were Presbyterian and founded what is now known as the old Fairfield Church, of which David was an Elder. My grand parents, Samuel Dilley born 1818, and Belinda Axtell born 1822, were both born in Mercer Co. Pa. For examples of the many inter marriages of the Axtell, Condit, Dilley, Dodd, and Lindley families see this very partial list:

MaJ. Henry Axtell b 1738 m. 2nd Mrs. Phebe (Condit) Day
Luther Axtell b. 1753 m. Hannah Condit - 2 daughters m. 2 Dodd brothers
Hannah Axtell b 1775 m. lst Levi Lindley, m. 2nd Ithiel Dodd, son of Daniel, all born in N.J.
Sister Sarah Axtell m. Timothy Lindley who m. 2nd sister Ruth Axtell
Sister Phoebe Axtell b. 1787 m. Ichabod Dilley b. 1783, son of Price.
Brother Samuel Axtell m. Mary Loveridge, studied medicine at Washington College and settled in Mercer Co. His son Wm. H. was also a Dr., as was his grandson John L. Axtell. His daughter Hannah b. 1823 m. Dr. J. W. Dillie (descendant of David Dille).
Sister Cecilia Axtell m. Darling Day b. about 1780.
(Philip Condit b. 1709 m. Mary Day b. 1713 of earlier family).
Hannah Dodd b. 1809, daughter of Ithiel above, m. Thomas Dilley of Mercer Co.
Sister Lovina Dodd b. 1807 m. Daniel Condit
Minerva Condit b. 1801 m. Simeon Axtell b. in Mercer Co. Pa. (our great grandfather).
Sister Elizabeth Condit b. 1802 m. Joseph S. Axtell (Uncle of Simeon) - Everett family.
Sister Bathsheba Condit b. 1804 m. Thaddeus Axtell (brother of Simeon).
Sister Phebe Condit b. 1810 m. Stephen Dilley of Mercer Co., Pa. (relationship of Thomas and Stephen Dilley to Samuel not definitely determined).
Wm. Dilley b. 1811 (brother of Samuel) m. lst Mary Axtell, m. 2nd half-sister Eunice Axtell - Russell Dilley, J. Andrews.
Samuel Dilley b. 1818 m. Belinda Axtell b. 1822, both born in Mercer Co. Pa. but married in Illinois - O'Hara

The migration from Mercer Co., Pa. to Warren Co., Ill. was from 1840-2. The story of their adventure is given in our family bible in my mother's handwriting. The Axtells, Dilleys and other families went separately but to the same locality, Roseville, where mother was born in 1846. From her mother she has it that "Simeon Axtell, the father, and sons Zenas and John, and daughter Phebe lying dead in the house at the same time, with Belinda and Minerva, the mother, sick in bed. It was the first winter in the Wilderness of Ill. - their old home was Pa. - they lived in a chinked log house and the whole family took some sickness due to exposure. There is no further mention of Eunice but it is presumed that she died that winter too. (Great Grandmother Minerva Axtell lived in Galesburg when mother (Durilla) was a girl going to school at the Academy.) She kept boarders, had red hair and peppery as to temper".

The O'Haras came to Western Pa. about 1773 with the migration of protestant Scotch and Irish that came to this area in the 1770's. O'Haras are also to be found in New Jersey by the 1750's, and in Mass. at an earlier date. Grandfather John Joseph O'Hara was born by 1819 in Pittsburgh, Pa. Father Henry Clay O'Hara was born 1841 Evansville, Indiana. and came as apprentice to same area in Ill., in 1849-50. After service in the Civil War he married in 1864, Durilla Loretta Dilley born 1846. In 1873 Henry and Durilla O'Hara, with her parents Samuel and Belinda Dilley, migrated to the prairie of Reno Co., Kansas, in the relative comfort of covered wagons, to conquer drought, grass hoppers, and fiery