****************************************************************************
File contributed to the Fulton County ILGenWeb Project
Copyright 2008, all rights reserved.

These electronic pages cannot be reproduced in any format 
without the written consent of the author at http://fulton.ilgenweb.net.

****************************************************************************

Source: Portrait and Biographical Album of Fulton County
Biographical Publishing Co., Chicago, 1890

****************************************************************************

The Biography of Francis M. WILLIAMS 

Pages 279-182, transcribed in full by Danni Hopkins 

[Surnames: FOSTER, SMALLEY, WILLIAMS] 

    
FRANCIS M. WILLIAMS. Prominent among the citizens of Fulton County who have materially contributed to its prosperity, is the subject of this sketch. He is one of its ablest and most brainy farmers and stock-raisers, and has been a conspicuous figure in its civic life for many years. He is the proprietor of one of the largest and best equipped farms in Harris Township, and here he and his family have one of the best appointed and most attractive homes in this part of the State. 
    
Our subject is the representative of an old pioneer family of Illinois, and many incidents of his early life here are of interest and are incorporated in this biography. He was born in Adams County, Ohio, December 1, 1833. His parents, John and Nancy (Smalley) Williams, were natives of the same place. The Williams family originated in Wales, and the Smalley family was of mingled Irish and Dutch extraction. His mother was the daughter of Isaac and Nancy Smalley, who came from the East, crossing the Alleghanys with pack horses. David Smalley, the father of Isaac, who was the descendant of an old American family, served in the Revolutionary War. He was personal acquaintance of Gen. Washington, and it is said that in early life he had many a bout with him in wrestling, but it is not stated which was the best man. John Williams was the son of John and Mary Williams, who went from Maryland to Ohio in a very early day. John Williams, Sr., had two sons in the War of 1812. 
    
In 1836 John Williams, Jr., the father of our subject came to this State with his family, and located in Winnebago County, near where the city of Rockford now stands, there being then but one house on the present site. He had come from Ohio with three yoke of oxen and a prairie schooner, and making good time, was but six weeks on the road. He squatted on a piece of land, and when he first settled there was surrounded by Indians who came to his house to beg. All the family had to eat, except some wild meat, which was very scarce, was cornmeal made by pounding corn in an old iron kettle with a wooden pestle. Mr. Williams made a little addition to their fare by raising some buckwheat on the sod, which was ground in an old-fashioned coffee mill. After he had lived there three years, a man came along with a load of hogs which he was taking to Galena, and Mr. Williams bought one. This was the first animal of the kind introduced into the county, and our subject, then a child of five or six years, made of it a great pet, and would stay with it for hours at a time. His sole playmates in his early youth were the little Indians of the Pottawattomie tribe, and in playing with them he became familiar with their language, and could speak it quite well. He can remember the ceremonies at that time of the death of a chief of the tribe, whom his men placed on a log, which they chipped off with their tomahawks, with his gun, tomahawk, pipe and tobacco around him. They built a fence around this novel bier, on which the Sachem lay until his skeleton fell to pieces. His last resting place was right on the ground where the city of Belvidere now stands. 
    
Mr. Williams' first trip to mill was with an ox-team and cart loaded with corn, and he journeyed to where the city of Joliet now stands. He was gone from home three weeks, as he had to go into camp and wait his turn, so many had preceded him. His wife was much worried about his long absence and almost gave him up as dead, as she heard nothing of him form the time he started out until his return. Their place was only about four miles from the battle ground of Stillman's defeat, which occurred in the Black Hawk War. They left there in 1844, and removed to McLean County near where the town of Lexington now is and eighteen miles from Bloomington. In the fall of 1847 the family came to the farm where our subject now lives and here his parents passed their remaining years, he dying in 1868 and she in 1873. They had six children, all of whom survive except one, John Jefferson, who died when young. The others are: Sarah Jane, our subject, Elizabeth, Isaac N., and Andrew Allen. 
    
F. M. Williams, of this biographical review, gained his early education as best he could. He being the eldest child, much depended on him in helping his father carry on his farming. But he was ambitious to train his mind, he being studious and scholarly, and he attended one term at the Farmington Academy, then entered Hedding College, at Abingdon, where he pursued a fine course of study. He was thus well equipped for his chosen calling, that of farming, and he returned to the homestead and resumed the pursuit of agriculture. In 1862 he married Miss Sarah Foster, a native of this county, born near Fairview, and a daughter of William and Hannah Foster. Her parents came here form near Columbus, Ohio, and were very early settlers of this section of the State. Of this marriage ten children have been born to our subject and his amiable wife, of whom eight are now living and are with their parents. They are named as follows: Florence D., who has been well educated and carefully trained for a teacher, to which profession she has devoted herself for three years, and is regarded as one of the best in the county; Odus C., an enterprising young man; Harry L., Charles C., Idola A., Adda V., George Emerson, and Chalmers C., the youngest member of the family. Mary May, the third child, died at the age of sixteen years; Luella died in infancy. 
    
After marriage Mr. Williams moved to Lee Township, and bought seventy acres of land in its native wildness, which he brought under the plow in the course of a few years, and he added thereto one hundred and sixty-six acres, the most of which he developed. In 1866 he bought his father's place, after disposing of his Lee Township property. This homestead then comprised two hundred and twenty-eight acres, and he has since added two hundred and forty to it, a good share of which he has under a fine state of cultivation, and he has here one of the finest places to be found in the township. He has greatly increased its value since it came into his possession by the many substantial improvements that he has made, including the commodious residence that he erected in 1884, which is one of the handsomest dwellings in this locality. It is neatly and tastefully furnished, marking the presence of an intelligent and cultured household, and among its choicest adornments is the well-selected library of the best authors of modern times and many of the past. Mr. Williams owes his present prosperous circumstances solely to his own persistent labors. He began life as a teacher after leaving college, and in that way earned his first $400, which he judiciously invested in land, on which he located at the time of his marriage. He thinks that his first thousand dollars was the hardest to acquire. 
    
In his career our subject has shown himself to be possessed in a marked degree of those faculties that are requisite to success--sagacity, far-reaching forethought and practical tenacity of purpose. Underlying all these traits are those high principles that have gained him the confidence of his fellow-citizens, and have caused them to elect him to important offices of trust and responsibility. He is Democratic in his political affiliations, and while in Lee Township was Collector two terms, and Supervisor for a like length of time. Since he has been a resident of Harris he has represented the township on the County Board of Supervisors four terms. During his official career he was instrumental in making appropriations for building iron bridges across Spoon River, Shaw's Creek and Pearsol's Branch. He was a member of the Board at the time of the Chicago fire, when the railway sinking fund was appropriated for the use of food and clothing for the sufferers. As there was no money in the treasury which they could legally sue to meet the demand, our subject made a motion to restore the original fund to the county treasury, which was done. He was one of the committee that purchased a portion of the land for the County Poor Farm. Mr. Williams has been a life-long Christian, and a consistent member of the Methodist Episcopal Church since he was twelve years old, and he has taken an active part in the Sunday-school and in all religious matters. He has been School Director, of which office he is still an incumbent, and has been a School Trustee for many years.