The Family Files of Darryl and Jemalee (Johnston) Adams
Notes for James SMITH
Obit stated b 1817 Parish records say 1823
Born in Aberdeenshire, Scotland in 1817. (Disagrees from b in Parish Records which state 12 August 1823. I may have cited the wrong James Smith) In 1854 he brought his family to America and settled in Connecticut for four years. In 1858 he
moved to Illinois and located in Grundy county on the James Horrie farm northwest of Gardner. Later they moved to the George Booth farm where James later purchased the farm. At the time of the 1860 census the family lived in Braceville. The
family moved a short time later to Gardner, Il where they lived for about 30 years. He and his wife, Jane Menzies Smith, were married in Scotland and had six children, two who died when children. James wife, Jane, died in 1861. In 1869 he was
married to Mary Fifeld. He joined the Presbyterian church in Scotland and was a founding member of the Gardner Presbyterian church. It is said that James voted a straight Republican ticket and was loyal to his party. He died at 89 years old on
November 12, 1906. The funeral was November 15, 1906, and he is buried in the Braceville and Gardner cemetery. (I, Darryl G. Adams, visited this cemetery in July 1999)
Note on origin of Scottish name "Smith" Between the 1715 and 1745 rebellions, an English official called Burt wrote from the Highlands, describing the process who so greatly increased the number of Smiths there. A company of Liverpool, England
merchants contracted with the chieftain of this tribe for the use of his woods and other conveniences for the smelting of iron. The Smiths built furnaces and the merchants sent ore from Lancashire, thus stripping the forests in the Scottish
Highlands. Burt also described the strife between competitive Smiths resulting in a murder followed by a public hanging of the culprit. In Gaelic Gow means Smith so Gow or Magown, etc. could be derivations from the Irish origins and the last
bastion of Scottich Gaelic culture, the island of Lewis.
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