The following is biographical information abstracted from:
Portrait
and Biographical Review of Johnson, Massac, Pope and Hardin
Counties, Illinois
Chicago Biographical Publishing Company 1893
(online - link above)
| ELIJAH JENNINGS. Among the
influential citizens of Pope county, no one has been
more prominently identified with her welfare or more
interested in her success and prosperity for many years
past, than has the gentleman of who we write. Many years
ago he was one of a company formed in this county for
protection against thieves and robbers. This was before
the days of organized defense against lawlessness, and
the early settlers were obliged to be their own
protectors. Mr. Jennings was one of a party that
captured a gang of robbers who had made themselves
notorious by many acts of violence and had acted in
defiance of the rights of others. A number of the
desperadoes were sent to the penitentiary for life, thus
ridding the county of some of the most daring outlaws
that ever infested southern Illinois. Mr. Jennings is
engaged in farming on section 31, township 13, range 6,
where he has resided since 1890. The subject of this sketch was born on Christmas Day, in the year 1822, in Allen County, Ky., his parents being Joseph and Elizabeth (Shadowens) Jennings. The father was a native of North Carolina, the mother's birthplace being in Tennessee. In 1836, they came in wagons to this State, crossing the Ohio River at Golconda, and settling first in Williamson County, where they lived only a short time. They then removed to this county, where they were numbered among the fist settlers, and later located in Hardin County, where they were called from this life. Our subject remained with his parents until reaching the age of twenty-seven years. He attended the subscription schools in Williamson County for about three months in the year, paying at the rate of $1 per month, as in those days there were no free or public schools. In his boyhood wild game was very plenty, and many a time has he seen bears, solves an deer as well as smaller animals in the locality. He first purchased a tract of forty acres in this county near the old Poor Farm, to the cultivation of which he devoted himself for about eight years, when he sold the place and became the owner of one about four miles from Golconda. For nearly forty years he lived on that farm, which he brought under thorough cultivation and great improved, so that when he sold it in 1890 it bore little resemblance indeed to the wild and unimproved farm which was his original purchase. This he traded in 1890 for the one where he now makes his home, which comprises eighty acres, besides which he owns a farm of forty acres north of Golconda. he is numbered among the most enterprising and progressive agriculturists of the vicinity. An important even took place in the life of Mr. Jennings on August 25, 1847, at which time he was united in marriage with Miss Mary Jane Saurd. The lady was born in Hardin County, Ill., July 22, 1828, and departed this life October 27, 1888. Our subject was again married, March 24, 1889, Mrs. Mary C. (Flannery) Flick then becoming his wife. She was born in Pope county November 4, 1845. Her father was a native of Kentucky, but her mother was born in this State. Our subject had a family of fifteen children by his fist wife, seven living, who are named as follows: Emily J., Minerva Armeda, U. S. and Mary J. (twins), Robert, E. L. and Otto C. For over fifty-two years Mr. Jennings has been an active worker in the church and Sunday school of the Baptist denomination. For one year he served as Constable, and for a number of years has been School Director and Road Supervisor. he affiliates with the Democratic party, and is a thoroughly patriotic citizen, striving in every way within his power to promote all measure having for their object the elevation of mankind and the good of his fellow-citizens. |
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