Biography of Giles T. Abbey, page 2 / 3.  History of Northeast Indiana; 
LaGrange, Steuben, Noble and DeKalb Counties, Vol. II, under the editorial 
supervision of Ira Ford, Orville Steven, William H. McEwen and William H. 
McIntosh.  The Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago and New York, 1920.

   Giles T. Abbey is one of the few surviving early citizens of Steuben 
County.  He is now in his ninety-second year and his memory of events in 
this section of Northeast Indiana runs back fully eighty years.
   He was born in Sandusky County, Ohio, November 24, 1827, son of Alanson 
and Lucy (Daggett) Abbey.  Alanson Abbey was born in Ontario County, New 
York, January 16, 1792, and was a soldier in the War of 1812.  His father, 
Joshua Abbey, fought in the Revolutionary war.  Lucy Daggett, daughter of a 
Revolutionary soldier, was born in Ontario County, New York, in 1793.  In 
1819 they moved to Sandusky County, Ohio, and in the fall of 1838 came to 
Steuben County, Indiana. Two years before Alanson Abbey had entered land 
in section 22 of Steuben Township, and he improved it with a log house and 
set out an orchard.  Later he sold this and lived on the shores of Pleasant 
Lake.  He was a carpenter by trade and built many of the early barns in his 
neighborhood. Alanson Abbey was a whig and republican, and he and his wife 
were members of the Free Will Baptist Church, but later he joined the 
Christian Church. He died in Pleasant Lake in February, 1877, and his 
first wife died in 1840. His children were: Henrietta, Lucy, Jacob D., 
Nancy, Giles T., George J., and Minerva and Harvey, twins.  The sons Jacob 
and George were both soldiers in the Civil war. Alanson Abbey was twice 
married.
   Giles T. Abbey was eleven years old when brought to Steuben County.  He 
first attended school at Clyde, Ohio, and his teacher was Lydia Chase, 
grandmother of Gen. James McPherson, one of the most gallant Union leaders 
in the Civil war. It was three years after the family settled in Steuben 
County before a school was established convenient to home. Giles T. Abbey 
then completed his education, and one of his teachers was George Everson, 
an uncle of Fred Emerson, the present postmaster of Angola.  He also 
attended school kept by Dr. Aaron Parsell, and uncle of John B. Parsell.  
Mr. Abbey taught school for six terms when a young man.  He first began 
farming by entering forty acres of Government land when nineteen years 
old.  Later he bought 102 acres in Steuben Township, selling this after 
two years and buying 240 acres near Flint.  There being no improvements, 
he rented the John Thompson farm and soon sold the land to Daniel 
Benninghoof.  He left the farm and rented and operated for three years the 
Union Mills, and then bought eighty acres in Steuben Township adjoining 
forty acres he previously owned, and lived on it four years.
  While on that farm his first wife died.  Her maiden name was Martha A. 
Long.  They were married in 1850. She was the mother of two children: Ella 
J., wife of Wellington H. Hollister, of Waterloo; and Carrie J., wife of 
John B. Parsell, of Angola.  In 1867 Mr. Abbey married Martha Davis. There 
were two children of that marriage, Edith L, wife of Albert F. Theiss, of 
Memphis, Tennessee, and Earl G., of Kansas City, Missouri.
   In 1864, the year his first wife died, Mr. Abbey moved to Waterloo, 
Indiana, and was employed in the grist mill there three years.  He was 
also the first agent for the Fort Wayne, Jackson and Saginaw Railroad.  
For twenty-seven years he served as cashier of the DeKalb Bank in Waterloo.  
He finally retired to a small farm adjoining that town and at present makes 
his home with his daughter, Mrs. John B. Parsell.  Mr. Abbey has been 
affiliated with the Masonic Order about fifty-four years. His second wife 
died in 1884, and he then married Sophia McEntarffer, who died February 17, 
1909.

Submitted by:
Arlene Goodwin
Auburn, Indiana
Agoodwin@ctlnet.com