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Other Early Immigrants

Rufus Thayer, Sr., came to Farmington in the fall of 1826. He was the father of Rufus and George Thayer, who came the previous year, and settled in the southwestern section of the township. He, the elder Rufus, brought with him his wife and five daughters; a very desirable accession, for women were yet very scarce in Farmington. John Brownell, brother of George, came that year, and settled near Buckhorn Corners; and Elisha Doty located on section 2. Hiram Wilmarth arrived in October, 1826. He was a surveyor and school-teacher by profession. After his arrival he kept house for a time in the bachelor's hall of Willard Wadsworth. Nathan S. Philbrick, Harman Steel, Benjamin Andrews, Jonathan Lewis, Clark Cogsdill, Willard Porter, Elihu Cooley, and John Thayer, a surveyor, from Richmond, New York, all came during the season of 1826.

Chauncey D. Wolcott, a Baptist preacher, came in 1827, and settled on the southwest quarter of section 3. Samuel Gage, from Seneca county, New York, arrived May, 1827, and settled on the northeast quarter of section 7. Thomas Johns, same year, on northeast quarter of 18. John Brownell, Sr., father of George and John, settled in the east part of the town near his sons, and Horatio Lee two miles south of them.

The following, whose dates of arrival cannot be given, were among the earlier settlers in Farmington: Ross Phillips, son-in-law of Samuel Mansfield, and John Phillips, his brother, both of whom worked in Mansfield's employ, Ebenezer Stewart, who married a daughter of Arthur Power, Thomas Ingersoll, cousin of Deacon Erastus Ingersoll, Darius Lawson, - now living at Grand Ledge, - David Wilcox, John Wilcox, John Walcott, father of Chauncey D. Walcott, Theron Murray, from Ontario county, New York, Samuel T. Bryant, William Daily, James B. Mellady, - died 1876, aged eighty- two; Salmon Stilson settled on northwest quarter section 6; Champlin Green, who settled for a time in Troy before coming to Farmington; Chauncey W. Green, who settled in Avon in 1825, and afterwards moved to Farmington; Alanson Brooks, from Saratoga, New York; David Coomer, who settled on the northwest quarter of section 2, with a family of nine children, and who, it seems, was in rather better worldly circumstances than many of the immigrants; William Serviss, northwest quarter section 5; Warren Servis; __ Barnum, on section 22, in whose family the dreaded cholera first made its appearance in the township, in 1832; Nathan Smith, Stephen Jennings, Darius Cowles, Frederick Monroe, Joseph Horton, Jacob Wood; these and others swelled the number of settlers, so that the first township assessment roll bore the names of seventy-nine resident tax-payers.