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Levi Brown Hewitt
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11 June 1852 - 2 Sep 1925
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Levi was Eli and Franey's second child and first son. He was born in Fountain County, Indiana, on 11 June 1852. The heavy weight of sadness and added responsibility must have befallen him at the age of 12 when his father died far away at war. He married first on 9 April 1878 to Mary Delilah Meitzler. Mary was born 1858 in Ross, Vermilion County, Illinois. She died young of "consumption" in July 1886 in Rossville, leaving Levi with their three small children. Levi then married Emily Belle (Davis) Meitzler with whom he had 5 more children, only three of whom lived. (Emily had been married to a brother of Mary Delilah, hence the Meitzler name.) Levi and Emily divorced once, remarried each other six months later, and subsequently divorced again! Levi worked many years, as did his eldest son Earl, on dredge boats. These boats kept many of the Indiana and Illinois rivers navigable as well as serving to drain swampland to make it usable for agriculture. It is said that he was still working on the dredges when he died at the age of 73. On 23 Sep 1916 Levi lastly married Maria Ivoriah Diddie (Phillips, Williams, Pringle), who survived him. Levi died tragically on 2 Sep 1925 after being struck by a truck while visiting his daughter Orla in Hannibal, Missouri. He is buried in Hebron, IN. (I am descended from Levi, via his eldest son, Earl, and grandson, Gilbert.) |
