Dr. Rufus Richardson 1793-1856
2010
Rufus Richardson was born in Vermont to Jesse Richardson and Anna Jones. He was the youngest child of four born to his parents. He migrated with his family from Vermont to Connecticut to Ohio along with many others, including our direct ancestor Timothy Watrous and his family. They settled in Muskingum County, in Monroe Township near what is today Zanesville. Rufus was unmarried at the time while ancestor Timothy was married to Mary Rowley. He had first been married to Mary’s sister Mabel who died. She left behind two sons, William and Samuel who were in the care of Timothy and Mary. In 1818, Timothy Watrous unexpectedly died. He was the first person to be buried in the newly formed township. Just two months after his death, Mary Rowley Watrous gave birth to direct ancestor Jerome Timothy Watrous. In 1820, Mary Rowley Watrous married Rufus Richardson. It was his first marriage and her second. They became the parents of two daughters. The oldest, Olivia, lived to adulthood and married Horace Hubbard Wilcox. They have posterity to the present day. The younger daughter Julia died as a young child. In 1826, Mary Rowley Watrous Richardson died and was buried in a graveyard on the Richardson Farm.
Rufus Richardson then married Jemima Gittings. It appears that she did not want to raise her new husband’s stepson Timothy. He was sent to live with her brother Benjamin Gittings who is credited with raising our ancestor Jerome Timothy Watrous. In 1843, when Jerome was newly married to Olivia Burke Muse and the father of a daughter Caroline, he, along with Rufus Richardson and Benjamin Gittings and their families, migrated from Ohio to Illinois. They bought land and settled in the area of LaHarpe and Terre Haute. In the same year, Jerome’s wife Olivia died, leaving him to care for a small child.
Rufus Richardson was both a doctor of divinity and a medical doctor. He was a fierce abolitionist and participated in the Underground Railroad during the Civil War. In 1842, he was one of the founders of the Methodist Protestant Church in LaHarpe. He is buried in the LaHarpe City Cemetery alongside his wife Jemima. His grave stone bears an epitaph referring to his anti-slavery sentiment and his efforts to help the cause.
The migration of Rufus Richardson
Vermont to Connecticut to Ohio to Illinois