YE OLDEN TIMES
Letter From Thomas A. WALTON
Ironton Register, May 15, 1902
Lambert, Woods County, Ohio Editor Register:
In a recent issue of the Register, a correspondent from West Virginia spoke of the early settler Ventraux. In my “Notes of Early Settlers of Lawrence County,” this statement: “In 1819, the first above Two Mile was Ventraux. He afterward died. His widow Virginia Fannie Madrid Ventraux, owned the land, sold it out to John Tierman, took four of her children, returned to France, and left four in this country.
Some of her descendants live in Kanawha Valley. Her son William kept a store at Coalsmouth, a sister Fanny lived with him, and I think Edward is dead. Mr. Ventraux built this county’s first brick house (except for the Burlington tavern). The house is yet standing and owned by Ephraim McGee and son.” The above was written in 1877.
In the same issue, I saw an account of the death of John I. Brown, who was born in Proctorville, Ohio, in 1814. I would like to know to which family of Browns he belongs.
Jacob Proctor
Jacob Proctor and Abner Smith, I think, were the only resident landowners in 1841 in what is now Proctorville, Ohio. Dr. Brown, known as Paddy Brown, built a cabin entirely of pawpaw trees just above the mouth of Paddy Creek and left there before 1832. He was a noted physician.
John J. Brown went west in about 1846 (?). He had lived on Turkey Fork of Paddy Creek. George Brown, who lived up in Rome Township, died before 1836, and the widow Brown (mother of Capt. Wm. Brown, of Scott Town), living a few rods north of where Rome Chapel is, moved away about that time.
T. A. Walton.
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