Santa Clara County
Biographies
IRA JOSEPH LOVELL
Ira Joseph Lovell, a pioneer of Santa Clara valley, was born in Logan county, Ky., November 5, 1811. His father, Michael Lovell, was bon in the state of Maryland in 1779 or 1780. He had two brothers. The parents died while Michael and his brothers were yet small boys. Michael, when a young man, went to the state of Kentucky, where he subsequently married a Miss Ingram, and settled on a farm in Logan county, where Ira Joseph was born. There were of the issue of this marriage four children, two boys and two girls: Ira Joseph, John, Mary and Sarah. Subsequently Michael Lovell moved to Muhlenberg county, Ky., and continued the occupation of farmer. John Lovell and Mary were both married and reared large families in Muhlenberg county, January 14, 1836, to Miss Ann Laurette Campbell, a daughter of William Campbell, who was a son of David Campbell, whose father came from Scotland. William Campbell was soldier in the war of 1812. He married a Miss McNary. Of this marriage there were two children, both daughters, Ann Laurette and Margaret, who were born in Muhlenberg county. Ann Laurette was born September 24, 1817. In 1824 she visited her uncle, Col Hugh McNary, in Columbia, S. C. Colonel McNary was then an officer in the state militia. During that year General LaFayette made his last trip to the United States and visited Columbia, S. C. Colonel McNary escorted the general from the Georgia state line to Columbia, the home of the colonel, and whose guest the general was during part of his visit there. The city was decorated with flags of the new republic, and while the general was being escorted through the principal streets of the city by an appreciative and applauding people, Miss Ann Laurette Campbell, who was one of fifty little girls, walked just in advance of the general and strewed flowers before his along his line of march throughout the city. At the conclusion of the general’s visit at Columbia Colonel McNary, with the state militia, escorted him to the state line of North Carolina, where he was welcomed to that state with military honors. From early boyhood Ira Joseph Lovell assisted his father on the farm in Logan and Muhlenberg counties, and continued to follow the occupation of farmer until his death.
In 1838 Ira Joseph removed from Muhlenberg county to Hopkins county, Ky., where he purchased a farm five or six miles from Madisonville, and continued to live there until 1850, when he concluded to move to Santa Clara valley, Cal., where his father-in-law, Mr. Campbell, and his family had gone in 1846. In October, 1850, Mr. Lovell sold his Hopkins county farm and went to Saline county, Mo., where Mrs. Lovell’s sister Margaret, then Mrs. James Finley, and family were living, with the view of all going together to California in 1851. They were to be accompanied across the plains by Benjamin Campbell, who had gone to California in 1846 with his father, William Campbell, and had returned from California. On arriving in Missouri it was found that all could not be arranged to start across the plains until the spring of 1852. Complete outfits, wagons, work oxen, stock cattle and a suitable number of horses and mules having been procured, in April 15, 1852, from near Marshall, Saline county, Mo., the little company, consisting of four families, all related, started on their long journey.
They crossed the western boundary of Missouri May 1, 1852, and looking back they bade farewell to the states and homes they had loved so well, and then westward and forward to the golden land far away beyond the Rockies and Sierras, they commenced from the then western border of civilization their long, slow and wearisome journey across streams, over plains and mountains, often beset by hostile Indians. Worn and weary by many months of travel those of the company whose destination was the Santa Clara valley arrived at Santa Clara October 1, 1852, just five months and fifteen days from the time they started from Saline county, Mo. Mrs. Lovell and Mrs. Finley, who had been sick much of the latter part of the journey, left the party in an ambulance at Stockton and hastened on to Santa Clara. Mrs. Finley died on about September 30, near State Clara, before the arrival of the remainder of the party.
In 1853, Mr. Lovell purchased a tract of farming land in the valley a few miles south of Santa Clara and north of where the town of Los Gatos now is, which he improved, and where he resided until his death, April 25, 1898. Mrs. Lovell died there December 16, 1891. Both are buried in the cemetery near Santa Clara.
Mr. and Mrs. Lovell were pioneer settlers of Santa Clara county. They were well and widely known, and had the respect, confidence and kindly regard of all who knew them. They were noted for their hospitality; their home was always a welcome resting place for the sick and wayfaring in the early days of the settlement of Santa Clara valley. They died as they had lived, consistent and honored members of the Methodist Episcopal Church South.
There were born to Mr. and Mrs. Lovell thirteen children, seven sons and six daughters, two of whom, a boy and a girl, died at birth. Of the others, five are dead. The deceased are, James Michael, who was a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church South, in California. He was twice married but died without leaving any children. Theodore Campbell was accidentally drowned at the age of about twenty. Hugh Washington was married to a Miss Farley. Both are dead, leaving one child, Hugh Farley Lovell, now almost twenty-one years of age. Cordelia, who died when she was young, and Leonora, who died at the age of about eight years. The living are William McNary Lovell, a lawyer, residing with his family at Tucson, Ariz.; John Alexander Lovell, residing with his family at Santa Clara, Cal. Joseph Worth Lovell, residing with his sister, Margaret, now Mrs. Lynn Cook, on the father’s old homestead, near Campbell; he was married to a Miss Farley, sister of his brother Hugh’s wife, who has been deceased for years; there were no children born to them; Mary Elizabeth, now Mrs. W. W. Beauchamp, residing with her husband and family near Gilroy, in Santa Clara county; Sarah Margaret, now Mrs. Cook, residing with her husband and family on her father’s old homestead near Campbell, and Ella, now Mrs. George L. Beaver, residing with her husband and family at Longacres near her father’s old homestead, in Santa Clara county, where the mother and father died.
Transcribed
Joyce Rugeroni.
Source: History
of the State of California & Biographical Record of Coast Counties,
California by Prof. J. M. Guinn, A. M., Pages 301-303. The Chapman
Publishing Co., Chicago, 1904.
© 2014 Joyce Rugeroni.