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ALEXANDER M. CAMPBELL
Salina
AMONG the early men of Kansas, few have had a more varied experience than the man whose name heads this sketch.
He came to Kansas a mere boy, and went to cutting wood for the Delaware Indians, then hired out to run a ferry
across the Kansas river, and afterward went into the store of Gilmore & Allen, with whom he remained for a
short time. He was born in Renfrewshire, Scotland, August 12, 1835, where his father, Peter, carried on the business
of bleaching cloth and yarn. His mother's maiden name was Margaret Melvin. At the age of eight years he left Scotland
and went to Ireland, his parents having both died when he was an infant. In 1848 he immigrated to the United States,
came west, and settled in Randolph county, Illinois, where he worked on a farm up to 1853, when he came to Missouri
and worked for the Hon. James Burch, of Clinton county, in that State. In 1856 he came to Kansas and stopped in
Lawrence. He was an anti-slavery man and ardently supported that side, never shirking any responsibility. He was
with Montgomery and Abbott in the southern Kansas fights. He acted as a deputy sheriff for Douglas county, in which
capacity he took the census in that county. In 1858 he moved to Saline county, and he and Hon. William A. Phillips
were the first to locate where the town of Salina now stands, where he opened a farm, traded with the Indians and
trapped, and took an active part in the organization of the county of Saline. He was appointed postmaster in 1861,
on the recommendation of Hon. M. J. Parrott, which position he has held ever since. In addition to conducting the
post-office, he is engaged in general merchandising, under the firm-name of Campbell, Sloan & Tuthill. He was
married October 6, 1858, in Rily City, to Miss Christiana A. Phillips, sister of Hon. William A. Phillips, by whom
he has five children - Christina, Mary, William, Margaret and Alexander. He has always been and now is an ardent
supporter of the Republican party.
The United States Biographical Dictionary and Portrait Gallery of Eminent and Self-Made Men. Chicago and Kansas
City, USA: S. Lewis, 1879. Page 414Transcribed by L. Smalley
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WALTER E. CONNELLY
WALTER E. CONNELLY of Salina has had some unusual experience as an educator in the western part of the state.
As a boy he attended one of the old dugout schoolhouses of Kansas, and he spent seventeen years teaching, concluding
that service with a term as superintendent of instruction in Saline County. Since retiring from that office he
has founded and is manager of the Salina Collection Agency, the first and only exclusive collection agency in the
city. He represents a family that during the past century have by successive stages progressed half way across
the American continent from New England to Western Kansas. His grandfather, Alexander W. Connelly, was born in
Massachusetts, and in 1811 went out to the extreme western frontier, along the Wabash River in Southern Indiana,
and secured a tract of government land, now occupied by the City of Terre Haute. Robert W. Connelly, father of
Walter E., was born on that land and within the present limits of Terre Haute, August 16, 1831. In 1860 he removed
to Illinois, where he was a farmer until 1883. In that year he went to Nebraska, spent three years as a farmer
in Thayer County, and in 1886 brought his family to Thomas County, Kansas. He homesteaded land there and for ten
years was postmaster of DeMunn, and also a justice of the peace. In 1898 he removed to Sherman County, where he
died September 20, 1905. He was an active member of the Christian Church and assisted in organizing the first church
of that denomination in Thomas County. In 1854 Robert W. Connelly married Miss Catherine Young, who was born in
Kentucky September 21, 1833. She died in Thomas County, Kansas, March 20, 1886. They became the parents of ten
children, five sons and five daughters: Rhoda, born in 1855 and died in 1883; Henry B., born in 1856; Charles E.,
born in 1858 and died in 1907; Julia, born in 1861 and died in 1881; James H., born in 1863; Mary, born in 1865
and died in 1881; Emma, born in 1868 and died in 1915; William A., born in 1872 and died in 1914; Walter E.; and
Sadie R., born in 1879. Walter E. Connelly was born January 22, 1876, in a log house on a farm in Piatt County,
Illinois. He was still a child when his father moved to the West and was ten years of age when the family located
in Kansas in 1886. He continued his education in the public schools of this state, and for a time was a student
in a dugout in Thomas County. In 1897, at the age of twenty-one, he began his career as a teacher. His first school
was taught in a sod house in Sherman County. Altogether he taught seventeen years, seven years in rural schools
and nine years in the towns of Waldo, Bunker Hill, Luray, Salina and Sylvan Grove. In 1910 Mr. Connelly was elected
on the democratic ticket as superintendent of public instruction of Saline County, and filled that position two
years. It was in 1914 that he established the Salina Collection Agency, and he has since developed that to a profitable
business and an important service in the community. On July 6, 1902, at Monument, Kansas, occurred his marriage
with Miss, Lizzie Belle O'Brien. Her parents were Thomas and Susan O'Brien, her father a native of Maryland and
her mother of Ireland. Mrs. Connelly was born near Lincoln, Nebraska, April 1, 1878. Mr. and Mrs. Connelly have
one child, Mildred Lillian. She was born May 22, 1903, at Hays, Kansas. At that time Mr. Connelly was a student
during the first year after the opening of the Kansas State Normal at Hays, and his daughter Mildred has the distinction
of being the first child born to a student in that institution. [Source: "A Standard History of Kansas and
Kansans", By William Elsey Connelley, Published by Lewis, 1918. Submitted by K. Torp]
JAMES M COOMBS, Brookville
JAMES M COOMBS was born December 8, 1824, in Penobscot county, Maine. His paternal grandfather, Samuel Coombs,
was a colonel in the Revolutionary army, and his maternal grandfather, William Mayhew, was a captain in the same
cause. Both served during the entire war, and both were wounded in battle. His father, Samuel Coombs, was a captain
in the war of 1812.
James received a common-school education in Bangor, Maine. In early life he became a noted fireman in that city,
belonging to the company known as the Bangor Tiger, and was celebrated for his activity, courage and daring. On
two occasions he saved the lives of young ladies in burning buildings, at the imminent risk of his own. His deeds
of thrilling adventure are still related by that noted company as among the interesting events of those times.
In 1850 he immigrated to Central America, afterward to California, and spent much time on the coasts of Spain.
After mining a year and a half in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, he entered a wholesale mercantile house, where he
remained two years. He traveled extensively on business in that State. He was at the head of the band that rid
the country of the gamblers and thieves who had taken possession of the government at Placerville, then known as
Hangtown, and led the band that took Mickey Frerer from the court-room at Stony Point and executed him for the
cold-blooded murder of an honest miner. His life in California was full of adventure. He was with Colonel Fremont
in the party that relieved the emigrants who were snowed in at the North Pass of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and
was one of the passengers on the Star of the West, wrecked off Cape Hatteras in 1854. The Star of the West was
afterward rebuilt, and was the same that attempted to reinforce Fort Sumter.
In 1857 he removed to Kansas, where he was an active free-state man and one of the most sincere and earnest friends
of General James H. Lane. He was one of the ten men who defended Dr. Doy at Lecompton, after his rescue from the
St. Joseph jail, and took him in his buggy under his own protection, at the risk of his life. In 1859 he became
famous for his heroic efforts to recover a drowning boy, named Bacchus, diving three times under a raft and drawing
him out, but not until life was extinct - an exploit witnessed by several hundred persons on the banks of the Kansas
river at Lawrence. He once captured two horse-thieves on the Delaware Reserve, without assistance, which led to
the dispersion of an extensive gang, and restored the horses to the owner, Judge Latta, of Leavenworth. He was
always ready to defend the free- state men, and was one of the trusted leaders under Lane.
In 1860 he removed to Colorado, where he was engaged in mining and various other avocations for five years. He
was connected with numerous expeditions against the hostile Indians, and was in many dangerous positions, always
heroically defending himself, and was noted for his adventurous spirit. He was identified with the early history
of Ellsworth county, and has contributed much to make it one of the leading and most prosperous counties in the
State. (See History of Ellsworth County.)
He was never indulged in games of chance, never played cards in his life and has always been a strictly temperate
man. He is a Republican and has been in many of the state conventions of his party - never seeking an office, but
ever willing to assist his friends. He became an Odd Fellow in California in 1851, has passed all the chairs and
is now a member of Lawrence Lodge No. 4.
Mr. Coombs was married April 26, 1846, in Bangor, Maine, to a lady bearing his name, but not related by ties
of consanguinity, Miss Deborah Coombs. In all his adventures, except during four years on the Pacific coast, she
has shared all his privations and been a true, affectionate and heroic wife. At one time on the Arkansas river
she bravely defended herself and a sick child, during her husband's absence, and escaped massacre by the Indians.
The United States Biographical Dictionary and Portrait Gallery of Eminent and Self-Made Men. Chicago and Kansas
City, USA: S. Lewis, 1879.Page 409 - 410
SWAYZE T. CRISS
Salina
The subject of this memoir, a son of Rezin and Sarah (Vincent) Criss, was born in Harrison county, Virginia, February
20, 1845. His fther, who was a farmer and a member of the Whig party, early taught his son lessons of patriotism,
and died in 1853, mourned by all who knew his worth and integrity. The son, having obtained a common-school education,
on the breaking out of the war warmly espoused the Union side and enlisted as a private in Co. A, 7th West Virginia
Infantry, and participated in all the battles in which that regiment was engaged during the war, among which were
the second Bull Run, Chancellorsville, Mine Run, the Wilderness, Spottsylvania and North Anna River. At this memorable
fight the 7th Regiment was making a charge on the enemy's works, when he lost a leg, and by reason of this disability
was honorably discharged from the service.
After leaving the army he attended Mount Union College, in Ohio, where he graduated in the class of 1870 with the
degree of A. B. Soon after leaving college he returned to West Virginia, where he taught school for some time.
In 1871 he removed to Kansas and located in Saline county where he engaged in teaching school. In 1873 he was elected
register of deeds for Saline county, and was twice re-elected, which office he now holds.
He was married July 15, 1872, to Miss Minnie Criss, of Lewistown, Illinois, a daughter of John A. Criss, a prominent
merchant of that place and an ardent Union man. By this marriage he has one daughter - Nellie Vincent.
Mr. Criss is a Republican, and he and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal church of Salina. He is a
man who has discharged with probity and fidelity all the duties of the positions of life to which he has been called.
The United States Biographical Dictionary and Portrait Gallery of Eminent and Self-Made Men. Chicago and Kansas
City, USA: S. Lewis, 1879.
Page 370 Transcribed by L. Smalley
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