Eliza's House

      




Samuel and Eliza Taylor Hanna and their family

Eliza Taylor Hanna lived like a queen. She lived in a mansion. She had servants to do everything, a carriage always at the ready, beautiful clothing and furnishings, and the most powerful husband in Fort Wayne. She also suffered the heartbreak of burying eleven of her thirteen children. 

     Eliza was my fourth great-grandmother’s little sister. The two sisters lived very different lives in the same town. According to the official version of the family story, the older sister, Laura Taylor, accompanied her father Israel on a “business trip” to Detroit from their home in New York. What kind of business could it have been? Detroit was a military outpost and fur trading center. Why would he bring a teenage daughter with him? It's a dubious story, especially as two of his children were born in Detroit.

     However things happened, Laura met a soldier serving at the fort, William Suttenfield, and married him when she was 16. Eliza was eight. Laura followed William to a posting in Piqua, Ohio. Her parents, Israel and Mary, followed them and moved to Ohio also. After a couple of years, William was stationed in Fort Wayne - then a military fort and not a town. It was a real outpost in the wilderness, a rough crowd of military personnel, French fur trappers, and Indians, mostly Myaamia - the Miami. The Suttenfields arrived by pirogue, the crudest of boats - a large poplar log with seating carved out. In 1816 William found a replacement for himself and got out of the Army. He built the first home outside of the fort, a log cabin, and established a two-story log tavern and inn. 

     The winter of 1821, Eliza came by sleigh all the way from Ohio for a visit. Who was with her? Which of her brothers were driving the sleigh? Or was it her father? So many details are lost, but the story goes that Eliza really was just planning a visit, not a permanent stay. While there, she met Samuel Hanna, a hardworking young man who ran a store in a log cabin across the street from the Suttenfields. Eliza married Samuel in 1822. 

     At first, the sisters' lives as Fort Wayne pioneers were similar. They both lived in their log cabin homes, cooking over open fire places, pounding corn to make a coarse meal, making their own soap and tallow candles, sewing their families’ clothes. The chores were endless. The town was rough and remote, if friendly. On the convergence of three rivers, Samuel Hanna was convinced it was a strategic location that would be great for commerce – if they could only establish transportation networks to bring goods in and out more easily and inexpensively. Poling upriver in a pirogue wasn’t efficient. 

     Samuel soon had his hands in many fires, and was building the wealth that would set his wife apart from her sister, and really, anyone else in town. Although not well-educated, he was charismatic and impressive. When Allen County was officially organized in 1823, he was appointed the first postmaster and soon after, associate judge of the circuit court. He would be chosen over and over again for leadership positions. 

     Meanwhile, his father-in-law, Israel Taylor, also saw something promising in this little village his daughters settled in, and he brought his family to Fort Wayne. Samuel went into partnership with Eliza and Laura’s brother, Lathrop Minor Taylor, who would become the co-founder of the city of South Bend. 

     The years passed; Samuel continued to build wealth, and the town of Fort Wayne developed. It became an official, incorporated city in 1840. The Wabash and Erie Canal, which Samuel helped shepherd into existence, would soon bring goods and people to town. The population stood at 2,000 the year of incorporation. But Samuel was always looking ahead. He would serve in the state legislature and help bring the railroad to Fort Wayne. He invested in vast amounts of land as it opened up for purchase. His wealth would benefit generations. 

     That year, too, he built the beautiful Greek Revival mansion that Eliza would live in for the rest of her life. It was truly grand, built to impress, with twin porticos and twin sets of chimneys, with a sweeping drive out front and park-like grounds. Some years the family had as many as five live-in servants. In 1850, twenty-one people were living in the house. Typically, when her sons married, they started married life for the first few years in the house that was always called the Hanna Homestead. In their daughter’s 1873 wedding notice and her 1937 obituary, the newspaper described the home as “palatial.”


                             The Hanna Homestead in winter


The Children

 

Eliza had, amazingly, twelve sons and one daughter. How happy she must have been when she finally had

that daughter, twenty years after her first child was born! She named her after herself, and the press called

her Eliza Jr. Eight sons lived to adulthood. She buried Joseph, John, Othniel and Lyman as babies and

toddlers. 

   Samuel Hanna died in 1866 at age 68. Their youngest living child was Eliza Jr., who was 23 and still

single. By the time he died, Samuel and Eliza had buried two sons in their twenties, including their oldest,

whom Samuel had especially groomed as his successor.

   It would have been hard for the sons to top their father’s life. For the most part, they didn’t live long

enough to have a chance, or they continued in businesses with the advantages he had given them, or they

lived on the income he’d left them through shrewd investments.  

   Following are brief sketches of their children. 


James Bayless Hanna (1823-1851) - James, who went by his middle name, Bayless, married Mary King

Fairfield when he was only 20. Mary was the daughter of sea captain Oliver Fairfield. He and his brother Asa,

also a sea captain, settled in Fort Wayne from Maine. Their Fairfields', Hugh McCulloch, who would one day serve

as the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, encouraged the brothers to come West. As became the custom for other siblings,

they lived in the Homestead their first years of marriage, then Samuel built them a house. They had three children, Clara Louise,

Oliver and James before his death at age 28. Mary remarried in 1855 and moved to Lafayette with her

husband, but Oliver stayed in Fort Wayne with his grandparents. Oliver became president of Nuttman & Co.

Bank, a bank founded by Oliver and his in-law Joseph D. Nuttman. He served on the hospital board for the

city hospital, and lived the expected life of a prominent businessman in his brief life.


                                                                  James Bayless Hanna


Amos Thomas Hanna (1825-1846) - Amos also went by his middle name, Thomas. Like his older brother, he married at 20, to Sarah Fairfield, who was Mary King Fairfield’s sister. Eleven months later, Thomas and Sarah had a daughter, Thomasetta, born September first. Six days later, Thomas died. Sarah remarried in 1856 and went on a honeymoon tour of Europe and the Holy Land. She settled in her husband’s Ohio hometown for a few years before they returned to Fort Wayne. Thomasetta married Benjamin Day “Ben” Skinner, son of a prominent Presbyterian minister, and had an only child Emily Montgomery Skinner, known as Plum. 


          
A teenaged Thomasetta is pictured here (far left) with her mother Sarah, her stepfather,

step-brothers and little half-siblings. She looks strikingly like her uncles Bayless and Samuel T.

     Ben and Thomasetta moved to Manhattan where he worked as a stockbroker. The two separated. Thomasetta and Plum both lived for the rest of their lives off of the Hanna inheritance, spending most of their time in Europe. Plum was a celebrated beauty whose first husband was noted sculptor Paul Wayland Bartlett. She was painted and sketched several times in her life by artist friends of her husband. (Auguste Rodin, one of Paul's mentors, was a witness at her wedding.)

She did not have children. 



Emily Skinner Lang


Henry Clay Hanna (1829-1881) - Of all his siblings, Henry came closest to having the large family his parents had.

He married Elizabeth C. Carson and they had eight children. All four of his daughters died young; Elizabeth

as a baby. Minnie died in childhood, Charlotte at 21 of consumption, and Annie, at 26 after a long illness in

which she sought treatment in Europe and Colorado. Maybe her illness was also consumption. 

     Henry’s obit said he led a life of quiet, gentile leisure, partially paralyzed from a fall and never in strong

health. He was killed when he was driving his horse and buggy over a bridge that collapsed into the St.

Mary’s River. The carriage flipped upside down, drowning the poor horse. Henry was able to keep himself

above the waterline, clinging to the seat until he was rescued by the sheriff, who happened to be nearby

and heard the bridge fall. Perhaps there were internal injuries, or just shock, but Henry died a few hours

after he was taken home. 

     Out of all of his children, only Robert left children, Robert Jr. and Agnes.



Home of Henry Clay Hanna

Charles Hanna (1831-1881) - Charles attended Wabash College, of which his uncle James Hanna was a

founder and ardent supporter.  James (not to be confused with Charles’ brother James Bayless) rode all over Indiana

seeking subscriptions to get the college out of debt. 

    Charles had a career as a businessman with the firm French, Hanna & Co., a woolen mill. His brother

Willis also worked there. Charles married Sarah McClain and had two children, Caroline “Carrie,” an

aspiring actress in her youth; and Samuel Frederick, who went by Fred. After Charles died, his widow

relocated to New York City. There, Carrie married a man named C.A. Pogue. She spent her last fifteen years

living with him in Scotland. 

     Son Samuel Frederick, who went by Fred, worked as a machinist in the railroad shops and never married.

He lived with his Aunt Eliza in the family mansion for decades before his death. Neither had children. 


Samuel Telford (1834-1887) - The picture below was taken in 1858 when Samuel was a

student at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. His obituary said he graduated from Hanover College, but he actually

graduated from its Grammar School, roughly equivalent to a high school. (Most colleges had what were more

typically called Preparatory Departments that provided preparation for those who might go on to college --

in other words, high school.)  

After his oldest brother James Bayless died, Samuel Sr. seems to have bypassed Samuel T.’s older brothers

Hugh and Charles, and favored him as his successor. He made Samuel T. executor of his estate, and brought

him into his office at the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chicago Railroad. 

     At first, Samuel did very well professionally. He also married Martha Brandriff, whose father was one

of the other most prominent businessmen in town. Her father established a large foundry in Ohio, and a

wholesale stove and hardware business in Fort Wayne. He served as president of First National Bank. 

     Samuel T. and “Matt,” as his wife was known, had three children, Mary, John and Marguerite. 

     In 1867, Samuel was treasurer of the board of the Grand Rapids and Indiana Railroad. It was a struggling

line with two engines in service and a single passenger car. In 1869 a judge appointed a receiver for the

company; under his direction the line was completed between Fort Wayne and Big Rapids, Michigan and

taken out of receivership. According to his obituary, Samuel lost his entire fortune, some $200,000

(equivalent to about $4.5 million) in railroad investments. 

      His last several years he was unable to engage in any business activity. He died in the family

Homestead at age 53, under the care of his sister Eliza Jr.  Of his three children, only the youngest,

Marguerite, had children. 



Samuel Telford Hannah as a college student in 1858


Horace Hovey Hanna (1838-1869) - Horace attended Hanover College's Grammar School where he met his

wife, Elizabeth Rogers. Like some of his older brothers, he also married at age 20. They had five kids before

his death at 31. At 22, Horace worked with his father at Fort Wayne Machines Works, where he was secretary. The

company made steam engines, boilers, ash leaches, tanks, cast iron building fronts and iron and brass

castings. 

     After his death his daughter Jessie tried hard to make it on the stage in comic operas in New York City,

imagining herself as understudy for Lillian Russell, one of the top stage performers of the time. This did

not happen. She died at 29, married but without children. His other four kids all had children. 


William Willis Hanna (1840-1869) - There was somethingabout Willis that drew people to him. Death of the young tends to draw large crowds to funerals, but that’s

not a guarantee. In his case, hundreds of people filed through the Hanna Homestead to pay their respects.

“It is seldom that any citizen, however old or useful he may have been, has been followed to their grave by

a more numerous cortege of friends and acquaintances than that which filled our streets with the last

remains of Willis Hanna,” the Fort Wayne Daily Gazette reported. 

     Willis was buried in a metal casket with a glass top and a silver plate engraved with the words, “Wm.

Willis Hanna, Died at St. Paul, Minn., Sept 15, 1869, Aged twenty-nine years.” Over a hundred carriages

followed his casket to Lindenwood Cemetery.

     Willis had gone to St. Paul seeking a health cure. His obituary said that his health was never robust, and

that it had been impaired by his “close, unremitting” attention to business. Within days of arriving in St.

Paul, his mother was summoned to his side. Eliza, Eliza Jr., and one of his brothers - probably Hugh -

stayed with him his last weeks. His illness was said to be “painful and protracted.” Obituaries in the

Victorian era were often over-the-top hagiographies, but his is believable in saying that he was a

remarkably kind and gentle young man. 

     In his working life Willis worked at one of many family businesses, in his case, the Woolen Factory

of French, Hanna & Co., where his brother Charles served on the board. Willis had not married and had

no children. 


Hugh Taylor Hanna (1842-1914) - As a young man Hugh engaged in the sale of real estate. For the last

decades of his life he lived at the Homestead. He did not marry or have children. 


Eliza Hanna (1843-1937) - Oh what it must have been like to be the only, much-wanted daughter! Yet

very little is recorded about her long life, especially her childhood. She was nearly 30 when she married

Canadian Fred Hayden. Fred was an enthusiastic outdoorsman and athlete who organized a curling club

in Fort Wayne and served as its president. He lived the kind of life one would expect of the husband of

Samuel Hanna’s only daughter, serving as president of First National Bank and getting elected to the

Indiana State Legislature in 1889 and 1891.  

     The two moved into the Homestead in the early 1880s and signed a financial agreement with Eliza Sr.

This caused a lot of dissension in the family, and in the 1880s surviving siblings and grandchildren

sued Fred, contending that his relationship with Eliza was exploitative and that he was not keeping her in

the style to which she was accustomed. They also charged him with being  impatient and rude to her.

The family seemed to have settled their differences. Fred and Eliza Jr. lived in the Homestead for the rest

of their lives.

     In 1892 Fred sold 100 acres of Eliza Jr.’s property to the Fort Wayne Driving Association. The

association was made up of the city’s wealthiest residents, and the land was used to create a first class

horse track. Car and motorcycle races were later held on the one-mile oval. (The property was sold in

1913 for a housing development.)

     In her later years, Eliza was active in Daughters of the American Revolution. On the 1930 census

her nephew Samuel Frederick, Charles’ son, lived in the mansion along with a trained nurse and a

housekeeper. She died in 1937. In her will, Eliza left the Homestead to the Fort Wayne public schools.

The old mansion did not fare well, and it was torn down in 1966. A small park, Hanna Homestead Park,

continues on the spot in Fort Wayne today. 


Sources:

Newspapers:

     “Obituary,” Fort Wayne Daily Gazette,18 Sept 1869, p. 4. 

     “Funeral of Willis Hanna,” Fort Wayne Daily Gazette, 20 Sept 1869, p. 4.

     Woolen Factory: Fort Wayne Daily Gazette, 16 March 1869, p. 4. 

     “Samuel Hanna - Death of a Another Prominent Citizen - a Brief Sketch of His Life,” Fort Wayne Daily

News, 8 Nov 1887, p. 1. 

       Leininger, Kevin. “Driving Park Deserves to Be Remembered, and Historic Status Would Help,” New

Sentinel (Fort Wayne, Indiana), 23 Jan 2023, https://www.news-sentinel.com/news/local-news/2020/02/25/

kevin-leininger-driving-park-deserves-to-be-remembered-and-historic-status-would-help/   


Other:

Warren, Johnny. "Sea Captain of the Summit City," ARCHES Magazine, Winter 2015, https://archfw.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/winter2015-ARCHmag-mobile01.pdf


Copyright Andrea Auclair © 2023























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