My First Home

In the year 1849, before he went to California, Henry Leighty, my great grand father, purchased from the government agent at Quincy IL 160 acres of land for $500 which was situated and described  as the SE quarter of Section 15 of Township 4 N.  in Range 1 West of the fourth principal meridian in what is now known as Eldorado Township in McDonough County, Illinois.

The first deed to this land was given to a soldier, named Thomas Rowsey as payment for his service in the War of 1812 and was given to said Thomas Rowsey in 1818 and was written on a small sheet of sheepskin and therefore called a sheep-skin deed. It was signed by James Monroe,Pres of the U,S. He sold 80 acres and later bought it back. He broke up this raw prairie land with ox teams and a wooden plowshare.

He lived in a cabin he built until1857 when he moved into a house which on the property he bought back and which was about  one half mile West of the cabin.This what he they called the old house. I don't know what  year the new house was built.

He married again after his trip out west and one his children was my Grandmother. I lived there from 1931, when I was born until the spring of 1937 when lost the farm during the depression.