Part of the Indiana Biographies Project
Albert G. Ogborn
The narrative of a life which has been filled with useful deeds, with duties well performed; a life which has exemplified the Golden Rule and recognized the principle of loving service to mankind as the supreme object of living, cannot lack interest, even to the casual reader or the stranger. Such a career has been that of Albert G. Ogborn, who, since the close of the civil war, has been one of the most respected citizens of Richmond.
His paternal grandfather, John H. Ogborn, was a native of the city of Baltimore, Maryland, where he passed his early manhood. He married Mary Pusey Elliott and had nine children, two of whom died in infancy. By trade he was a shoemaker, and that calling he followed, more or less exclusively, throughout his active life. By the time that some of his older children were meditating how they should begin the independent battle of life he decided to remove, with his family, to the new west, where they might have better opportunities. Accordingly they started for Indiana in a wagon, crossing the mountains in that manner, and having a memorable journey, not unfraught with dangers. They settled in Richmond, then a small village, where they made their home for many years. The last days of the aged couple were passed in Waynesville, Ohio, he dying in the '70s, at the age of eighty-one, and his wife entering the silent land two years before, when in her seventieth year. They were members of the sect known as Hicksite Quakers, and were very strict and severe in their ideas of life.
Thomas E. Ogborn, the father of our subject, was born in Frederick, Maryland, in November, 1820, and was a boy when the family came to this state. He worked with his father at the shoemaker's trade, becoming very skillful at the business. In 1861 he enlisted in Company A, Second Ohio Infantry, which was assigned to the First Brigade, First Division, Fourteenth Army Corps. He was promoted from the ranks to orderly sergeant, and soon afterward, on account of his ill health, was given the position of clerk to his captain. During his three years and one month of army life he participated in numerous important battles, among which were those of Perryville, Kentucky; Chickamauga, Lookout Mountain, Missionary Ridge, Ringgold, Tunnel Hill and the engagements of the Sherman campaign, including the siege of Atlanta. In the latter part of 1864 Mr. Ogborn was granted an honorable discharge, owing to his continued ill health, which he bravely ignored as long as possible. Going to Mechanicsburg, Ohio, his former home, he recuperated during the ensuing winter, and in the spring following was elected mayor of the town on the Republican ticket. He occupied that office for fourteen consecutive years, then refusing re-election, as he was physically unable to longer discharge the duties of the position. He has always been one of the most honored and popular citizens of the place since he took up his residence there, and for the past six years he has been retired. For some ten or twelve years he served as a justice of the peace, and for several decades he has been actively concerned in the prosperity of the Republican party and the Grand Army of the Republic.
The first wife of Thomas E. Ogborn bore the maiden name of Julia A. Shepherd. She died in 1857, leaving four children, her first-born, Mary, having died in infancy. Elizabeth, the second child; lived to be sixteen years of age. Argus C, now a machinist in the employ of Gaar, Scott & Company, of Richmond, was one of the heroes of the war of the Rebellion, in which he served for four years and four months, enlisting when he was but sixteen years of age. He was a private of Company B, Eleventh Ohio Volunteer Infantry, and took part in all the battles in which his father fought, and in many others, among which were Franklin and the second battle of Bull Run. For marked bravery he was promoted to be one of General Sherman's body guard, and he continued at his post of duty, valiant and faithful, as long as his country had need of him. The two younger children were Emma, now the wife of William H. Horr, of Richmond; and Eleanora, who married Abram Thompson and is deceased. The second wife of Thomas E. Ogborn was Mrs. Caroline Miller prior to their marriage.
Albert G. Ogborn was born in Mechanicsburg, Champaign county, Ohio. February 9, 1848, and was consequently but nine years of age when his mother died. He went to live with his aunt, Mrs. Ruth E. Butterworth (whose husband was a cousin of Hon. Ben Butterworth), at Waynesville, Ohio, and was employed on a farm until the close of the war. Then, coming to Richmond, he learned the trade of a machinist with Baylies, Vaughan & Company (now the Richmond Machine Works), and for twenty-two years was employed by local firms, Gaar, Scott & Company, Robinson Machine Works and Richmond City Mill Works, among others.
In 1889 Mr. Ogborn was elected city marshal of Richmond, was re-elected, and continued in the office until 1891, when he received the nomination for sheriff. Elected to that position the following year, he served for the four-years term, and since November, 1896, he has been associated with Mr. Doan in the undertaking business. In 1897 he was appointed by Governor Mount as a commissioner of police, as in 1892 Richmond inaugurated a metropolitan police system. For a short time Mr. Ogborn officiated as president of the board, but he resigned that position. He has always been an efficient and valued worker in the Republican party, and has been sent as a delegate to many county and local conventions. In the fraternities he is influential and honored, being past master of Webb Lodge, No. 24, Free and Accepted Masons; a member of King Solomon's Chapter, No. 4, Royal Arch Masons, and of Richmond Commandery, No. 8, Knights Templar. In the last mentioned he is past eminent commander, and though he was elected to the Scottish Rite degree, he was unable to take it, on account of illness. In the Odd Fellows' society he is past grand of White Water Lodge, No. 41, and in Osceola Tribe, No. 15, Improved Order of Red Men, he is past sachem. In the First Presbyterian church he has long been an active member, having served as a deacon and elder.
The first wife of Mr. Ogborn, to whom he was married in 1876, was Miss Emma R. Morgan, of Richmond. Their only child, Nellie I., died at the age of ten years, and Mrs. Ogborn passed to the home beyond in 1894, in Petoskey, Michigan, where she and her husband were staying for a period in the hope of benefiting her health. On Thanksgiving day, November 30, 1896, Mr. Ogborn wedded Mrs. Alice T. Laws, of this city.
Source:
Biographical and Genealogical History of Wayne, Fayette, Union and Franklin Counties, Indiana, Volume 1, The Lewis Publishing Company, Chicago, 1899