Marion Illinois History Preservation

Well I have never run into an instance where I couldn’t actually nail someone’s first name down so this is a first. Lots of men in the early days went by their initials only as in this instance, W.C.S. Rhea. Two census records that I found show his name as William and the others with his initials, W.C.S. However his official death record calls him out as Walter C.S. Rhea and his son was named Walter Scott Rhea. Then again, I found two references that call him Winfield C. Scott Rhea. So for simplicity, I will refer to him in his bio as W.C.S. and keep his name as Winfield in the heading since that was how he was listed as alderman for the city of Marion in 1904. I suspect it’s more likely that his name was Winfield C. Scott since a lot of young men born in this era were named after historical figures like General Winfield Scott of the War of 1812 and the Mexican American war fame.

Ezra Norton Rice was born in Mercey County, Pennsylvania on October 15, 1861 to Joshua E. Rice and Mary Lesure. The family is reported to have migrated to Williamson County in 1864. When the 1870 federal census was taken the family was found to be living in Township 9, Range 1, which is Blairsville Township today and they were living near the Fredonia Post Office which is now the village of Cambria. The father, Joshua, was a 37 year old blacksmith and the 42 year old mother Mary, reported having Ezra aged 9 and five other children.