ALMON MASON
From Fairfield & Warren, NY to Palermo, NY
Contributed by Lisa Slaski Transcribed by Joanne Murray
ALMON MASON. [AUTOBIOGRAPHY.]
I was born in Fairfield, Herkimer county, New Jersey(sic), on Monday, May 11, 1795, and raised
there until I was seven years of age. In the year 1802 my father moved into the town of Warren, in
the same county, where he resided until his death, which occurred in 1811. It was here that I spent
my childhood. In an old log school-house situated on one corner of my father's farm I was taught my
alphabet by an old-fashioned pedagogue. Though I have forgotten his name, his looks were so impressed
upon my memory that they are often recalled to my mind. I commenced going to school at the age of
eight, and attended quite steadily until my father's death; then came the burden of maintaining the
family; and, as I was the oldest son at home at the time, I was taken from school to assist in
supporting my mother and four children younger than myself. I was soon called to do duty in the war
of 1812, in which I entered with the Massachusetts militia, under General Rudolph I. Shoemaker,
September 14, 1814. The company was discharged at Sackett's Harbor in November of the same year. I
came home and married Lydia Thomas, who was born in Herkimer county, November 16, 1796, and who has
lived with me faithfully since the day of our marriage, September 20, 1815. We commenced housekeeping
in a part of mother's house, and I managed the farm. June 25, 1817, being the forty-first year of our
Independence, I received a commission as ensign in the twenty-seventh regiment of infantry of the
State militia of New York. In 1822, I moved from the homestead farm to Deerfield, Oneida county,
where I kept a hotel until 1825. I then removed to Richland, Oswego County, - the county at the time
being covered with timber, and very wild, with only here and there a clearing, where some squatter
had located. I was obliged to live in my wagon for fourteen days, until I could get a log house
suitable to live in. I lived in the vicinity of Richland until 1838, when I moved into the town of
Granby, where I remained until 1851. In the latter year I removed to Palermo, and settled on the
place where I now live. Myself and wife are members of the Baptist church at Gilbert's Mills,
which we united soon after coming here. (See portraits.)
A. MASON.
Source:"History of Oswego County, New York, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its
prominent men and pioneers." Philadelphia: L.H. Everts & Co., 1877. Page 321.
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