Saturday, June 2, 2012

Death of Hugh Doherty


The following obituary appeared in the Le Sueur Sentinel:

DEATH OF HUGH DOHERTY

In the death of Hugh Doherty which occurred at noon on Thursday last, at the residence of his son James, in Tyrone Township, another old settler has been taken to rest. Mr. Doherty was born in County Tyrone, Ireland, in September 1802, and was therefore in his 83d year when he died. He came to America in 1846-just escaping the terrible hard times of 1847 in his native country-and located in Manyunk, a suburb of Philadelphia, where he remained until 1856, when he came to Minnesota, and took a government claim of 160 acres in Tyrone, where he had lived ever since and where he died. His family came the following year. The deceased was chairman of the first board of supervisors of Tyrone township and named the town after his native county in Ireland. (The other two members were Louis Winterfeld and David Jones, the first named of whom is living yet.) He was also one of the earliest members of the board of county commissioners in the county. During the earlier years in Tyrone he also taught school a number of terms. In his public as in his private life, Mr. Doherty was a model of conscientious and honest citizen, and no kinder hearted, upright or agreeable neighbor ever lived. He was a christian in the highest and truest sense-and one who carried his notion of christian duty into all walks of life and when Death came at last, he was shorn of his terror for the venerable and venerated man of faith and works, who welcomed his departure from earth as one who had done the best he could and was ready to lay down the burden of life. The world is better that such men have lived. The deceased leaves a wife, aged 80 years, in feeble health, four sons, James, Samuel, (in Stevens County,) Patrick and Hugh and one daughter, the wife of Patrick Cantwell. The funeral took place at St. Thomas on Saturday and was one of the largest ever known in the county.

Le Sueur Sentinel, Nov. 27, 1884

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