son, Charles H., which he continued until the son lost his health, and died April 17, 1865, in his twenty-sixth year.

Charles H. Cowden was a young man of rare amiability of character, upright and pious in all his intercourse in the church (Central), of which he was a member, and toward all others, and his death was deeply mourned by family and kindred, as also by the Sunday school, of which he was a teacher. The general sorrow was marked and demonstrative

at the funeral.

The death of his faithful son led to the closing of the grocery, after which for a short time he was employed in further settlements and collections, when, 1868, he obtained the post of Warden of the prison, which he held two years, a position of great responsibility and care, which taxed his health greatly. While he resided there his eldest daughter, Mary J., was married to Ellis W. Baily, of Short Creek, Ohio. The fruit of that union was two children, Florence Grace, who lives with her grandmother in the West, and another who died in early infancy, the mother dying soon after, December 21, 1871, and was brought home and lies in Montgomery Cemetery. Several years before this his second daughter, Hannah A., was married to J. Jones Wright, of Norristown; she died 1874, leaving one son, C. Carroll, who at this writing is growing into a promising young man. The death of his three children in the freshness of early life and the disease in his own system, contracted while Prison Warden, had undermined his health, but he bore up under it, and having purchased what was many years ago called the "Sterigere lot," which the latter designed for a town reservoir, he proceeded to build a double brick mansion upon it beside St. John's Church, which he occupied at first in connection with his younger daughter's family, and where he died September 3, 1876, at the age of sixty-two years, leaving his estate to his widow during her lifetime. Charlotte, his widow, surviving, remained in part of the house until June 7, 1882, when she also died, and as all the other deceased members of the family had been, was interred in the family lot at Montgomery Cemetery.

John Cowden had been from a young man a member of the Norristown Presbyterian Church and his wife almost from her childhood to the Methodist Episcopal, of Oak street congregation, at the time of her death. John Cowden was a man of resolute purpose and great uprightness of character, and his wife distinguished for christian meekness and sweetness of temper.

John and Charlotte Cowden's youngest son, Samuel L., at the proper age was apprenticed to the plumbing business, which, soon after his majority, he set up in a small shop at Airy and DeKalb streets April 1, 1868, continuing there until 1873. About that time his father purchased a lot fronting on DeKalb, a few doors above Main, where he erected a plumbing shop, and his son Samuel L. formed a partnership with S. S. Jones, which existed until 1879, when the latter retired and S. L. C. continued the business alone with increasing trade, until 1884, when he purchased the property, and finding the place too small and inconvenient, he in 1886 purchased more depth to his lot, enlarged the building into a deeper store-room below and workshop above. The building was raised by a Mansard third-story, with all the modern improvements pertaining to his business. It is now one of the most complete stores and workshops combined in the county. Here Mr. Cowden, who is a man of indomitable will and energy, is pushing his business at this writing with assured success.

Samuel L. Cowden is the sole surviving child of John and Charlotte Cowden, and was married March 9, 1871, to Miss Lidie A., daughter of William and Hannah A. Keiger, of Bridgeport. They have two children well grown, Lottie and Harry, and at this writing reside in the old homestead. Mrs. Samuel L. Cowden is a member of the DeKalb street M. E. Church. As we have given in this memorial those connected by ties of affinity with the elder branches of the family, so we add those of Lidie A. Cowden also.

George Keiger, the earliest known ancestor, was a German, and served in our army during the Revolutionary war. His wife's name was Margaret. His son Andrew, born near Spring Mill February 4, 1788, married Eliza Harrison, lived many years at Bridgeport and died there, 1849, aged sixty

one. He left the following children: William, intermarried with Hannah A. Vandergrift, who left the following children: Ellen V., wife of Morgan Bechtel; Henry P., intermarried with Hettie Mauger; Lidie A., already noted; William J., who is also married, Emily R., deceased; John A., Ellen and Harry, also deceased. George W. married Hannah Evans, and has children Andrew and Camilla. Colbert Keiger is married to Rebecca Welsh; children, Florence F., Frank M., Eugene V., Colbert H. Julia Ann, wife of Charles Rodgers, had one daughter, Mary. John A., intermarried with Ann Vandergrift; children, Colbert, Clementine and Lilian. Eliza married Thomas Widdecomb, have children William, Calvin, Robert and George.

CHARLES W. MARTIN.

The worthy man whose name stands above, claims a German ancestry. His grandfather was Nicholas Martin, who emigrated from Baden, Germany, before the Revolutionary war when a boy, and who was indentured to a farmer near Fairview, in our county, to serve a term of years. Before serving out his term, however, the war of Independence broke out, and he was offered and accepted his discharge on the condition of enlisting in the Pennsylvania line of the Continental army, thus serving about five years, and was at the battles of Germantown, Trenton, and probably the previous one at Brandywine.

Nicholas Martin, living near Fairview all his life and dying there in 1832, had eight children, named, Henry, John, Abraham, Elizabeth, Catharine, Mary, Sarah and Sophia. His second son, John, married Sarah, daughter of Devault Wanner, of same township, and had the following children, named as follows: Charles W. (our subject), Harriet, Tobias, Elizabeth, Kate, Mary, Charlotte, John, Angeline and Emma. There are at this writing but four of the above, the two eldest and two youngest, living.

Charles W. Martin was intermarried with Miss Susan, daughter of John Wilson, October 4, 1849, and there have been born to them eight children, named, Mary, Anne, Sarah, Mary, Martha, Martin L., Ida and Anne. The five first named are deceased. Martin L. is married to Anne, daughter of William and Elizabeth Moore, of Conshohocken, and have children, Sallie, Ida, Charles W., Laura and C. Wright; the first and last named only survive. The daughter Ida is intermarried with Nathan Hallowell, and at this writing have one child, Susan M. Anna is the wife of B. F. Novioch, of Norristown, and have one infant son, Paul.

Charles W. Martin has been a life-long farmer and horticulturist, commencing when a boy in Worcester, and after his marriage began farming for Joseph and Jonathan Conrad, in Upper Merion, and soon after started trucking on the same property, and followed it there, supplying Norristown market about twenty years, in that time gaining a thorough knowledge of the whole business. Mr. Martin was the first person who made a specialty of trucking for Norristown market. He left the business a little later, and for a short time engaged in carpenter jobbing in West Conshohocken and Lower Merion, of which he had some knowledge, for five or six years, when he was induced to return to trucking again at the place of Frederick Fox, on the northern border of Norristown.

Charles W. Martin is extensively known and esteemed for his mild, courteous demeanor, honest dealing and industrious habits. The foregoing plain family narrative is given to be recorded by the father of the family, that children and grandchildren may not forget their ancestry, but emulate their humble, unassuming virtues.

JESSE R. EASTBURN.

The name Eastburn is one of the earliest and most reputable in eastern Pennsylvania. Neither records nor tradition, however, settles the doubt as to whether it is English, Welsh or Scotch in original nationality. The affix "burn" or "bourn" in North British or Scotch, signifies river or boundary. The family appears to have settled where its members still reside, immediately above Bridgeport, on the Schuylkill, ever since April 21, 1742, now 145 years; as Mrs. Jesse R. Eastburn has the original deed of that date conveying several hundred acres from Benjamin to John Eastburn, who was probably the great-grandfather of our subject, said deed setting forth that it "is part of the Letitia Penn's manor of Mount Joy," which is known to have extended from the present western line of Bridgeport up the river to Valley Forge, possibly to Pickering creek. The deed bears the signatures of James Logan and William Logan, Penn's deputy governor and attorney, although the grantor named in the instrument is Benjamin Eastburn, who, from other papers also in her possession, was “surveyor general" under John, Thomas and Richard Penn, so early as 1733.

Mrs. Eastburn has also found an "agreement" made November 12, 1726, between Isaac Norris and Benjamin Eastburn, for the purchase and sale of several hundred acres of land. This may have been the very tract they afterwards secured, possibly including Barbadoes island, which latter, being a part of the "Williamstadt manor," deeded first to William Penn's son, and afterwards sold to Norris, as is well known. On early records Benjamin Eastburn's name is found as a landholder in Marion as early as 1741, and from the aforesaid agreement it would appear for several years earlier still.

In hunting for ancient papers in their family archives, Mrs. Eastburn came across a "Muster and Pay Roll of Captain Benjamin Eastburn," a paper belonging to the war of Independence. This officer could not have been the original Benjamin, but must have been a son, nephew or grandson. This document shows, if nothing else, that the family were among