Edward Elijah Rouze Biography

 

Note: The following text is mostly taken from the

1928 Rouze family book by Nellie Hunter Sherman.

 

 

Edward Elijah Rouze was born March 29, 1841 in Clay Township, Decatur County, Indiana.  In 1861 he answered the call for troops in the Civil War, supporting the Union army as part of the Company D, Seventh Regiment of the Indiana Volunteers.  He was wounded in June 1862 and received an honorable discharge.

 

In 1865 he was united in marriage to Elizabeth Woodwill.  They lived in Kansas for a short period, then resettled in Marion County, Iowa, near his brothers.  They settled two miles west of Tracy, Iowa on a farm known as the Hayworth place (in 1928 the farm was owned by William Brubaker).  Elizabeth died in 1871.  She was buried in the nearby Bethel Cemetery.

 

Edward married Lydia Ann Marsh Lowry in 1872.  She was a war widow and had one son, Willie Lowry.  Lydia also happened to be a sister of Mary T. Marsh, the wife of William Kates Rouze (one of Edward’s brothers).  Edward and Lydia gave birth to James Samuel Rouze in 1873 and Elizabeth Ann Rouze in 1875.

 

Shortly thereafter, in the fall of 1875, the family moved to Edward’s childhood home in Indiana to help look after his parents in their declining years.  During this time, two more children were born: Bertha Susan Rouze in 1877, and Jessie Lily Rouze in 1879.

 

Father Joseph Rouze died in 1880.  The house was sold and the Edward Rouze family - along with mother Susan Rouze - moved back to Iowa.  This time they moved to the former Henry Parker farm, purchased for $20 an acre.  Two more children were born: Frank Forsyth Rouze in 1881, and Ezra Marsh Rouze in 1883.

 

Wife Lydia Ann died in February 1895, leaving Edward with a family of six children. By 1900, both oldest children had married.  In September 1900, Edward turned the farm over to son Samuel and moved to Lincoln, Nebraska with his four youngest children.  After the children finished school in Lincoln, Edward returned to the Tracy, Iowa area.  He remained there until his death in 1924.  He is buried in the nearby Bethel Cemetery.