AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JOHN F. LACEY 381 



died, and November 2d Marion (Dumpsie) died, both of 

 that fell scourge, diphtheria. I have given mother's last 

 words; Dumpsie 's were, "Put away all my playthings." 



The dead never grow any older. Ray and Dumpsie will 

 always be children to me. "A happy home is the suburbs 

 of Heaven" and when these little folks were with us, the 

 happiest days of my life were passed. 



Father was a constant reader and though not highly ed- 

 ucated had a good common school education. Bishop 

 Simpson and Edwin M. Stanton were his schoolmates at 

 Cadiz, Ohio, where most of his boyhood was passed. 

 Reared a Democrat by his father, he changed his politics 

 in 1840 and voted for William Henry Harrison, after 

 which he was a consistent Whig protectionist and finally 

 a Republican, in which faith he died. 



MY EAELY LIFE 



I first saw light on the banks of the Ohio River, two 

 miles above New Martinsville, West Virginia, in a little, 

 one-roomed, log cabin, one story high, roofed with clap- 

 boards which were held in place by poles. I used to see 

 this building in after years up to the time I was twelve 

 years old, but it has long since disappeared. Father was 

 a bricklayer and plasterer and was gone from home much 

 of the time. They used to show me where the chips at the 

 woodpile were swept back, leaving a little ridge around 

 the house, and old Carlo the faithful watch dog would al- 

 low no one to cross that line without consent of my 

 mother. 



Father first settled in Woodsfield, Monroe County, 

 Ohio, where Mary, Isaac, and James were born. He then 

 moved to "Sunfish" or Clarington to join a colony about 

 to emigrate to Texas. A party of travelers solicited the 

 privilege of staying over night, and unfortunately they 

 had some quilts with them in their sleigh which had been 



