| Notes |
1840 Jackson, VA
1m 20-30
1f 10-15
1850 Jackson, VA # 443-448
Rader George W 36 M Farmer Va
Rader Nancy 26 F Va
Rader Elizabeth H 3 F Va
Strally Barthemia A 19 F Va
1860 Jackson, VA # 460-428
George W, 46
Nancy J, 38
Elizabeth E, 13
Abraham G A, 7 [Alonzo]
1870 Mill Creek Dist,, Jackson, WV # 419
Nancy Jane 44
Abraham G A, 16
1880 Ripley, Jackson, West Virginia Page 429A
l/w Alonza RADER
Nancy J. RADER Mother F W W 57 OH PA PA
John House, "Pioneers of Jackson Co":
George W. Rader was born (from record on tombstone) July 9th, 1814, and died September 18th, 1868, aged fifty four years. He married Nancy Miller, a daughter of Kitts Miller, and Aunt of Judge Warren Miller.
George W., commonly called Wash Rader, lived on the Charley Shinn farm, on Station Camp, where his daughter Ellen, who married Shinn, now lives. It is said that he built a cabin near where the pike crosses Joe's Run, when he first married.
In letters to Abe Rader, who was in the west, written just after the war, he mentions a son, Alonzo, and two daughters, Ellen, who married Charley Shinn, and Eliza.
These letters throw light on the conditions in Jackson County, just after the war. Wash and Abe Rader were Union men, the remainder of the family all being Confederates.
Under date of May 21st, 1865, he writes –
"We have had a very early spring, and we have had some very high waters. On the 9th day of May, the creek was over my floor, as it was in 1852. It was twenty three inches over my house floor (probably an old house nearer the water). I had a nasty time. It only took off three hundred rails for me.
I am nearly done planting. I have about two acres to put in a the Gabbert place yet, and then I'm done. I have some corn that is large enough to work. My wheat and grass all looks well. Stock is high.
I sold my big oxen the first week in May, for One hundred fifty dollars. They would have weighed a thousand pounds a piece. That was seven and a half cents a pound.
The thieves is still a stealing horses, grain, chickens, meat, etc.
I have Bill Harper's Charley, and two weeks ago Thursday night, some rascal stole him and took him off. I don't know where, and the next morning about seven o'clock, he came back. Two weeks ago they stole two horse from Tom Wilkerson, and I have not heard of them since."
Under date of July 3rd, 1868, he writes –
"The weather here is extremely hot for the last two weeks and very dry for two weeks today.
I have been cutting wheat for two days, and I have just one hundred dozen cut. I will have fifty more, I think.
Our county is almost taxed to death, my tax last year was Seventy three Dollars, and this year we are building a new bridge at Ravenswood, and we will have to pay Nine thousand dollars for the bridge. In the last two years, we have had to pay over Sixteen thousand dollars for bridges in the county.
My taxes for township purposes is Thirty eight dollars this fall. I will be strapped, I know.
There is a great deal of party strife here at present. Our Rebels feel very big since Johnson's trial is over."
On the 4th of October, 1868, Charley Shinn wrote Abram Rader to announce the death of Wash, on the 18th of the previous month, after "laying sick" "about five weeks", he first "took" the "information of the brain", followed by "billious feaver" and "newmonia". Dr. "Bectal" "on Grass Lick" "tended on" him three weeks.
He also states that the fall was so wet that "corn has pretty near all rotted". The water had been fifteen inches higher than ever before known.
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West Virginia Pioneers
