Bay, James S.

Born: 1815-03-30 Champaign County, Ohio

Died: 1895-06-27 Kansas

Flourished: 1841-1860 McLean County, Illinois

As a youth, Bay was a mail carrier, making trips between Indianapolis and Madison, Indiana; after eight years in that position, he became a special agent for the Post Office Department. He settled in McLean County, Illinois, in 1837, and in 1841, he married Sarah Rout. James and Sarah had two children before her death in 1844. In 1846, Bay married Albina Bay in Warren County, Illinois, and together they had ten children. Bay was a Republican and a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1850, he was a constable in Bloomington, Illinois. In 1860, he was a prosperous farmer in McLean County, where he owned $12,000 in real estate and $1,000 worth of personal property.

Gravestone of James Bay, Oxford Cemetery, Oxford, KS; Gravestone of Sarah Bay, Evergreen Memorial Cemetery, Bloomington, IL; Illinois Statewide Marriage Index, McLean County, 2 February 1841; Warren County, 27 September 1846, Illinois State Archives, Springfield, IL; Portrait and Biographical Album of McLean County, Ill. (Chicago: Chapman Brothers, 1887), [233-34]; U.S. Census Office, Seventh Census of the United States (1850), Bloomington, McLean County, IL, 11; U.S. Census Office, Eighth Census of the United States (1860), Bloomington, McLean County, IL, 57.