Buckles, Abraham

Born: 1800-06-26 Virginia

Died: 1878-05-17 McLean County, Illinois

Flourished: 1832-1878 Bloomington, Illinois

Buckles settled with his family in White County, Illinois, in 1810. During the War of 1812, Buckles helped build a fort near his home to protect settlers from potential Indian raids, although fears proved to be unwarranted. In 1819, he married Mary Williams, and the couple had ten children. In 1832, he settled his family in Buckles' Grove in McLean County, where he farmed and raised his children. In 1850, he owned $5,000 in real property. In 1860, he was still farming and had maintained most of his wealth. A "tall" and "quite fleshy" man, Buckles was a lifelong Democrat.

Gravestone, Gilmore Cemetery, LeRoy, IL; E. Duis, The Good Old Times in McLean County, Illinois (Bloomington, IL: Leader, 1874), 564-67; U.S. Census Office, Seventh Census of the United States (1850), McLean County, IL, 111; U.S. Census Office, Eighth Census of the United States (1860), Empire, McLean County, IL, 141.