JOSIAH WORTH.-Never can greater honor be paid than to those who aided in holding high the principles of liberty during the period of the Civil war, and among those who were called upon to lay down their lives on the altar of their country during that conflict is numbered Josiah Worth, one of the early agriculturists of Sullivan county. He was born in Tuscarawas county, Ohio, March 19, 1830, a son of James and Elizabeth (Romig) Worth, who were also born in that county. Coming to Indiana about 1858, they located in Jackson township, Sullivan county, and after several years they moved to a farm near by the one on which they had first located. But after five years they returned to the first homestead, and there they subsequently died, the mother in 1874 and the father in 1888.
Shortly after coming with his parents to Sullivan county Josiah Worth married, but continued to live on his father's farm until he enlisted for the war, entering the Eighty-fifth Indiana Regiment in 1862, and his death occurred at Lexington from sickness contracted in the army. His widow continued on the senior Mr. Worth's farm for about two years longer, and then bought twenty acres where she now lives, but has added to this little tract from time to time until she now owns sixty-two acres, and here she expects to spend the remainder of her life. She bore the maiden name of Mary Tennis, and was born in Columbiana county, Ohio, October 9, 1835, a daughter of John and Nancy (Rose) Tennis, both of whom were also born in that county. In 1853 they came to Sullivan county and located on the farm on which Mrs. Worth now resides, and at that time the farm was densely covered with timber. The father at once began clearing and preparing his land for cultivation, and he died on the old homestead there in June of 1873, his widow surviving until the 6th of November, 1888. Four children were born to the union of Mr. and Mrs. Worth, namely: James, who married Martha Nicholson, a native of Sullivan county, and they reside on the old home farm with his mother. Their ten children are: Mollie, deceased; Effie May, wife of Herton Griffith, of Jackson township; Anna Elizabeth, wife of Earl Griffith, of Clay county; Emma Viola, with her parents; Melissa Elvie, at home; James Harrison, Charles Joseph and Herbert Alfred, also at home; and two who died in infancy. John, the second child of Mr. and Mrs. Worth, is deceased; Elizabeth is the wife of Joseph Gordon, of Clay county, and their four children are James Sylvester, Herbert Alfred, Ethel and Stella. Anna, deceased, was the wife of John B. Nicholson, of Jackson township, and their two children arc Mary Josephine and Charles Edward.
James Worth, the eldest of the children, has always remained with his mother, looking after her estate as well as his own. In 1874 he bought eighteen acres of land in Jackson township, but he has since, added forty acres more to this tract, and is engaged in general farming and stock raising. He is a Republican politically, and a member of the Masonic order in Hymera and of the Christian church. The politics of Mr. Worth, the father, were also Republican, and he too was a valued and earnest church member.