Male

May 22, 1788

March 16, 1840

Norwalk, CT

Norwalk, OH

Elizabeth Lockwood Gibbs (May 20, 1810)

David Gibbs was born in 1788 in Windsor, Conn., a son of Capt. Samuel Gibbs, who served in the Revolutionary War and then was involved in shipping, and Engeltje (Nancy) Harsin Gibbs. When David was 14, the family moved to Norwalk, Conn. He graduated from the Litchfield Law School in 1808 and two years later, he married Elizabeth Lockwood, daughter of Stephen and Sarah Betts Lockwood also of Norwalk. With a view to practicing law in the newly opening west, he and fellow lawyer Charles Robert Sherman made a trip to the Western Reserve in 1811, which had begun to be settled around 1807. Sherman stayed, but Gibbs returned to Connecticut to accept a position in Bridgeport. When the War of 1812 broke out, he enlisted and was given a commission as first lieutenant in the 37th Regiment, Infantry.

But ...the pull west remained with Gibbs, and in 1815, he and with four others in Norwalk announced the formation of an association to foster a settlement in Ohio. That year, he, his brother-in-law Henry Lockwood, and father-in-law Stephen Lockwood made a return trip. They spent 10 weeks looking for a suitable place to settle and decided on Norwalk, Ohio, located in the “Sufferers’ Lands” (as the Firelands were originally called). Stephen Lockwood owned a large tract there. They spent several months on their homestead, beginning work on the construction of a double log cabin and clearing land and laying in a crop of wheat. Then, they returned to Connecticut and their families.

The following January 1816, David and Elizabeth Gibbs, their daughter Eliza, age five, and son David, age three; Henry Lockwood and his family; and a teamster set off from Connecticut to start a new life in Ohio. After a difficult journey, the Gibbs and Lockwood families into a double log house, the fourth house built in Norwalk. The early years were not easy, but Gibbs had an active civic presence in his new town. In 1817, he was one of the petitioners to form the township of Norwalk and was elected as its first justice of the peace. In 1820, he was a founder of the local chapter of the Masons. In 1823, he was on a committee to establish an educational institution, the Norwalk Academy, that opened in 1826. Among the school’s many graduates were his sons and future president Rutherford B. Hayes. He was appointed county clerk in 1825, a position he held for the rest of his life. In 1837, he served as president of the board of directors of the Female Institute, founded in 1837. He died in Norwalk in 1840. Elizabeth Lockwood Gibbs died there in 1873.

David and Elizabeth Gibbs had ten children, but only seven made it to adulthood. Eliza Gibbs Alling (1811-1904) was born in Connecticut and survived the arduous trip west. The rest were all born in Norwalk, Ohio: David Gibbs Jr., 1817-1897; Roswell Gibbs, 1818-1880; Charles Gibbs, 1821-1891; James B. Gibbs, 1822-1850; Ralph M. Gibbs, 1824-1854; and Sarah Louise Gibbs Mowry Adams, 1835-1934.
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1808

Lawyer

Justice of the Peace (OH)
Clerk of the County (OH) 1825-1840

Ledger. "Journals of the Barr - Litchfield County." Litchfield Historical Society; Catalogue of the Litchfield Law School (Hartford, CT: Press of Case, Tiffany, and Company, 1849), 7.

Litchfield County Bar Association Records, 1808, Litchfield Historical Society, Helga J. Ingraham Memorial Library.

The Firelands Pioneer, vol. XI, Oct. 1874, 83-85.

The Firelands Pioneer, new series vol. IX, Oct. 1896, 105-108.

The Firelands Pioneer, new series vol. XII, Dec. 30, 1899, 542-552.

Williams, William W. History of the Fire Lands. Cleveland, Ohio: Press of Leader Printing Co., 1879.