Dawson Haggard (d. 1844) was the only man in Bloomington who could claim military service during the Revolutionary War. His grandson David Dawson Haggard (1819 – 1900) had a long career in Bloomington as a merchant. He started off his business life making and selling half bushel measures and shoe pegs. He invented a tool for mass-producing shoe pegs. He also farmed and was even listed as a printmaker in the 1860 census. His children all migrated away from McLean County, but his many brothers and sisters who followed him to McLean County helped to swell the ranks of the small town.

 

             The Haggard family line united four 1838 families. Dawson Haggard’s granddaughter Sally married Samuel Lander and their two sons married Elizabeth Wallace, the daughter of William Wallace and Elizabeth Adolph, and Margaret Major Hawks, the granddaughter of M. H. Hawks, who had an early flax oil mill in Bloomington. Although Margaret’s daughter Mary Lander Fay moved to Chicago, she returned for family visits and on one visit a photo of five generations of oldest daughters was made which included Mrs. Margaret Major, Mrs. Elizabeth Hawks, Margaret Hawks Lander, Mary Lander Fay and her baby daughter.

 

              Martha Haggard married John Routt and was the mother of John L. Routt a Bloomington councilman, Civil War officer and governor of the Colorado Territory. Her daughter was the first wife of James Simpson Bay, who died quite young.

 

              David Haggard’s daughter Melvina’s family had two sad stories. Her daughter Lucy (1836 – 1911) never married. She lived with her family for many years in Bloomington, but in 1900, at the age of 66 she was living as a lodger in Chicago and attempting to support herself as a seamstress. Melvina’s son William’s life was cut short by consumption in 1870 in McLean County. 

 

              There is no known remaining line of Haggards in McLean County. To read a full biography of Dawson Haggard, the Revolutionary War soldier, follow the link below to the McLean County Museum of History website.