William Anderson Dingess (1806-1893)

This obituary appeared in The Logan Banner Thursday, December 21, 1893.

William Anderson Dingess died at the residence of his son David Dingess, in this county on last Wednesday morning, December 13th, 1893, in the 88th year of his age.

This announcement brought sadness to many homes, for this was a familiar face, and there was always a welcome for him in every household.

Mr. Dingess was born just across the river from this place on the farm where Mrs. J. W. Deskins now lives, on the 30th day of October, 1806, and was the first white child born in the present limits of Logan county. He was the son of John Dingess, who together with his brothers Peter and William, made the first settlement of the Guyandotte valley above the falls. In 1824, when the county of Logan was formed, Mr. Dingess, though only eighteen years old, was appointed by Wm. Toney, the first Sheriff of the county, as his deputy.

In 1832 Mr. Dingess was appointed as one of the Justices of the county and continued as such until 1850. In 1872 he was elected Surveyor of the county. In all of these offices he discharged his duties satisfactory to all: In private life Mr. Dingess was popular with all with whom he can in contact and was in every sense an old fashioned Christian gentlemen.

About a year ago he was stricken with paralysis and since that time he has looked daily for the severing of the cord that bound him to life. He was buried on Thursday evening, the services on the grave being conducted by Rev. M. A. Kelley, of the Baptist Church.

Link by link the chain which binds us to the past is being broken and a few years more the men who assisted in opening up our vast wilderness will have passed to the other side.

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Credit and thanks to Brandon Ray Kirk author of “Blood in West Virginia: Brumfield V. McCoy” for searching through the Logan County Banner microfilm at the WV State Archives in Charleston to find this obit.