[p. 1015] a veteran of the Civil War and for many years a prominent citizen of North Beaver Township, Lawrence County, Pennsylvania has been a resident of Petersburg, Ohio, since January 16, 1908. He still carries on farming on his farm of 133¾ acres in North Beaver, located three and a half miles east of Petersburg, on the Moravia Road.
Mr. Swisher was born in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania, December 5, 1836, and is a son of Jacob and Jane (McGuire) Swisher. The Swishers, originally from Switzerland, spelled the name Switzer, but for generations the orthographv has been as it now is. The family has been established on American soil many years, coming from Maryland to Pennsylvania. Jacob Swisher, the father, was born on the same farm as our subject, in Lycoming County, and was a son of Philip. In 1853 he moved to North Beaver Township, Lawrence County, where he followed farming until his death.
Thomas M. Swisher was seventeen years old when he accompanied his parents to Lawrence County, and there he remained until the war. He enlisted June 8, 1861, in Battery B., First Regiment of Pennsylvania, at Mount Jackson, and was in the service three years with but one interruption, coming home on a ten days' furlough. He participated in some seventeen important engagements and many skirmishes of minor importance, and was honorably discharged June 11, 1864. He then returned to his old home to engage in peaceable pursuits. He and his wife moved to his present farm in the spring of 1866, it being the original Gilmore farm, settled by Joseph Gilmore, grandfather of Mrs. Swisher. He has followed general farming in a highly successful manner, and all of the present day improvements on the place are of his working.
Mr. Swisher was married in April, 1863, while home from the army on a furlough, to Miss Eliza Gilmore, who was born one and a half miles north of their farm, and is a daughter of John A. and Rachel (Dobbins) Gilmore. Six children were born to bless this union, as follows: Ocia; James A., who married Elsia McCauthtry; Francis K., who married Flora Lusk; Ralph, who married Mattie Gaston and has three children, namely—William, Margaret and Sarah; Cora J., who married Alvin Ferrell, and has two children—Clifford and Donald; and Burt, who lives on the home farm, married Ethel Jones, and has three children—Irene, Gertrude, and Thomas. Religiously, our subject and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Petersburg.
20th Century History of New Castle and Lawrence County Pennsylvania and Representative Citizens Hon. Aaron L. Hazen Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company, Chicago, Ill., 1908
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