Excerpt from Early History and Pioneers of Champaign County: Illustrated by One Hundred and Fifteen Superb Engravings by Melville, Containing Biographical Sketches of the Early Settlers, the Early History of the County Obtained From the Most Reliable Sources and Many Graphic Scenes and Incidents The soldier who risks his life in battle for his countrymen receives the highest praise and glory; but these hardy men and women, who battled with malaria and disease in blazing the pathway of posterity through a wilderness of latent dangers, to such a goal of health and happiness as we have reached, deserve to have their memories preserved as we are doing now, and handed down to those who follow us. We beg to urge upon the young men and youth whose eyes shall fall upon these pages, to ponder well the records of these busy lives, that they may rightly estimate the great inheritance they have received, and thus be led to emulate, and if possible, to equal the virtues of the great generation they are to succeed. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.