The Baugo mills and the Bancrofts: three accounts of the first mill, none reconciled

1831 – 1880

The conflict, whole: Chapman (pp. 789–790): "In 1831 or '32 a saw-mill was built on Bawbawgo creek, near where the village of Oceola now stands. Several years after this, another mill was built a little lower down; and by extending the same race, the one dam answered for both mills. This last mill was erected by Zelotes Bancroft; but the date is not certainly known. In 1856, this mill having been discontinued, Mr. Bancroft and his brother William erected a saw and grist-mill on the same site. It is now owned and conducted by a nephew of the preceding. Its capacity is 25 barrels per day." Howard (vol. 1, pp. 294–295): a saw mill was built on the creek "near the site of the present town of Osceola" in 1832, builder unnamed, and "the name of Zelotes Bancroft and that of his family is inseparably connected with the milling business at this point." [TOWN], quoting Samuel Ireland's "Memories of Penn Township": "William Ireland built a saw mill at Osceola in 1833, damming the Baugo at that point and building a bridge over the Baugo at the same time. This was the first saw mill in this locality. It is now the Bancroft flour mill." Three accounts — 1831/32 unnamed, 1832 unnamed, 1833 by William Ireland — printed as they stand. The Ireland claim is not implausible on the record: Howard makes the same William Ireland proprietor of the rival Canton plat on the same creek in 1835; but no assigned source except the town page's quotation states it, and the "Memories" author's own identity carries an open question flagged in the Irelands article.

The Bancrofts: William Bancroft (b. Granville, Massachusetts), carriage and wagon maker, lumberman and trader, married Emeline Belden 24 December 1828 and brought his family to the county in 1837; of his six children five were living when Chapman wrote — Zelotes, Alma, Ruth, Emeline and Louisa. Zelotes Bancroft, the miller of Osceola, carries the band's thickest dating conflict, three figures deep: Chapman (p. 802) has him born at Castile, New York, 23 October 1831, placed in a flouring mill young, coming with his parents in 1837, marrying Sarah Masten 1 June 1865 (four children, one living, Zelia), and proprietor of Bancroft's flouring mill at Osceola. The 1893 Goodspeed memoirs [1893] give the same day and month in 1830, call him "one of the founders of the town of Osceola and… now its oldest resident," and give the mill story a different shape — Zelotes first of the family to settle, purchasing the original saw-mill on the creek and 160 acres and sending for William to take charge, William then building the grist and flouring mill in 1856 on nearly 300 acres "on a part of which Osceola is now built." And the 1875 directory prints Bancroft's settlement year as 1834 — a fourth figure, agreeing with none of the above: "Bancroft, Z. — sec. 16 — Flour Mill — New York — 1834." The family's web runs through the file: Alma Bancroft married Henry S. Plumb, the Osceola merchant; Emeline Bancroft (a Bancroft of Osceola, her parentage unstated in the source) married Milton M. Proudfit, whose son Dr. Louis Proudfit practiced at Osceola from 1902 — the parent's identity is not assigned here, because Howard does not state it.

Sources:

1. Chapman, pp. 789–790 (Bancroft's Mill) and p. 802 (the Zelotes Bancroft sketch); Howard, vol. 1, pp. 294–295; [TOWN] quoting Ireland's "Memories"; [1893] Goodspeed, Pictorial and Biographical Memoirs of Elkhart and St. Joseph Counties — labelled where used; 1875 Atlas directory, p. 60.