Thomas Wilson, The Man Who Loved Nellie

Thomas  C. Wilson, sometimes T.C. Wilson, was the man who loved Nellie Sheridan enough to wait fifteen years before marrying her so that she could keep her position as postmistress.  Although clearly deeply in love, the couple didn’t always share the same points of view, religion,  or culture, but theirs was truly a relationship based on mutual admiration and respect.

Thomas was the grandson of  Judge James W. Wilson (1781-1852) and  Martha Ann Ashby(1786-1880).  It was his grandfather, James, who had come to Perry County and settled in Clayton Twp., Perry County, Ohio.  Graham’s 1883 History of Perry and Fairfield County stated the following information on  Thomas’s grandmother,  Martha Wilson:

Martha Wilson, wife of Judge James Wilson, one of the earliest settlers, was born in Alleghany county, Maryland, Feb. 1786, and died March, 1880, in the ninety-fifth year of her age, and was the last of the pioneer women in Clayton…