From HISTORY OF THE PAN-HANDLE, West Virginia, 1879, by J. H. Newton, 
G. G. Nichols, and A. G. Sprankle. Page 259  

Contributed by Linda Cunningham Fluharty.


WILLIAM PAXTON is the senior member of an influential and popular pioneer 
family in West Virginia, a native of county Down, Ireland, coming to America
with his parents in 1801, when he was only seven years of age. The good ship
bearing him over was the "Stafford," which in those days depending solely upon
sails, took ten weeks to accomplish the trip during which the whole family,
father, mother and three children, were very sick, the former of whom passing
out of life ere the shore was reached. They made for Little Washington, Pennsyl-
vania, where the subject of our sketch had an uncle residing - the Rev. Thomas
Ledlie Birch, of the Presbyterian Church - with whom most of them resided, on
and off, for several years. William first espoused the dry goods business, en-
gaging with Mr. Alexander Reed, of Washington, whom he served faithfully for
eight or ten years, a brief portion of the time sharing an interest in a branch
store at Waynesburg, Pa. He subsequently visited the "Iron City," filling a 
clerk-ship in the Bank of Pittsburgh for two years, during the war of 1812, and 
left there in 1814 to link his future with the city of Wheeling. Arriving here 
he joined in opening a small dry goods store on Main street, under the firm 
style of Paxton & Woods, and after a few years took a recess to recuperate his 
declining health. He next returned to his old quarters, and established the 
first wholesale dry goods house in the city, at the southwest corner of Main and 
Tenth streets. Here he continued successfully for three or four years and again 
found it imperative, for his health's sake, to retire. But in November, 1839, 
anxious to establish his son in business, bought out Moore & Carr, and opened up 
a wholesale grocery house, taking in his son James as a partner, this time 
locating on Twelfth, between Main and Market. The business prospering several 
years, he withdrew in favor of his son, who took in Mr. E. W. Paxton, his 
cousin, now a resident of Brooke county. These gentlemen, however like the 
subject of our sketch, also subsequently retired, and still lives in private 
life. Mr. W. Paxton has ever been a warm promoter of Wheeling's prosperity - 
served many years, at an early period of his residence, in the council, and
as a director in what is now known as the First National Bank of West Virginia. 
As one of the earliest merchants in the Nail City, he is probably the oldest 
still living amongst us, and though upwards of eighty-five years of age, may be 
met with almost daily on our streets, comparatively actively moving around. He 
was married in 1817, to Hannah, oldest daughter of the late Mr. Elisha 
Whitehead, of New Jersey, but who for some time resided in Wheeling. By her he 
had a family of seven children, of whom, however, only two sons and one daughter 
still live, while Mrs. Paxton succumbed to death in 1828. The subject of our 
sketch was married a second time, about 1831, to Eliza, daughter of Mr. C. 
Ivers, of New York, and niece to Mr. Burgh, of New York, a gentleman universally 
popular and esteemed for the lively interest he has manifested in that noble 
institution organized for the prevention of cruelty to animals. Mr. Paxton's 
only daughter is married to Capt. Heiskell, who served in the late war, and
is at present also a resident in Wheeling, on Chapline street.