Peter Brewer and Mary, his wife, late of the Township of Addison, whose portraits are here with given, may well be classed with the pioneers of Oakland County. The father of the former, whose name was also Peter, was born in Holland, April 1, 1740, and at the age of twenty-one years came to America, landing in the city of New York, where he remained until 1767, when he married Elizabeth Stone, and soon after settled in Westchester County, where he resided until the beginning of the Revolutionary War, when he entered the Army to assist and sustaining independence of the colonies, which had been proclaimed by the patriot fathers. At the close of the war he settled in Dutchess County, where Peter Brewer, his son was born, June 8, 1791, being a youngest but one of sixteen children. In 1795, Peter Brewer Senior, removed with his family into Greene County, among the Catskill Mountains, where he died in 1804, his wife surviving him until 1828.

in 1824, Peter Brewer, the subject of this sketch, married Mary Ternes, the daughter of John and Mary Ternes, who was born in the north of Ireland, April 16, 1804, and when three years of age came to America with her parents, who settled and remained until she is about twenty years of age, in the city of New York, and then, with her father’s family, moved into Greene County

. In the month of August 1833, Peter Brewer and his wife Mary, with their family of four children, set out in search of a new home in the then almost unknown Territory of Michigan, coming from Catskill in the sloop, thence the Buffalo on the Erie Canal in what was known as a line boat. They sailed from Buffalo for Detroit on board the steamer “New York,” a comparatively new boat. On their arrival at Erie, Pennsylvania, the boat ran onto a sandbar, where remained nearly 3 days, when the passengers were transferred to the “Superior,” one of the first steamboat’s that sailed the lakes. Their journey from Catskill to Detroit occupied more than two weeks. The remained at the latter place only a few hours, when he started out with two hired teams to the unbroken wilderness, over a road that was nearly impassable on account of a mire and fallen trees. After a toilsome journey of three days they arrived at Elisha Townsned’s, a brother-in-law, living in the Township of Washington, Macomb County, 28 miles from Detroit.

After remaining there a few days, they started for the new feature home on section 36, which is now known as the Township of Addison. It being then an unorganized as a separate Township. At that time there were but few settlers in the Township there was sawmill at what is now the village of Lakeville, but no Gristmill nearer than Stony Creek, ten miles away. Neither were there any churches nor school houses in the Township, and the winding trail of the Indian was for some time the pioneers only. The wolf and the deer, with other wild animals, were abundant, and none save the Indian contested their rights or dispute there is jurisdiction.

Here these pioneers labored from year-to-year, suffering all the privations inseparable from a frontier life, until the log dwelling gave way to the beautiful white farmhouse shown any accompanied engraving, and the church and the school building of the paleface supplemented the wigwam of the savage.

On 23 September, 1866, beloved and respected by all, and surrounded by children and friends, after a short illness, this aged couple, within a few hours of each other, surrendered up your spirits to him who gave them. They left five sons and four daughters: Addison P. Brewer, Peter W. Brewer, John A. Brewer, Abram N. Brewer, Mark S. Brewser, Mary L. Brewer, Lydia M. Brewer, and Sarah E. Brewer, all of whom have become men and women, and still live to love and cherish the memory of kind and indulgent parents.