Husband Joseph Underwood 1
Born: 18 Jun 1834 - England 2
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Father: Joseph Underwood ( - ) 2
Mother: Jane Whatmugh ( -1856) 2
Marriage: - England
Wife Ellen Roscoe 2
Born: - England
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Children
1 F Nancy Underwood 3 4
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Spouse: Albert Lapp Darrah ( - ) 4
Marr: (Divorced)
2 M Thomas J. Underwood 5
Born: 20 Jun 1867 - New Eagle, Washington Co, PA 6
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Spouse: Etta Qualk ( - ) 7
3 F Jane Underwood 3
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Spouse: [Unk] Laur ( - ) 3
4 F Elizabeth Underwood 8
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Spouse: Charles P. Speers (1862- ) 9 10
5 M Joseph H. Underwood, Jr. 11
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Spouse: Mary Sphar ( - ) 12
General Notes: Husband - Joseph Underwood
He was born in the shadow of a coal mine and his entire childhood and boyhood were spent in the same environment. It was as a helper to his mother, who worked in the mines, that he started to earn a little to go to his support, and worked until the passage of the law refusing to allow women to work in mines. His mother died in 1856, but he remained in England until 1863 and then came to America. The Civil War was then in progress and the first work he contracted to do was to help dig trenches around Pittsburgh as the Confederates had invaded Pennsylvania. The Battle of Gettysburg, however, was fought and the Pittsburgh trenches were not required. At that time it probably made little difference to Mr. Underwood, his main business being to secure employment, but he was a skilled and experienced miner and easily found work at mining, at Buena Vista, in Allegheny County and remained there from June until September, when he went to Illinois and in St. Clair County fell in with a party of from eight to ten venturesome men who decided to go to Colorado. On account of the ill feeling engendered by the Civil War and the consequent lawlessness on the frontiers of civilization at that time, the party gave up the project and he went to work as a miner in St. Clair County, where he remained until March, 1864, when he returned to Buena Vista and remained there until July 9, 1864, going then to Old Eagle, in Allegheny County, where he mined coal and then went into the coal business with a partner, having saved enough to purchase sufficient coal to load two small boats. These the partners started to float down the river but they met with disaster, the boats striking the bridge at Steubenville, Ohio, and sinking. Mr. Underwood not only lost all he possessed in worldly goods, but almost lost his life.
This accident happened in September, 1866. He then moved across the river into Washington County, in 1867, opposite Monongahela City, and for a time resumed coal digging, and continued later at Sunnyside, in Allegheny County; and here was made mine foreman and served as such for eight years. Afterward he served as mine foreman for one and one-half years, at Webster, in Westmoreland County, and then bought an old mine in Fayette County, across the river from California, Pennsylvania, and moved to California. He operated that mine for two years and then went into partnership with Joseph Coatsworth and Joseph Good and they bought the old Alps mine in Fayette County, directly across from the old wharf, in California. Then John W. Ailes, of Donora, Pennsylvania, a Mr. Miller and a Mr. Elliot bought out Coatsworth and Good, brought in more capital and with Mr. Underwood formed the Old Alps Coal Company. Later this company sold out and opened the Snow Hill coal mines in Fayette County across the river from Roscoe. They also opened a small mine on the Jacobs' estate in Fayette County, which they later sold to James Black but they continued to run the Snow Hill mine and did a thriving business, buying steamboats and barges and sending their coal down the river as far as New Orleans. They also opened the two mines, the Vigilant and Crescent, at California, Pennsylvania. The stockholders-Joseph Underwood, John W. Ailes, John W. Dorinan, S. A. Taylor, W. I. Berymenn, and Henry Kinlock-formed a new company and secured a charter for that under the name of the California Coal Company. In 1900 after many prosperous years, they sold all their mines, boats and barges to the River Coal Company. Mr. Underwood continued his connection with the Crescent Coal Company, in Allegheny County, having large coal interests, he being one of the owners of the Crescent Coal Company. In spite of early hardships and later disasters, Mr. Underwood was a remarkably successful business man. He possessed the sound business judgment which regulated the success or failure of an undertaking almost from the beginning, and once he had the capital to make use of, it was carefully and remuneratively invested. He was a director in the Charleroi Savings and Trust Company; in the Donora Savings & Trust Company; in the Farmers' and Miners' National Bank of Bentleyville; in the First National Bank of Roscoe; in the People's National Bank of California, Pennsylvania; and in the First National Bank of Canonsburg, and a stockholder in all of these.
General Notes: Wife - Ellen Roscoe
In her honor the village of Roscoe, Washington County, Pennsylvania, was given its name.