Pioneer Physician Dr. John Evans (Defiance first Physician) History of Defiance County 1883 Page 177-179

    The family of Dr. John Evans was widely known to the people of the Upper Maumee Valley. He studied his profession under the instruction of Dr. Spencer, of  Kentucky, and Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, and commenced practice at Washington, Fayette county, Ohio, about 1814 and also conducted in a separate room of the same building the mercantile and apothecary store (A person who prepared and sold medicines and drugs.). On the 27th of May, 1818, he married Miss Elizabeth Taylor, of Bainbridge, Ross County, Ohio.

    The Evans family were among the early settlers of Kentucky. Samuel Evans (father of Dr. John), removed to Ohio from Bourbon County, Ky., when Dr. John was about seventeen years old. William Taylor (father of Elizabeth, who married Dr. John), the first settler between the Ohio River and Chillicothe, moved from Pennsylvania to Kentucky when his daughter was about three months old, and from Kentucky to near Bainbridge , Ross County, Ohio, when she was six or seven years of age. Dr. John and family (now consisting of his wife and two daughters) removed from Washington, Fayette County, to Defiance, in February, 1823. They started in a large double sleigh, but the snow failing they compelled to abandon their sleigh and resort to wagons. The family reached Judge Nathan Shirley's, on the Auglaize River, one mile above Defiance, on the last day of February. Their first location was camp No. 3, five miles below Defiance on the north side of the Maumee in a double log cabin, and here Samuel Cary Evans, their first born son, was born April 10, 1823. During the summer, the doctor built a frame house at Defiance, into which he removed his family in the month of November of that year. He made the first brick and the first lime that was manufactured in Defiance, a part of which was used in the construction of his own house and the proceeds of the sale of the surplus lime and brick netted an amount that paid the entire cost of his house. In the same year, Foreman Evans, his brother also removed to Defiance. Judge Pierce Evans (cousin of Dr. John) removed to the head of the rapids and reside there during the year 1822 and 1823, and then removed to the farm below Defiance. When Dr. Evans reached Defiance, there were no physicians on the rivers nearer than Fort Wayne above and Maumee City below, and his professional visits often extended to Fort Wayne, to St. Marys, on the St Marys River, and to the head of the Maumee rapids. There being no good roads, no bridges over streams and facilities for ferriage were at points remote from each other, it is difficult to convey to the mind of the medical practitioner of this day (1883) an adequate view of the formidable and often dangerous obstacles that Dr. Evans was compelled to encounter in the discharge of his professional duties. The first relief from this exhausting toil was afforded by the arrival at Defiance of Dr. Jonas Colby, in 1832. In 1824. he purchased the stock of goods of Hunt& Forsyth, of Maumee City, which were brought up on pirogues. This was the first store of considerable importance that contained goods adapted to the wants of the white settlers, although staple Indian goods (except whisky) were included in his general stock. When the family removed to Defiance, there were no regular church services, and, until the court house was erected, no suitable house for worship. The Methodists, however, held services at short intervals, sometime in private houses, and when weather was favorable, in the adjacent groves. The first Presbyterian clergyman was Rev. Mr. Stowe. During his residence in Defiance, Dr. Evans possessed more fully the confidence of the Indians than the majority of those who had dealing with them. He acquired this confidence by professional ministrations, by fairness in trade and refusing their applications for intoxicating drinks. When the Indians men and women would visit Defiance and obtain liquor from mercenary traders and become drunk and crazed, and their brutal nature aroused, the Indian women  would gather up the tomahawks and knives of their  men and deposit them at the premise of their friend, Dr. Evans. On one occasion the chief, Oc-co-nox-ee, of Oc-co-nox-ee town, on the Auglaize River (now Charloe, Paulding Co.) brought one of his daughters to the doctor  to be treated for some sickness which had baffled the skill of the Indian "medicine man." She was received into the Doctor's household and in due time restored to health. As an equivalent for his service the chief made the Doctor a present of an Indian pony. In 1838, with a view of affording his children opportunities for obtaining better educational facilities,he temporarily removed to Troy, Ohio, and continued there until the fall of 1840, when he removed to Fort Wayne and engaged actively in commercial pursuits in partnership with his son-in-law, John E Hill. During his residence in Troy, he continued business in Defiance, and now from the two stores they supplied the contractors, who were constructing the Paulding County Reservoir, with goods to prosecute their work. In 1840, he removed the Defiance stock to Fort Wayne and concentrated his business at that point. In the summer of 1842, business called Dr. Evans to Defiance, and while here he was seized with an illness that would have induced an ordinary person to remain and receive medical treatment, but his indomitable will had determined him to make an effort to reach his family at Fort Wayne. Leaving Defiance on horseback, he had traveled only about a mile and reached the house of Thomas Warren, when the intensity of his suffering arrested his progress, and he remained at the house of Warren two or three days. Moved Dr. Evans to Mrs. Hiltons house, in order to secure more comfortable quarters .
    On the following day, August 11, 1842, Dr. Evans past away. Dr. Evans was taken back to Fort Wayne, by his family, to be buried there.