Leicester and Juliet Walker, Pioneer Residents of the Firelands

Pictured above is the home of Leicester and Juliet Walker, in Perkins Township, Erie County, Ohio. The home was at what is now the intersection of Milan road and Hull Road, on the west side of Milan Road.

 The Firelands Pioneer of September, 1876 states that Leicester Walker was born in Herkimer County, New York in 1796, and he was orphaned as a child. He settled in Sandusky in 1818, and assisted in building the first frame homes in the Sandusky area. He married Juliet Andrews of Richland County, Ohio in 1825. It is said that both Leicester and Juliet Walker often attended to the needy and sick. Leicester was an abolitionist who was “an active supporter of the government in its efforts to crush the slaveholder’s rebellion.” (Three of the Walker sons served in the Union Army during Civil War.) In 1832, Leicester and Juliet Walker moved to Perkins Township, and they raised a large family of seven sons and two daughters.

On March 31, 1875, the Walkers celebrated their Golden Anniversary. Unfortunately, not long after, on May 6, 1875, Leicester Walker died at his home in Perkins Township. Mrs. Walker died at the home of her daughter in Michigan on September 13, 1875. The Walkers were interred at Oakland Cemetery in Sandusky, Ohio.

The pioneer settlers of the Firelands area worked the land, established churches and businesses, and formed governmental units to oversee the region where they lived. To learn more about the earliest residents of Erie and Huron Counties, see the Firelands Pioneer a multi-volume set of books housed in the Reference Services section of the Sandusky Library.