Taken about 1881 in LaRue, Ohio by H.R. Mills Photography, age about 93

Final resting place of Ruth Hill and Hervey Chapman, Big Island Township, Marion County, Ohio.

Hervey was born in Saybrook, Connecticut in 1788, descending directly from the Robert Chapman (1616) line. He moved with his father Levi Chapman to the Northwest Territory about 1793-1794.

Legend suggests that Elizabeth Hull and Levi Chapman had twelve children in sum and that Levi followed his eldest daughter Sybil Chapman (b. 1768 and m. 1787 Joshua Shipman) to Marietta, Ohio. Levi supported the revolutionary war, but his claim to fame is said to be the first Ohio Farmer. He left the stockades, settling along "Duck Creek" now the town of Whipple. These lands were apart of the Donation Tract and Ohio Company Purchases. The Levi Chapman family were some of the first settlers who helped erect the Marietta Congregational Church. There are unfounded writings that Levi may have been influenced by Rufus Putnam to move West, albiet one of his grandchildren were named Rufus Putnam Chapman (descended from his son Levi, Hervey's brother).

Hervey who was born in Connecticut, moved to Ohio, married his wife Ruth Hill in 1807 in Washington County, Ohio and farmed in the Marion County area. Hervey and Ruth had nine children. Their daughter Betsey died when she was 12, in 1825.

Ruth was buried atop the Union Cemetery in Marion County, Ohio in 1851, resting beneath a tree. Their oldest daughter Jane S. Chapman (m. Rezin Riggle) may have died about a year later in 1852 before Hervey moved on.

Hervey's brother Stephen Chapman became a Judge, while many of his siblings remained in Ohio farming.

Hervey continued his life journey following his daughters, Ruth Chapman (b. 1822) Scoville and Mary Ann Chapman (b. 1830) to Iowa. After arriving, Ruth's husband John Scoville enlisted in the civil war, while Mary Ann married Joseph Reynolds Lewis in 1859 who was the prosecuting attorney at the time. Hervey continued to watch the birth of his grandchildren, such as Ruth Davidena Scoville (b. 1859) daughter of Ruth Chapman. Hervey eventually moved back to Ohio with his children and grandchildren, speculating that it was near his son the silversmith Harvey Chapman in Kenton, Ohio; the place Hervey dies in 1881.

Hervey is lying in a grave next to his wife Ruth, where his marker fell sometime after she was buried and which now the tree has since been cut down. His marker shows "Harvey" Chapman. The contributor to this passage is the fourth great-granddaughter.