"J. D. Hess, a prominent attorney of Pike County residing in Pittsfield, was born near Milton in this county in 1856, a son of William and Catherine (Wagner) Hess. The paternal grandfather, David Hess, came to Illinois from Brown County, Ohio in 1828 and settled in Greene County this state. He was a farmer by occupation and was very successful in the management and control of his business affairs. In 1836 he came to Pike county, Illinois, locating in Pearl township. He owned and operated five hundred acres of land in this county, and was one of the leading and prosperous agriculturists here. His death occurred about 1881 (22 Dec 1880) when he had reached the age of seventy-two years.

His son, William Hess, father of our subject, accompanied his parents on their removal from Greene county to Pike county and was here reared to manhood, pursuing his education in the common schools. He has followed farming throughout his entire life and is still actively engaged in agricultural pursuits. He owns about one thousand acres of land in Pike county, and also some outside the county, a fact which indicates his excellent business ability, judicious investment and careful control of his property. In 1849 he drove an ox team across the plains to California, remaining for three years on the Pacific coast, after which he made his way homeward by the isthmus route, bringing with him forty-five hundred dollars in gold, which he had saved as the result of his labors in the mines. When he was a young man he taught school, but the greater part of his life has been devoted to agricultural pursuits, and he is today one of the most prosperous farmers of this part of the sate. He is also prominent in public affairs, and has exerted considerable influence in political circles. He has been prominent and influential in community affairs, having served for several terms as supervisor of his township, and he has also been the candidate for county treasurer on the populist ticket. He was one of the building committee at the time of the erection of the county courthouse. Fraternally he is connected with Masonic lodge, and religiously with the Christian Church. He lost his first wife in 1857 and in 1862 was married again, his second union being with Miss Nancy Minerva Smith, who was born and reared in Pearl township, Pike county, and is a daughter of constantine Smith, one of the early settlers of the county, and one of the first officials of Pearl township. By the second marriage there were nine children born, of whom one died in infancy, the others being: L. C., an attorney and now assistant United States attorney at Fairbanks, Alaska; W. H., who was a farmer and died in Sesptember 1903; Lee, who is living at home with his father; Sarah A., the wife of W. L. Coley, a lawyer of East St. Louis, Illinois; Eva B., who was the wife of Sidney Crawford, a farmer, and died in 1905; Ada B., who is married and lives in San Antonio, Texas; Blanche, who married Clyde Vance, a farmer near Milton; and Verda June, the wife of William Dillon, also a farmer near Milton."

Source: Past and Present of Pike County, Illinois, by Captain M. D. Massie pg220