From: May Heath Saugatuck Book

Early Memories of Saugatuck, Michigan : 1830-1930
Author: Heath, May Francis
Publisher: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company; Grand Rapids, Mich: 1930

CHARLES C. BILLINGS

Pioneer, soldier and sturdy citizen, apply to Charles C. Billings who had lived in Newark and later The Flats, then it was named Saugatuck for eighty-one years and in practically one location in Saugatuck village for sixty-six years. To have lived all those years arid to have won the respect of all who knew him, was his record.

From 1837 when John H. Billings with his wife (Mary Barager) and several children came from New York to Allegan, then a wilderness, the Billings family have figured largely in the county history.

Shortly this family came to Saugatuck and in 1840 they figured in a tragic river trip when Mr. Billings and his family were going in an open sail-boat from the Flats to visit the Mann and Meeker families, the boat hit a snag and cap­sized and his wife and three children, James, Mary and Hannah, were drowned — He saved four children. Peter Henry and the twins, Hozias and Darius, who were cared for by an Indian woman until 1842 when he married Miranda Clark, a widow with two children, and to this union were born thirteen children, the eldest being our C. C. Billings, and in 1856 they came to Saugatuck to reside and in 1861, at the age of 18, Charles was married to Miss Clara Brown, a childhood playmate, and the next day he enlisted in the service of his country in Company A, Third Michigan Cavalry, serving to the end of the war.

Mr. and Mrs. Charles Billings were the parents of eight children, three dying in infancy and one daughter, Alta. wife of James Tahaney, dying at the age of 21, those living are Mrs. Edith Clark, Mrs. Ivah Taylor, and two sons, Clarence B. and John, and the wife, Clara, is at the old home at the age of eighty-nine, when in her old age she is cared for by her daughter, Edith.