Christopher Wiswell was youngest but one of eight children of Henry Wiswell and Elizabeth Salter. Captain Wiswell, with Zenas Crane and John Fox, began about 1800 to make paper at Dalton, Massachusetts, and from this beginning was developed the present Crane paper-mill, known throughout the country for its bond paper and other fine products. Christopher was born January 1. 1811, and about a year later his father died. Edward Salter took his sister and her children to Chenango County. In time, Leonard and Christopher owned a tannery at Norwich. In 1840 the brothers Zenas Crane, Leonard and Christopher, and their sisters, Mary (Mrs. Sutherland German) and Elizabeth (Mrs. Solomon Lewis), came west—all but the first to Lafayette or Sugar Creek. Christopher had married August 12, 1837, Almira, daughter of Stephen G. West, Sr., and Rebecca Pike.
Mr. Wiswell was a good farmer, and in 1865 he was able to lay aside plow and hoe, sign national bank notes and fill various village offices at Elkhorn. He died March 3, 1883, two days later than his wife’s death. She was born February 9, 1817. Their eight children, who lived, were Jeannette Rebecca (Mrs. William P. Ellsworth), Henry Christopher, Charles Edward (died in military service), Philip Stephen (married Mary L. Harriman), Frances Almira (Mrs. Everett C. Rouse), Jane Maria (Mrs. William L. Holden), George Nelson (married Clara M. Perry), Jessie Leora (Mrs. Frank H. Winsor).
From: Beckwith, A.C. (1912). History of Walworth County Wisconsin