A Pennsylvania Dutch Genealogy
the genealogy & family research site of Kris Hocker
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The next installment in the Unidentified Pennsylvanians series features a photo of a young woman. She may have lived in the Montgomery County, Pennsylvania area and may have been either a friend of or related to either the Greulich, Wieder, Waage, Snyder, or Witmer families. The photo was likely taken in the early 20th century.
For more photos visit the Unidentified People photo gallery.
Happy birthday to Isabella Aitken! Isabella was my great great great grandmother. She was born 27 Feb 1816 in Carnwath Parish, Lanark, Scotland to William and Marion (Brown) Aitken. She died 1 Dec 1856 in Whitburn Parish, Linlithgow, Scotland.
I just got a chance to watch the latest episode of Who Do You Think You Are, featuring Blair Underwood. I learned quite a bit about research areas I’ve had no need to investigate. I also saw a great example of why in researching your family scratching the surface is not nearly enough.
What struck me the most was the story of his ancestor Sauney Early, a former slave. The research found that by 1900 Sauney had been institutionalized in a mental hospital. Subsequent research found newspaper articles from the 1870s and 1880s which seemed to show an angry, super-religious nut who kept getting into serious trouble with his neighbors that lead to him being shot several times—once in the face by his own weapon.
If they’d stopped researching there, Mr. Underwood would have been left with a negative impression of his ancestor. While mental illness isn’t anything to be ashamed about—and I’m sure we’ve all got relatives who’ve suffered from it somewhere in our family trees—the newspaper accounts are only one side of the story.
And the story looks very different from another vantage point.
In one newspaper account Sauney reportedly stole a cow from a neighbor and killed it, then argued with the neighbor and tried to shoot him when he came to inquire about the cow. Sauney was shot instead. Paints Sauney in a bad light, hmm?
However, the researchers found a deposition from Sauney’s landlord that stated the neighbor’s cow had trespassed onto Sauney’s land and into his corn. The impression I had was that this wasn’t the first time his neighbor’s cows had done so and the neighbor wasn’t too concerned about the damage his cows were doing. However, to Sauney it was huge. The corn was the means that enabled him to feed and care for his family and the cows were destroying it. His actions seem quite justified now, don’t they?
Another article described another argument—this time with another neighbor—about cutting down timber. This time the neighbor shot Sauney three times. The shooting was deemed self-defense and the neighbor was released from custody. According to a subsequent article, the black community was outraged.
If Sauney was truly an angry, violent, crazy man would his community have supported him and been outraged on his behalf, would his landlord have defended him? Probably not. The story of Sauney Early now looks like that of a man who was trying to take care of his family, raising crops and cutting down firewood, who got into disputes with his neighbors and was vilified in the press—most likely because they were white and he was black.
But Mr. Underwood would never have known this side of the story if the research had stopped with the newspaper articles.
The Sauney Early story showed me very clearly the need to do more than just scratch the surface when researching the story of our family. When we grab the low hanging fruit and move on, we may be revealing only part of the story and distorting our view of that ancestor.
If our goal is to know who we are and where we came from only the full story will do. The genealogical proof standard calls for a “reasonably exhaustive search for records that contain pertinent information.” While you may not require your research to meet professional standards, I’m sure you care about knowing the truth about your ancestors. Digging as deep as you can into the records is the only way to make sure that the full story is revealed.
Happy birthday to my 4 times great grandfather George Krauss! He was born 23 Feb 1783 and died 22 Jun 1844.
I think I answered a question that’s been bothering me for a while yesterday. But I didn’t do it by researching my ancestors.
My ancestor Johan “Hans” Adam Hacker emigrated from Germany to Pennsylvania aboard the ship Ann, landing in Philadelphia on 28 Sep 1749. He was the first to immigrate. His brother Johan Georg followed in 1751, then his parents—Christoph and Anna Margaretha (Jock) Hacker—and his sisters Christina (Hacker) Lang and Margaretha (Hacker) Haushalter with their husbands in 1752.
When my distant cousin John Garrett Hocker was in Germany in the 1990s (I believe) he found that the Hackers applied for permission to become citizens of Gräben. They were denied. So, they applied for permission to emigrate to “norde-amerika.” John wrote about his trip to Rußheim and my great uncle William Wingeard included John’s essay in his book A German-American Hacker-Hocker Genealogy. No date was given for this application, but it had to be prior to their emigration in 1752 and possibly before Adam’s emigration in 1749.
So, that tells me why they left Germany. But why did they settle near Brickerville, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania? It’s known that the Germans tended to move in groups and settle amongst people they’d known in a prior location. But I found no other family already in the area.
Rußheim and its neighbors
The answer has less to do with immediate family and more to do with the larger community. In Feb 1749 three widows from Rußheim applied for permission to move to Pennsylvania. They apparently wanted to remarry, but their prospective spouses were denied citizenship in Rußheim—possibly because they were only tenant farmers/farmhands. They were granted permission to leave.
One of these women was Margaretha (Heger) Elser.1 She was engaged to a man named Mock from Gräben. His given name was not provided, but a Henrich Mock and Peter Elser appear on the passenger list of the ship Ann which arrived in Philadelphia in Sep 1749. Both of these names appear in the records of the Warwick congregation (now Emanuel Lutheran Church) at Brickerville.
Adam’s name appears just below theirs on the ship list. So, it’s probable that he was traveling with people that he knew from his village.2
But why did they settle near Brickerville? Looking at the other names in the Warwick congregation records, you’ll see Stober, Weidman, Ness, and Oberlin. All of these names appear as residents of either Rußheim, Liedolsheim, Gräben or Linkenheim in 1709 lists.3 The Hackers intermarried with some of these families—Adam and his brother Georg both married Wiedman sisters. Additionally, the names Haushalter and Lang/Long also appear in the church records. It’s quite possible they were relations to Adam’s brothers-in-law Lorentz Haushalter and Johan Michael Lang.
So while there were no Hackers waiting to receive him when he arrived in 1749, Adam settled amongst people he may have known—or their relatives—from the villages surrounding Rußheim.
On 22 November 1717, Martin Kendig (Kendick, Kendrick, Cundigg) and John Herr (Heer) were warranted 5,000 acres in Lancaster County by the Proprietaries of Pennsylvania. They, in turn, transferred this land to their fellow immigrants. On the 12th of 9mo (November) 1720, four tracts on the Pequea were surveyed in the right of Martin Kendig and Hans Heer to Hans Boyer, Jacob Hoober, Martin Boyer/Abraham Smith, and Christian Stone/Jacob Boyer.1
Jacob Boyer’s Conestoga/Martic tract
Sometime between 1720 and 1735, the land was passed from Christian Stone to Jacob Boyer. “Jacob Biers” patented 162 acres on Pequea Creek on 1 Oct 1735.2 Jacob Boyer apparently lived on this tract for his entire life.
On 20 Jun 1772, Jacob (the elder) and his wife Catharine sold 112 acres from their two tracts—they owned another tract adjoining the first directly to the south in Martic Township—to their son Henry Boyer.3 This piece of property adjoined that of Jacob Boyer Jr., John Jameson, and Samuel Boyer, and lay along the eastern edge of Jacob Sr.’s two tracts.
On the same date, Jacob and Catharine also sold 160 acres from their two tracts to Jacob Boyer Jr. This piece of land included all the land north of Pequea Creek and a strip south of the creek between those of Henry Boyer (to the east) and one previously sold to Abraham Smith (to the west).4
Jacob was apparently preparing for the future in Jun 1772. He also wrote his will at that time. The will abstract names his wife Catharine, children: Jacob, Henry, Barbara, Anna, Mary, Catharine and Elizabeth wife of Jacob Steiner, and grandchildren: Cornelius and Frederick Steiner. The will was probated 30 Oct 1775 and named Catharine and son-in-law Jacob Steiner as executors.5
Several years later, on 22 Oct 1781, Jacob [Jr.] and Mary Boyer sold 16 acres from their tract to Rudy Miller.6 By metes and bounds this piece was situated in the northwest corner of the plot, north of Pequea Creek. It adjoined land of Rudy Miller, John Line and Pequea Creek.
On 3 Mar 1806, Rudy Miller’s heirs—Rudolph Miller, Stephen & Mary (Miller) Rine, and Hugh & Barbara (Miller) Evans—sold their interest in Rudy Miller’s four tracts of contiguous land in Conestoga and Martic townships, including this 16 acres, to John Miller, another of Rudy Miller’s children.7
Happy birthday to Johan Adam Hocker Jr.! My 5G grandfather was born 20 Feb 1764 in Cocalico Township, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania and died in Nov 1821 in Derry Township, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.
Happy birthday to my great great grandfather Samuel Thomas Hoover, son of Christian and Caroline (Kinnard) Hoover. Sam was born 18 Feb 1857, likely in Jefferson County, Pennsylvania, and died 18 Aug 1930 in Burnside Township, Centre County, Pennsylvania.
I was recently contacted by a reader who found one of my posts on Christian Hoover of Heidelberg Township, York County, Pennsylvania. She thought the information was interesting, but didn’t see how it was pertinent because it directly conflicted information she believed to be true. I followed up with a series of questions to learn more about her connection to Christian Hoover.
The reader had information on Christian and Maria (Lehman) Hoover of York County. Christian, born 1807, was supposedly the son of Christian and Nancy (Plowman?) Hoover of Mifflin County. The father Christian was born ca 1770 and died 18 Aug 1855.
In reading the information she provided, I was convinced we had a case of mistaken identities. It’s a very common mistake, one so easy to fall victim to everyone does it a some point during their research. Same name, same area, same person, right? Not necessarily.
The first rule of genealogy is to start with what you know and work backwards. The earliest documented evidence this reader had was the connection between Christian and Maria (Lehman) Hoover and several of their children. The death certificate of Christian Augustus Hoover, born 16 Aug 1847 and died 29 Dec 1918, names them as his parents. Birth and baptism records of several other children confirm their identities.
Christian and Maria (Lehman) Hoover are buried in Hoover’s Cemetery, Starview, East Manchester Township, York County, Pennsylvania. Christian was born 29 Mar 1807 and died 22 May 1883.1 Maria (Lehman) Hoover was born 1 Jun 1803 and died 19 Jan 1883.2
York County federal census records for 1840 through 1880 show that Christian Hoover and his wife Mary lived in Manchester or Conewago townships throughout his adult life:
No record with Christian Hoover listed as head of household was found in the 1830 census. Given the age of his children in the 1840 census, Christian likely married sometime after 1830, so may have been living at home at the time of the 1830 census. He would have been 23, enumerated within the 20-30 age bracket.
Given that Christian lived in York County all his adult life, it’s quite likely that he was raised there, as well. There are several households with male members of an age to be Christian Hoover in the 1810 through 1830 census records for Manchester Township.8,9,10 The only head of household there for all three years is Philip Hoover. Does this prove that Philip is Christian’s father? No, but it gives us a direction for further research.
In 1850, Christian Hoover owned $300 of real estate. In 1860, he owned $1100 in real estate and had $600 in his personal estate. Given the sharp rise in his net worth, it’s quite possible that he inherited some of it through the death of a relative—a father, for instance.
Philip Hoover died 23 May 1854.11 He left a will, dated 13 Aug 1852, in which he names the following children: Henry, John, Molly (wife of Henry Hartman), Jacob, Daniel, Andrew, Felix, Christian, Susanna (deceased, wife of Daniel Koch), and Elizabeth (deceased, wife of John Sniderman).12
A search of York County church records reveals the following baptisms for children of Philip and Susanna Huber:13
They were also sponsors for:
Christian was allegedly baptized at Christ [Evangelical?] Lutheran Church in York on 9 Jun 1807. This date was outside the records available to me, so I couldn’t easily verify it. However, it is consistent with those of Philip and Susanna (___) Huber’s family members.
The 1825 record is the last one I found with mention of Philip and Susanna Huber for Trinity or Christ Evangelical churches. On 29 Feb 1822, Philip and Peter Hoover deeded some of their land to the Lutheran and Reformed congregations.14 This church was called “Christ’s Church,” aka Huber’s [Hoover’s] Church. Family members are buried in the associated cemetery—as are Christian and Maria (Lehman) Hoover, so it is likely Hoover births, marriages and deaths were recorded in the church’s records.
After Philip’s death there were three deeds recorded as releases from his heirs to his executors, sons Daniel and Andrew Huber: one from Jacob Huber of Crawford County, Indiana15; a second from Henry Hoover, John Hoover, Henry Hartman, Christian Hoover and Nancy Koch, all of York County16; and the last from Felix Hoover.17
Philip Hoover’s will gives his property to his sons Daniel and Andrew and calls for them to pay the heirs $200—one heir/year in sequence—until the value of the property has been paid off. However, Henry Hoover, John Hoover, Henry Hartman, Felix Hoover, Christian Hoover and Nancy Koch contested the terms of the will. A compromise was reached and Daniel and Andrew Hoover agreed to pay them $700 each before 1 Apr 1856.18 This partially explains the jump in value of Christian Hoover’s estate between 1850 and 1860.
But what about the other Christian Hoover? Couldn’t Christian and Nancy have been the parents of Christian (b. 1807)?
Christian Hoover died 18 Aug 1855 at the age of 88 years, 3 months, and 16 days.20 Using his age at death, his calculated birth date is 2 May 1766. Christian’s wife Nancy died 5 Feb 1855 at the age of 80 years.21 She was born circa 1775. They are buried in the Little Valley Presbyterian Church Cemetery, Vira, Pennsylvania.
Their family lived in Derry Township, Mifflin County, Pennsylvania consistently from 1810 through 1850. They had sons aged <5 in 1810, <10 and 10-15 in 1820, and 15-20 and 20-30 in 1830.22,23,24 This is consistent with having a son born in 1807.
In 1840, there are two Christian Hoovers living in Derry Township—one aged 60-70 and another aged 30-40. They are both enumerated in Derry Township again in 1850. The first household is that of “Christian Hoover Jr.,” age 45, and his wife Margaret, age 41.25 The second is that of Christian Hoover, age 79, and his wife Nancy, age 76.26
Christian C. Hoover died 8 Aug 1873 at the age of 67 years, 7 months and 12 days and was buried in the Little Valley Presbyterian Church Cemetery, Vira, Pennsylvania.27 Using his age at death, his calculated birth date is 27 Dec 1805. A gravestone for Margaret, wife of C.C. Hoover can also be found in this cemetery.28 She died 19 Aug 1891, aged 82 years, 1 month, and 6 days. Her calculated birth date is 13 Jul 1809.
This Christian is a match for a son of Christian and Nancy (___) Hoover, as seen in the census records. Is it definitive proof? No, but the evidence is certainly pointing in that direction.
Based on this research, I would say that the Christian Hoover, who married Maria Lehman, was most likely a son of Philip and Susanna (___) Hoover. Maria did not sign the deed of release in 1856, nor did I find any deeds from Philip to Christian. So, I don’t have a direct connection from Philip to Christian and Maria (Lehman) Hoover, but the circumstantial evidence is certainly suggestive.
Going forward I would look for the baptismal records for Christian and all of his children. His parents should be named in his record. If that cannot be found, since Philip and Susanna were sponsors for several other grandchildren, it’s possible that they were sponsors for one/some of Christian’s children, too. If not Philip and Susanna, perhaps one of Christian’s siblings will be named as a sponsor.
Is there a connection to Christian Hoover of Heidelberg? It’s not likely. Philip Hoover’s family resided in eastern York County from the time Philip arrived from Northampton County circa 1796-1798. Heidelberg is in the western part of the county and Christian received land there as early as 1749. Records show him there consistently from that time through his death in 1771. And of course, based on his estate records, we know that he did not have any children.
I just came across the Technology Tuesday writing meme and thought I’d share some of the tech-know-how I use on this web site.
If you’ve read any of my family pages, you may have noticed that I use a pseudo Register Style for the formatting. I call it pseudo Register Style because it doesn’t include every style element in the NEHGS Register style. For more information on this style, visit the American Ancestors site.
Mainly, I follow the Register style when formatting names and child lists. When writing a family sketch, I put the first instance of the person’s name in bold, small caps. I also use this format for their spouses. If you’re using WordPress (a hosted install), you can format your family information like this, too!
You want the name to look like—Christoph Hacker. Here’s how you would do it in the HTML code using the style option of the <span> element:
<span style="font-weight: bold; font-variant: small-caps;">Christoph Hacker</span>Using <span> will apply the style to only the text between <span> and </span>.
Childrens’ names in the child list are also formatted in small caps, but not bold, and in a smaller font size. Here’s how it looks—Johan Adam Hacker. And here’s how you’d write it in HTML.
<span style="font-variant: small-caps;font-size:.85em">Johan Adam Hacker</span>The child lists are formatted using lower case Roman numerals and a smaller font size. If grandchildren are included in the list, their list is formatted with regular numerals, and their names are in italics. In a family sketch it looks like this.
To create this using CSS and HTML, you would apply the style information to the <ol> (ordered lists), as follows:
<ol style="list-style-type: lower-roman;"> <li><span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Andrew Hoover</span> was born 25 Jan 1775 in Fayette County, Pennsylvania and died 20 Apr 1821 in German Township, Fayette County, Pennsylvania.<sup>9</sup>Andrew married <span style="font-variant: small-caps;">Frances McClure</span> on 14 Sep 1800 in Fayette County. She was born 20 Feb 1779 and died 16 Feb 1850. She was buried with her husband in the Harrison Graveyard. Andrew and Frances had five children:<ol style="list-style-type: decimal"> <li><span><em>Abraham<sup>4</sup> Hoover</em></span> was born 18 Nov 1801 and died 2 Sep 1807.</li> <li><span><em>Rebecca Hoover</em></span> was born 6 Jun 1802 and died 26 Apr 1864. She married Nathaniel Darrall</li> </ol> </li> </ol>
The children’s <ol> uses the lower case roman numerals to number each <li> (list item) and the grandchildren’s <ol> uses the regular decimal to number each <li>. As you can see, you can also include the name formats within the list using the <span> just like above.
So, where, you ask, would I put all this CSS and HTML stuff? In WordPress, there are two tabs for the content box—Visual and HTML. The Visual shows you your post as if you’re writing it in a text editor like Microsoft Word. The HTML tab shows what the text and it’s formatting in HTML. It might look scary at first if you’ve never seen HTML. But you’ll soon become accustomed to it.
That seems like a lot of HTML to type for each name and/or list, right? Right. You can simplify it by defining each format in your style.css file. Then you only need to add the format name to the class option in the <span> and <ol> elements, as follows:
<span class="name">Christoph Hacker</span> or
<ol class="child-list">
<li><span class="child-name">Andrew Hoover</span></li></ol>or
<ol class="grandchild-list">
<li><span class="grandchild-name">Abraham Hoover</span></li></ol>for the name and list formats. The code to put in your style.css file would look like this.
.name {
font-variant: small-caps; Because we’re using the class option, we need to start each format name with a period. We declare the style definitions between the curly brackets, making sure to include both the opening and closing brackets and a semicolon at the end of each style. For more information, check out the CSS tutorial.
Simple, no? Give a try and let me know how it goes.