USA > New Jersey > Sussex County > Hardyston > Hardyston memorial : a history of the township and the North Presbyterian Church, Hardyston, Sussex County, New Jersey > Part 3
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CHARLES BEARDSLEE, JR., was born in 1762 and died in 1818. His wife was a Schofield. Samuel Beardslee, their son, was born in 1813, and died in 1863. Ile married Sarah Kimble, born in
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1813, and died in 1877. They were the parents of Samuel A. Beardslee, who died in 1881, in his forty-first year.
GEORGE was Captain of a Company of Sussex 2d Regt., and took his company to Sandy Hook during the war of 1812. He lived in the stone house on the Lantz farm, which was commonly called the "Plains farm," and upon which were the Hemp meadow, the Potash works, and a brick kiln. He was a very active busi- ness man. Ile engaged in iron manufacture and ran a forge at Snufftown ; but iron making did not prove profitable, and, his estate becoming involved, he sold out and removed in 1837, with all his family, to Michigan.
JOHN lived in the Samuel F. Randolph house, and kept a tavern. Ile married Susan Cary for his second wife. After his death she kept the public house for many years. Ilis son Beverly lived in the old parsonage, now the sexton's house, built in 1788, and mar- ried Ann, daughter of Captain Christopher Longstreet. Beverly was drowned in Lake Grinnell while fishing. Edward, another son, lived on the Darralı place until he removed West. Sibella, a daughter, married Josepli Linn, who kept store at Monroe Corners. The sign painted on the house, "Monroe Store, " gave name to the cross roads. Another daughter married one of the Wellings, of Warwick.
MORRISON lived on the farm owned by Judge Haines for many years, and now by Edward Case. He built the house and cleared the fields, which were then thickly covered with timber.
SAMUEL lived on the Peter Wilson farm and built the house. His wife was Hannah, daughter of Major Blain, of Orange county. Their daughter Abbey married Thomas L. Wilson.
JAMES lived in the old house yet standing near the Fowler homestead.
THOMAS Was an elder in the North Church, and married Rachel, daughter of Ebenezer Tuttle. They were church mem- bers previous to the separation of Sparta and the North Church, in 1819. Their home was on the Demarest farm, east from Tuttle's Corner, in Lafayette township. They removed in 1831.
EBENEZER TUTTLE owned the Mark Congleton farm and lived in a house which was burned, near Monroe Corners. He
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united with the church in 1820 and died in 1834. His son Samuel married Lydia, daughter of James Hopkins, and lived at the Big Spring on the farm his wife inherited, where he built the stone house. He sold the place to his brother-in-law, Jacob Kimble, and bought the Zebulon Sutton, now Rutherford farm, near Franklin Furnace. He was an Elder of the North Church from 1823 until his death in 1861. His wife died in 1868.
JAMES HAMILTON Was born at sea. He was a young man, a carpenter in Philadelphia, during the Revolutionary war. After the capture of the city, in 1777, by the enemy, he was claimed as a British subject and taken forcibly to a man-of-war anchored in the river. One night he tied his clothes together and threw hint- self, with his bundle, into the water. The enrrent was so swift that he lost his clothes and reached the shore naked, but he went into the town and climbed up by the window of his boarding house and reached his own room. In the morning when the woman, who had charge of the room, entered, she was surprised to find the bed ocenpied. He asked her to bring him a suit of his clothes and to say nothing about hin. IIe escaped, and came to Orange Co. to a Mrs. Hinchman's house. A troop of tories and British came in pursuit of him. Mrs. Hinchman concealed hin in a large barrel over which she spread flax, and then prepared a good dinner for the troopers, with plenty of cider, and they went away without discovering the fugitive prisoner. After the war, Hamilton worked at his trade, and, going to Frankford, met and married Sarah Price, daughter of Francis Price, and grandaughter of Robert, who was captured by the Indians. After the birth of his son Benjamin, he engaged to build a grist mill near the Dela- ware River. He built a log house in a lonely place which he had selected, but had no materials for window or door. Here he had to leave his wife and child for days while he went away to his work. She closed the entrance at night with her table and a bed quilt. She was frequently awakened in terror by the wolves which came prowling around the cabin, but they never broke the feeble barrier. James Hamilton built the Lawrence mansion, 1794. The eldest son, born in 1781, was named for an unele, Benjamin, in Philadelphia, who sent money to pay for his school-
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ing. He conducted many suits at law in Justices Courts, and be- came Brigadier General of Militia and had a prominent part at the general trainings, which were formerly held every year. He was a member of the Legislature, and for several years represented Sussex in the State Council. He died in 1864. His wife was Sally Edsall, who died in 1874, in the 95th year of her age. She was a woman of remarkable ability of mind and of attractive character. She retained her memory to the last, and we are in- debted to her for much information respecting olden times.
COL. ROBERT HAMILTON, their son, was member of Congress ; and Major Fowler Hamilton, another son, showed great gallantry in the Mexican war, and died soon after in Texas, while on mili- tary service. Benjamin Hamilton, Jr., practiced law in Newton, was a member of the Legislature, and died in early manhood.
FRANCIS HAMILTON, another son of James, was named for his mother's father. He married the eldest daughter of Joseph Sharp, Jr., Nancy (or Anne), who was brought up by her grandmother, Grace Sharp, the Quakeress, who gave them a large sum of money to purchase the farm where they lived. This farm was purchased by Dr. Samuel Fowler, sometime previously, for $S per acre. Peter Fountain worked it for him for a number of years and never owned a horse during that time, using oxen. Dr. Fow- ler sold it for $22 per acre ; and in more recent times it has been valued as high as $120 per acre.
Esther Hamilton, daughter of James, married Colonel Joseph E. Edsall.
Thomas Hamilton, ancther son, lived in Hamburg and mar- ried Elizabeth Hoffman, (familiarly called Aunt Betsy), a woman noted for her kindness of heart and earnest piety.
MICHAEL RORICK was of Dutch descent. He was born April 10th, 1749, in Bergen County, and came to Franklin Furnace about 1765, in the employ of the men who built and ran the earl- iest forge there. He was then but seventeen years old, and drove an ox team for carting around the forge. By careful saving he gathered a little property, and some years later secured a tract of wild land, embracing several hundred acres, on the west bank of the Wallkill, above the forge. He lived at first in a log house, but
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afterwards built the frame dwelling which stood an hundred years, and was burned after the construction of the N. Y., Susquehanna Western Railroad, which ran beside it. The house was at that time occupied by his grandson, Samuel Losey, who inherits that portion of the homestead farm.
Michael Rorick, in 1774, married Lucretia Hardin, who was born in Massachusetts, February 21st, 1752. The region around their home was a vast forest, with the exception of the little clear- ing where there had been a small Indian settlement, and within which their house was erected. An old Indian trail crossed the Kill at what is still called " The Ford," where the water is shal- low and runs with nearly a uniform depth over a pebbly bottom It then passed along up the stream on the edge of the meadow and upland, very near where the road was formerly located. The trails were very narrow foot-paths, where the Indians walked in single file, one behind another ; for it is said they never went two abreast, and so disturbed as little as possible the foliage along their foot-paths. Traces of the Indian occupation may still be seen in the fruit trees, some of which, planted by them, are yet, after all these years, standing and bearing in their season blossoms and fruit. The apples are of peculiar variety, the plums of the common red sort, while the cherries are of three kinds -- red, yellow and black.
It was with difficulty Rorick could preserve his sheep from the attack of wolves which abounded in the country. To save his flock, he constructed caves in the side hill into which they were driven at night. One morning, at break of day, the cry of the wolves was heard just opposite the house, and one of the men ran ont and fired at them. They fled to the kill and passed over it in two or three jumps, making the water fly and shaking themselves from the wet as soon as they were over, when they started for the mountain on the east side. A hunt was organized by several men, who saw nothing that day of the wolves, but killed a bear and several wild cats in Bear Swamp, then an almost impenetrable jungle on the mountain near the Losey pond. The passage way for wild beasts from the Wild Cat Mountain to the Munson moun- tain seemed to run very near the house, and frequently the cry of
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the panther, as well as the howl of the wolf, was heard at night.
The Indians were occasional visitors for years after the set- tlement. A rock on the Wild Cat Mountain, whose top overhangs its base, was occasionally the halting place at night for their warriors and hunters. One day a warrior, decorated with red paint and naked to the waist, presented himself at the door with a demand for food. He said he would tell them where there was a lead mine if they would feed him. When his hunger was ap- peased, he said the mine was under a clump of trees in the bend of the river. No searching has ever yet been able to verify the saying of the Indian.
Michael and his wife were very exemplary in their lives and firm in their religious belief. Their four sons and six daughters, who survived childhood, were trained in the knowledge of the Scriptures and to follow their godly example. The parents were among the ten corporate members who formed the Franklin Bap- ist Church at its organization, December 11th, 1823.
When Michael died, October 28th, 1832, at the age of eighty- four years, and Lucretia, September 12th, 1834, aged eighty-two, they were buried in the grave yard of the Franklin Church. In March, 1832, Michael put all his property into the hands of two trustees, who were to furnish him and his wife a good, comforta- ble and ample support, and divide the remainder of the income among his heirs apparent, while he and his wife survived, and after their death, make equal division of all his estate among his children.
GARRET KEMBLE's grandfather came from Devonshire, Eng- land, with his wife and four sons. Three of the sons entered the Revolutionary army, two of them losing their lives during the war, and the survivor afterwards settling in Virginia. William, the youngest son, studied medicine and practiced in that part of Bergen County which is now Northern Passaic. He married Elizabeth Cole, of Holland descent, and lived at Oak Ridge. He had a large family of hardy children, but died himself in middle life.
Garret was born near Oak Ridge, September 4th, 1793. He came to Sussex County in 1812, in his nineteenth year, and enter-
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ed the employ of Captain George Beardslee on his farm in the vicinity of the North Church. When New York city was threat- ened by the British, during the second war, Captain Beardslee marched his company to Sandy Hook, and young Kemble had the entire management of the farm. This was conducted to the satis- faction of his employer, who encouraged him to bring here his mother and her three youngest children. He was remarkable for great physical strength, and his industry and integrity made him respected by all. He married, in 1818, Ann Carnes, daughter of Michael and Lucretia Rorick, who was born 1795 and named by Mrs. Ann Carnes Newman, the blind wife of Emanuel Newman, who lived in the J. Ludlum Munson house. After their mar- riage, Michael Rorick built a house for them, and they lived upon the farm which Mrs. Kemble inherited from him, until their death. The house and farm remained in the family until recently. Mrs. Kemble died in 1877, aged eighty-two years, and Garret Kemble in 1884, in his ninety-first year. They united with the Baptist Church of Franklin in 1824, and were esteemed and usc- ful members, distinguished for consistent piety and fidelity to the Christian profession. Garret was ordained a Deacon in 1828, and held the office until his death.
Two brothers, named Sutton, of Huguenot descent, settled in Morris County before the war of the Revolution. Captain Jona- than Sutton, the son of one of the brothers, was in the Continental army. At the close of the war he came to Sparta, and from thence to Hardyston, where he resided until his death, in 1818. He was an Elder in the Sparta Church. Some of his descendants imi- grated to the West and some still reside in the vicinity.
JACOB SUTTON, SR., son of Captain Jonathan, married Hannah Rorick, eldest daughter of Michael and Lucretia Rorick. They had six sons. The eldest son, Michael R., owned a farm on which he lived, one mile northeast from the New Prospect School House. He, his wife and children, were members of the North Church. He was a very active member of the congregation. Removing to Michigan, he died in advanced years. His eldest son is Rev. Dr. Ford Sutton, of New York city, a son-in-law of the late Horace Holden, a man well known in the religious world.
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Jacob Sutton, Jr., lived on lands formerly owned by George Buckley, near New Prospect School House. He married a daughter of Martin Cox, of Wantage, in 1825. They are both living at an advanced age at Monroe Corners.
Jonathan Sutton, another son of Jacob, Sr., lived on the West Mountain road on the second farm from the school house. He was an active member of the North Church, a man of considerable enterprise, removed to Andover, and afterwards to Michigan.
West Mountain was formerly called Ireland. Samuel Knox came from Ireland, with his wife Rose, who united with the North Church in 1826. When there was special religious interest at the North Church, Rev. Mr. Fairchild visited them and urged their attendance upon the meetings. The wife, with her daughters, spun and wove the yarn and cloth to furnish a new suit of clothes for her husband that he might attend church. One evening the father, mother, sons and daughters came for the first time to church. The house was filled, and, coming in late, they had some difficulty in finding seats. The father, and several of the sons and daughters, were converted while the series of meetings continned. The descendants of Samuel and Rose Knox have been excellent citizens and useful in church and state. Jeannett married Samuel Morrow, of Hamburg, and afterwards of Wantage. They edu- cated their sons, and five of them entered the legal profession and attained to high civil positions.
James Scott lived at Franklin, near where Col. Samuel Fow- ler built the stone house. He was a contractor in building the Paterson and Hamburg Turnpike road, and is said to have made considerable money by his contract. Scott's Hill, on the turnpike, is called after him. He invested in land and became well off. He had several sons and left to each of them a good farm. He gave $100 toward building the North Church, in 1813. His brother, Ben Scott, was a man of powerful frame and noted for great strength.
GARRETT VAN BLARCOM Was the son of a Revolutionary sol- dier, born in Bergen County, 1780, and married to Mary Degraw, in 1804. He served in the war of 1812, was a mason by trade, and came to New Prospect 1820. His death, in 1834, was caused
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by a fall from a haymow by which his back was broken. On his deatlı bed he summoned his sons and neighbors around hin and most earnestly counseled them to seek religion and lead holy lives. He and his wife were devoted Christians and members of the North Church. They had two sons, Samuel and William. Their grandson, Garret S. Van Blarcom, son of Samuel, was struck by a locomotive on the Sussex Railroad, and instantly killed. 9 Captain Lewis Van Blarcom, another grandson, and son of William and his wife Catherine Sutton, was a student at law with M. R. Kemble, of Hamburg, for one year, and afterwards with John Linn, at Newton. He went out with the 15th Regiment, N. J. Vols., was wounded and captured at Spottsylvania, May 8th, 1864, and his leg amputated.
MARTIN RYERSON, with his brothers, came to Sussex County in 1770. They were descendants of Martin Ryerson, of Flatbush, Long Island, who emigrated from Amsterdam previous to 1663. Martin purchased the Walling property and, in 1800, made his home in Hamburg. He died at Hamburg, in the house built by Dr. Fowler, November 1820, at the age of seventy-two. His wife was Rhoda Hull, and among their six children were David Ryerson. of Newton, well known in business circles, and as Presi- dent of the Sussex Bank, Thomas C. Ryerson, and Elizabeth, who married Robert A. Linn.
THOMAS COX RYERSON was born in 1788, at Myrtle Grove, and came to Hamburg with his father in 1800. IIis early life was spent upon the farm, but having a taste for study, his father sent him to Princeton College, where he graduated in 1809. After a course of legal study in the office of Job Stockton Hal- stead, he was admitted to the practice of law. He married Han- nah Amelia Jarvis Ogden, the daughter of Robert Ogden 3d, of Sparta, and lived with his father in the house built by Dr. Fow- ler, frequently called the "L'Hommedieu house," where his son, the late Judge Martin Ryerson, of Newton, was born September 17th, 1815. Mr. Ryerson's law office was a small building on the side of the public road, and was afterwards used by Daniel Haines, when he first began the practice of law in Hamburg, in 1824. He was a member of the State Council for two years, and,
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in 1834, was chosen Justice of the Supreme Court. He died ina 1838, while in office. He was a man of the firmest independence and strictest integrity. As a lawyer, he was well read and an earnest advocate, having great influence over the courts and juries in the counties where he practiced. As a judge, he was held in the highest esteem, and had the confidence of the bar and the general public. In 1820 he exchanged lands with his brother-in- law, Robert A. Linn, and removed to Newton. His second son was Thomas Ryerson, an eminent and well known physician, who died in Newton, May 27th, 1887. His youngest son, Col. Henry Ogden Ryerson, after a brave and honorable service in the late war, was killed in the battle of the Wilderness, in Virginia, May 7th, 1864.
ALEXANDER McEOWEN was born in Kilaron, in the Isle of Isle, Scotland, in the year 1730, and reached Philadelphia when eleven years of age. He accompanied the family of Andrew Kirkpatrick in their journey on foot across the State to Basking- ridge, where he made his home in after life. He married, Feb- rnary 20th, 1766, Mary Cross, daughter of the celebrated Rev. John Cross, and died April 27th, 1777. Ilis son was IIngh Mc- Eowen, and his granddaughter, Matilda, the wife of Rev. Dr. Elias R. Fairchild.
Rev. John Cross left a number of sons and daughters, several of whom were quite young at his death, and were brought up by his widow, Deborah. Joseph Cross, of Baskingridge, was a grand- son, and his daughter, Caroline, was the mother of Joseph E. Sheldon, of Hamburg.
JOSEPH LINN was born in 1725 and died at Harmony Vale, April 8th, 1800. He married Martha Kirkpatrick, of Basking- ridge, who was born in Scotland,1723, and died March 7th, 1791. After their marriage they lived, first in Hunterdon County, then near Johnsonsburg, in Hardwick township, and later, removed to Harmony Vale.
Andrew Kirkpatrick, with his sons, John and David, and his daughters, Martha and Elizabeth, and also his brother Alexan- der and family, removed from Wattie's Neach, Dumfrieshire, Scot- land, the place of their birth, to Belfast, Ireland, abont 1725. In
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1736 they embarked for America, landed at New Castle, Dela- ware, crossed the river at Philadelphia and wandered up through New Jersey, reaching Bound Brook. Finally they settled on the sonthern slope of Round Mountain, near Baskingridge. They were all on foot, and much of the way there were no other roads but the Indian paths.
David Kirkpatrick was twelve years old when his father came to this country. For one hundred years the Kirkpatrick family were prominent in the Presbyterian Church of Basking- ridge.
ANDREW LINN, M. D., son of Joseph and Martha Kirkpat- rick, was born in Hardwick township, in 1755. His youth was spent at Harmony Vale. He studied medicine with Dr. Samuel Kennedy, who lived near the "Log Goal." In the war of the Rev- olution he was Adjutant of the Second Sussex Regiment. HIe began the practice of medicine at Monroe Corners, and, after his marriage, removed to Newton, where he died April, 1799. HIe lived in a stone house, which was afterwards enlarged by a frame and brick structure by his son Robert, and where Judge Thomas C. Ryerson afterwards lived. His practice was very large. He was highly popular and regarded as an excellent physician. He married Ann Carnes, of Bladensburg, Maryland, whose brother, Thomas, was Member of the Third U. S. Congress, from Geor- gia. She was on a visit to her blind aunt, Mrs. Ann Carnes Newman, near Sparta, when he met her.
Their children were Robert Andrew, long a merchant and leading citizen of IIamburg ; Margaret, wife of Major William Thornton Anderson, of Newton ; Mary, wife of David Ryerson, of Newton ; Martha, who married Hugh Taylor, and, after his decease, became the wife of Judge Richard R. Morris, of Sparta ; and Alex- ander, of Easton. Their children, with their descendants and connections, have filled a wide circle of influence in the society of the Town and County.
JOIN LINN. Few men of Northern New Jersey stood higher in public esteem than he, in his lifetime. The son of Joseph and Martha Kirkpatrick, he was born December 3d, 1763, in Hardwick township, Warren County, and came to this vicini-
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ty when his father removed to the farm which he afterwards inherited and called Harmony Vale.
During the Revolutionary war he was at first a private, then Sergeant in Captain Manning's Co., Sussex, New Jersey Troops. We know not how early in life he became a child of God, but when the First Church of Hardyston (embracing the congrega- tions at the Head of the Wallkill and Cary's Meeting House) was organized in 1787, in accordance with the requirements of the State law, his name and that of Martha Linn, his mother, ap- pear as communicants.
He married, May 19th, 1791, Martha Hunt, daughter of Richard Hunt, Sr., of Hardwick, who, July 15th, 1827, in the fifty- fourth year of her age, "died, asshe had lived, a christian."
Their children were fourteen-Elizabeth, the wife of Rev. Edward Allen, born September 2d, 1792; Joseph, born Septem- ber 25th, 1793, a most excellent and exemplary man ; Sarah, Mrs. Shafer, born March 7th, 1796 ; Alexander Richard, died in infancy ; Andrew, born May 7th, 1799, married Sibella Beardslee, elder in North Church 1827, kept store at Monroe Corners ; Marga- ret died in infancy ; John, born May 6th, 1803. died at Bloomfield Acadamy, 1819 ; Mary Ann, Mrs. Low, born March 4th, 1805 ; Caroline, born December 18th, 1806, wife of Dr. Roderick By- ington, of Belvidere, and mother of the missionary, Theodore Linn Byington, D. D .; Henrietta, who still survives, received into the church in 1830, at a communion held in Hamburg, and is the first upon the roll of living membership of the North Hardys- ton Church ; David Hunt, and Alexander, M. D., were twins, born February 17th, 1811, David dying in infancy, and Alexan- der, May 12th, 1868 ; Lucilla Matilda, wife of Ezekiel Brown, born December 10:1, 1814, and died in California, 1884; and William Helm, M. D., born March 6th, 1819, died October, 1877.
John Linn had served as Sheriff of Sussex County, and, in 1805, was appointed Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, and re-appointed for his fourth term, serving for sixteen years. He was then elected member of Congress, and re-elected for a second term. He died in Washington City, while a member of Congress, Jan. 5, 1821, of typhoid fever. As the weather was very cold,
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his remains were brought the whole distance in a sleigh to the North Church Cemetery, where he was buried.
He was made an Elder of the Hardyston Church 1812, and, after the division, of the North Church of Hardyston, May, 1819, exerted an extraordinary influence for good in the community and was associated with Robert Ogden in church work and public services.
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