USA > Pennsylvania > Montgomery County > Biographical annals of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, containing genealogical records of representative families, including many of the early settlers and biographical sketches of prominent citizens, Vol. I > Part 3
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JACOB V. GOTWALTS, a prominent lawyer, and ex-District Attorney of Mont- gomery county, was born in Lower Provi-
dence township, Montgomery county, Penn- sylvania, May 13, 1840. He is the son of Jacob and Esther (Vanderslice) Gotwalts, both natives of Pennsylvania. They had four children, Jacob V. being the only one now living.
Jacob Gotwalts (father) was a farmer in Lower Providence township, where he owned two farms. His wife was Esther Vanderslice, daugh- ter of Anthony Vanderslice. He and his wife were Mennonites in religious faith. He died in 1851, aged fifty years. His wife survived him until 1900, when she died at the age of eighty- seven years. He was a Whig in politics.
Adam Gotwalts (grandfather) was also a farmer who lived and died in Montgomery county. The family originally came from Ger- many, but the first ancestor in this country set- tled in Montgomery county in the latter part of the seventeenth century. Anthony Vander- slice (maternal grandfather) was a native of Pennsylvania. He was a farmer, and was also interested in canal boating. He died at an ad- vanced age, leaving several sons and daughters.
Jacob V. Gotwalts lived on his father's farm until he was ten years of age, when he entered Freeland Seminary, now Ursinus College. In 1856 he became a student at Dickinson College, at Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and graduated in 1860. He was principal of the Cape May High School, New Jersey, for four years, and a member of the faculty of Treemount Seminary for more than a year before he commenced the study of law in the office of Hon. George N. Corson, of Norris- town. He was admitted to the bar in August, 1867, and immediately began the practice of law. He continued in Norristown until 1894, when he removed to Pottstown, being a member of the firm of Gotwalts & Saylor.
On December 3, 1873, Mr. Gotwalts married Miss Henrietta Royer, daughter of ex-Senator Lewis Royer and Isabella (Treon) Royer. Mrs. Gotwalts belongs to the Reformed church.
Mr. Gotwalts was district attorney of Mont- gomery county from 1876 to 1879. He was a school director and a member of town council while he lived in Norristown. He does a general law practice, but makes a specialty of criminal
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law, in which he has been very successful. He is attorney for a number of corporations. He is a Democrat in politics and was a delegate to the National Democratic Convention in 1876, at St. Louis, when Hon. Samuel J. Tilden was nominated for President, and also a delegate at the recent convention held at the same place when A. B. Parker was nominated. He has been a Mason for more than forty years, and belongs to Phoenix Lodge, No 75, Free and Accepted Masons, also to the Elks, and the Knights of Friendship.
Mr. Gotwalts is genial in disposition, and has made many strong friendships. He has been a prominent figure at Democratic county conven- tions for many years, and has frequently re- sponded to calls for speechmaking during differ- ent campaigns in behalf of his party. He is a fluent speaker, his manner being logical and con- vincing, and his eloquence being frequently inter- spersed with sallies of humor that enable him to please and captivate his audience.
HORACE MILTON EBERT, secretary of the March-Brownback Stove Company, of Potts- town, was born in Cressona, Schuylkill county, Pennsylvania, January 9, 1866. He is the son of Joseph R. and Margaret (Wurts) Ebert.
Joseph R. Ebert (father) was born in Mont- gomery county. In young manhood he was a carpenter, and afterwards became an agent for the Philadelphia & Reading Railway Company. He was station agent at various places. Joseph R. Ebert made his home in Norristown for many years, and about 1894 removed to Pottstown, where he died in 1897, aged fifty-eight years. His wife died in 1900, aged sixty-two years. In poli- tics he was a Republican. The family were mem- bers of the Lutheran denomination. Margaret Wurts Ebert was also born in Montgomery county. Mr. and Mrs. Ebert had four children : Walter Winfield, died in infancy ; Ida May, died unmarried at the age of thirty-eight ; Horace M .; Ella Blanche, a music teacher.
William Ebert (grandfather) was born in Pennsylvania, and was of German descent. He was a cabinet-maker and later a miller, being the owner of a mill at Mingo, below Royersford. He
lived most of his life in Montgomery county and died at the age of seventy years. He and his wife had four sons and three daughters. George Wurts (maternal grandfather) was also born in Pennsylvania, and was of German de- scent. He was a farmer in Schuylkill county. He was twice married and had seven children. George Wurts died at an advanced age.
Horace M. Ebert removed to Norristown with his parents when he was seven years of age, and lived in that borough for many years. He completed the public school course in that bor- ough, graduating from the Norristown high school in the class of 1881. After receiving his diploma he took a clerical position with the Philadelphia & Reading Railway Company, and later was employed for a time in the Pencoyd Iron Works, one of the most extensive establish- ments of the kind in America. In the year 1892 Mr. Ebert went to Pottstown, where he has held ever since the position of secretary of the March- Brownback Stove Company, one of the most suc- cessful corporations engaged in above manufac- turing in Pennsylvania, employing one hundred and fifty persons or more in its various depart- ments. Mr. Ebert belongs to the Elks and the Foresters of America. He served in the Spanish- American war, raising a company in Pottstown and neighboring townships. He was its first lieutenant, and he served with it throughout the Porto Rican campaign.
Mr. Ebert has always taken an active interest in politics, national, state and local, being strongly attached to the principles and policy of the Re- publican party. His name has frequently been mentioned in connection with public positions, and at the Republican County Convention of 1902 he was nominated by acclamation for the position of assemblyman on the party ticket, along with Messrs. Rex, Weida, Ambler and Landis. Mr. Ebert as well as his colleagues on the assembly ticket took an active part in the canvass, which was one of the most earnest ever made in Mont- gomery county. They were triumphantly elected in November of that year, Mr. Ebert's popularity, wherever he is known, being attested by his large vote in Pottstown, Norristown, and elsewhere in
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the county. At Harrisburg Mr. Ebert was one of the most useful, industrious and influential members of the House of Representatives. He He served on the committees as follows: To Compare Bills, Corporations, Manufacture, and Federal Relations, and took a large share in the work of the session.
DR. DAVID DORRINGTON RICHARD- SON, third son of Major George Park and Sarah Ann Richardson, and grandson of George Rich- ardson, of Richmond, Virginia, is a native of that city, born May 11, 1837.
Dr. Richardson's preparatory education was obtained at Transylvania University, at Lexing- ton, Kentucky, from the medical department of which he graduated with the degree of M. D., at the termination of his third course of lectures, in February, 1858. He removed to Philadelphia the following spring and organized a school for prep- aration for the degree of Doctor of Medicine and for the medical staff of the army and navy. This enterprise proved very successful.
Dr. Richardson served three years, from 1858 to 1861, as interne at the Howard and Philadel- phia Hospitals, being appointed in the latter year resident physician at the Northern Dispensary, Philadelphia, the institution being under his en- tire charge. He held this position until Decem- ber, 1866, when he was appointed superintendent and physician in chief of the Philadelphia Hospi- tal. Department for the Insane.
In 1871 he graduated with the degree of M. D. from the University of Pennsylvania. In 1879 he was appointed superintendent of the State Hospital for the Insane, at Warren, Pennsyl- vania, organizing that institution and placing it on a good working basis, and remaining in charge as superintendent until July, 1881, when he was unanimously recalled to the Philadelphia Hos- pital, of whose Department for the Insane he had previously had charge, performing the duties in a highly successful and satisfactory manner. He retired from this position in 1886 to engage in private practice.
Dr. Richardson was not to remain thus, how- ever, for any great length of time. His ability
as a superintendent of institutions for the insane. had now received very general recognition, and in 1889 he was elected the first superintendent of the Delaware State Hospital for the Insane, at Farnhurst, which position he held until October 1, 1893, when he resigned to take charge of the male department of the State Hospital for the Insane, Southeastern District of Pennsylvania, Norristown, in which he has been equally suc- cessful, keeping the institution up to the high standard which it had attained under his pre- decessor, Dr. Robert H. Chase, and making many improvements in the care and treatment of the. unfortunates in his charge. Dr. Richardson is a model resident physician, giving personal super- vision to every detail of the work of the institu- tion of which he has charge. His many years of successful experience in the management of the insane, has made him an adept in that field of labor which he has chosen for his life-work.
Dr. Richardson's interest in anatomy made him a frequent visitor to the dissecting room, and in 1858 he was appointed demonstrator in the Philadelphia School of Anatomy, of which the late Dr. D. Hayes Agnew was the principal. He- continued in that position for a period of eight years. In 1886 he was appointed assistant dem- onstrator of anatomy in the University of Penn- sylvania, Department of Medicine, continuing in that position until 1890.
In 1861 Dr. Richardson published the "Chem- ical Remembrancer." In 1876 he prepared for publication "The Old and New Notation of Chemistry Reconciled." In 1885 he revised for publication his clinical lectures on insanity, de- livered from time to time in the Department for the Insane of the Philadelphia Hospital.
Dr. Richardson is a member of the American Medical Association, of the American Medico- Psychological Association, the Philadelphia County Medical Society and the Philadelphia Neurological Society.
Dr. Richardson married, in 1860, Margaret Spear Hancker, of a Pennsylvania family.
The Norristown Hospital for the Insane, with which Dr. Richardson has been identified for so long a time, may be properly noticed in this con-
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MONTGOMERY COUNTY.
nection. Its grounds comprise nearly six hun- dred acres of fertile land finely situated on the banks of Stony creek, just hefore that stream enters the borough of Norristown. The site commands a very extensive view of the surround- ing country, and the institution and its grounds make a highly picturesque scene. It was erected by a commission appointed by Governor John Frederic Hartranft in 1876, one year having been consumed in the selection of a site, and another in the adoption of a suitable plan of hospital buildings. Its construction required nearly two years, the buildings as they then were (many ad- ditions and improvements having since been erected), being completed in February, 1880. The plan of the institution is unique, the segregate or detached system being adopted for the dif- ferent wards. The plan of treatment is rational throughout and entirely opposed to the old theory that the victims of insanity are possessed of an evil spirit. There is an absence of re- straint except in the violent ward; patients are kept employed as much as possible; there is a thorough night service, as well as the strictest scrutiny by day; each case is scientifically in- vestigated and treated, as much as may be ; and every employe is expected to realize the responsi- bility resting upon him as a part of a system for improving the condition of the patients in the hospital.
Of late years the institution has been very much overcrowded, its total population, including attendants and other employes, being about twenty-five hundred, the patients being nearly equally divided between the sexes.
EARL A. JENKINS, recorder of deeds of Montgomery county, to which office he was elected November 4, 1902, was born at Colmar, November 21, 1850. He is a son of Milton and Sarah (Ellis) Jenkins, both living at Colmar. Milton Jenkins was reared on a farm, attending at intervals the public schools of the vicinity, and spending two years. 1868-9, at Freeland Seminary, Collegeville, now Ursinus College. On leaving that institution he learned the trade of butcher- ing with James W. Buzby, near Spring House,
in Gwynedd township. Later he engaged in that business at Colmar and has followed it success- fully ever since.
Earl A. Jenkins has been an earnest, active and influential member of the Republican party, ever since reaching manhood. In township, county and state politics he has always taken a deep interest, doing his utmost to secure the suc- cess of the principles and candidates of his party, and working very effectively to that end. He has served occasionally in township offices, and his worth is very generally known to party lead- ers and its membership throughout the county, of which he has been a life-long citizen. When his name was mentioned for the nomination for re- corder on the party ticket in the summer of 1902, other aspirants, recognizing his strength, grad- ually withdrew until he was left without a rival before the party convention, in September of that year. He was therefore nominated by accla- mation. Mr. Jenkins entered into the canvass with his usual energy. His efforts contributed much to party success at the polls, and he was elected in November, with the rest of the Repub- lican ticket, by a large majority. He entered upon the duties of his position early in January, 1903, and has performed them very acceptably throughout, giving close attention to business, and being affable and courteous to all with whom he comes in contact. The growth of the county has made his department one of the most impor- tant of the court house offices, and it requires a person of good business ability to perform the duties acceptably.
In 1874 Mr. Jenkins married Elizabeth Clark, daughter of James (deceased) and Mary (Mc- Cormick) Clark, both of whom were natives of Scotland, where Mr. Jenkins' wife was born, May 21, 1848, the family coming to this country about 1855 or 1856, and locating near Colmar. They have four children : Ethel I., Royden C., M. Rus- sell and Earl Wayne.
Mr. Jenkins is a direct descendant of Jenkin Jenkins, who came from Wales and settled in Hatfield township in 1729. His eldest son, Jolin Jenkins, was the progenitor of all the family who now bear his name. He bought land in Gwynedd,
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MONTGOMERY COUNTY.
adjoining Langsdale, in 1746, and died in 1803 or 1804. His son John, born in 1742, died in 1805. He was an officer in the Revolutionary army. He married Elizabeth Lukens, widow of Abraham, and had six children : Owen, Sarah, Jesse, John, Edward and Elizabeth.
John Jenkins (grandfather) married Ann Todd, and lived to a very advanced age, dying at North Wales, at the home of his son-in-law, Abel Lukens, October 5, 1880, in his ninety- seventh year. He had seven children: Naomi married Abel Lukens, Charles Todd married Saralı Lukens, Jane married Samuel Rhoads, Ann T. married Jacob B. Rhoads, Silas T. married Eliza Morgan, John S. married Eliza Stoner, Milton married Sarah Ellis. (For further par- ticulars of the Jenkins family, see the biographical sketch of J. P. Hale Jenkins, of Norristown, a cousin of the recorder of deeds, Earl A. Jenkins, of Colmar, which will be found elsewhere in this work.)
Milton Jenkins (father) was born March 9, 1825. He married, December 26, 1849, Sarah Ellis, born December 6, 1826. Sarah (Ellis) Jenkins is the daughter of Jonathan and Elizabeth (Jones) Ellis, who were married October 16, 1818. Jonathan was born in December, 1790, and died November 26, 1871. His wife was born April 10, 1797, and died August 18, 1875. Jona- than's father was William Ellis, a well-known citizen of the county, who died at the age of sev- enty-eight years. His mother, Sarah (Barnes) Ellis, died at the age of eighty years. Eliza- beth (Jones) Ellis was the daughter of John and Esther (Conard) Jones.
Milton and Sarah Jenkins have had seven children, as follows: Earl A., born in 1850, mar- ried, November 18, 1874, Elizabethı Clark, who was born May 21, 1849. Mr. and Mrs. Earl A. Jenkins have four children: Ethel Iona, born October 30, 1875; Royden C., born September 3, 1877, and married May 3, 1899, to Clara Keighly, the couple having three children, Elizabeth, Sarah and Iona ; Milton Russell, born December 19, 1885 ; Earl Wayne, born August 24, 1888.
Ida, second child of Milton and Sarah Jenkins, born September 24, 1852, died October 8, 1854.
Horace M., born December 28, 1853, married December 28, 1880, Mary Clark, who was born January 29, 1859. Mr. and Mrs. Horace M. Jenkins have had five children, as follows: Ros- coe C., born November 25, 1881, and died Jan- uary 9, 1889; Laura Z., born November 4, 1883 ; Clark, born April 12, 1886; Donald, born October 31, 1889; and May, born February 13, 1892.
Elma, born February 29, 1856, married, April 29, 1885, George E. Brecht. Mr. and Mrs. George E. Brecht have three children as follows : Ralph Anson, born July 13, 1886; John Ernest, born February 13, 1889; and Sarah Elizabeth, born September 25, 1892.
Anson B. Jenkins, born November 2, 1857, is unmarried.
Elizabeth Jenkins, born January 19, 1860, married November 25, 1885, Gilbert M. Clark, who was born May 31, 1860, and died May 2, 1899. Mr. and Mrs. Clark have one child, a daughter, Cara, born May 6, 1894.
U. S. Grant Jenkins, born January 3, 1863, married, November 15, 1893, Cara Scholl. They have the following children: Milton Carl, born August 22, 1894; Hazel, born June 3, 1898; and Everett, born June 19, 1899.
Mrs. Earl A. Jenkins was born in Scotland. Her father, James Clark, was born June 16, 1812, died May 26, 1898. He married, January 27, 1843, Mary McCormick, born September 13, 1821. James Clark's parents were Quintin and Jane (Blaine) Clark. Mary Clark's parents were Robert and Mary (McClelan) McCormick.
FREELAND G. HOBSON, lawyer, banker, and one of the most prominent men of affairs of Montgomery county, is of excellent lineage. On the paternal side he traces his ancestry to the families of Bringhurst, Turner, Lewis, Shaw, Morris, Jenkins, Wainhouse, Hawkes, Prache, Sellers, Johns, Hughes, Currier and Gibbons, and on the maternal side to the families of Van- derslice, Gotwals, Hunsicker and Pennypacker. He is a descendant of Francis Hobson, who came from England in 1712, accompanied by his wife Martha Wainhouse, and settled in New Garden township, Chester county, Pennsylvania. They
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MONTGOMERY COUNTY.
were members of the Society of Friends, as were most of the settlers in those parts of the pro- vince. On February 5, 1712, they presented their letters from Friends at LaGrange, near Charlemont, Ireland, to the Newark Monthly Meeting. Francis Hobson, the first of the family name in America, was a weaver, but became a farmer, buying two hundred acres in New Garden township in 1713.
Francis, son of the immigrant, Francis Hob- son, was born September 12, 1720, married Mary Shaw in 1744, and in 1748 removed to Limerick township, Montgomery county, where he bought, near Royersford, a farm of two hundred acres, which is still known as the Hobson farm. One of his sons, Moses Hobson, in 1791, bought the Limerick farm, upon which he resided during the remainder of his life. He was a justice of the peace and a surveyor. Many of the old sur- veys in that part of the county were made by him, and his field notes, and legal papers ex- ecuted by him as a justice of the peace shows his penmanship to have been very fine. He died intestate in 1825, when the Limerick farm came into the possession of a brother, John.
John Hobson, born June 10, 1772, married Penelope Turner, and reared four children upon the ancestral farm. Moses, who became the suc- cessor of his namesake uncle as surveyor and justice; Mary ; Charlotte, who became the wife of Homer Kimberly, of Batavia, New York ; and Francis.
Francis, youngest child of John and Pene- lope (Turner) Hobson, was born October IO, 1803. He inherited the homestead farm, and lived there many years, subsequently removing to Reading, where he died, August 24, 1874. Notwithstanding he was far beyond the military service age, when he was sixty years old he served with the emergency force, called out in 1863 to repel the invasion of the state by the Rebel army under General Lee. He married, January II, 1829, Matilda, daughter of William and Mary (Morris.) Bringhurst. Two children were born of this marriage, Frank M. and Sarah H.
(I) William Bringhurst was a descendant of
Dr. Thomas Bringhurst, a noted physician and surgeon of London, England, who married Eliz- abeth Hughes, August 27, 1647. Their son John, born November 1, 1665, was a printer in London, and, for advocating the freedom of the press, he was, on September 20, 1684, fined the sum of one pound and stood for two hours in the pillory. He married Rosina Prache, daugh- ter of the Rev. Hillarius Prache, a Lutheran clergyman. After the death of Mr. Prache, his widow, Barbara, came to America, where she was subsequently joined by her daughter, Ro- sina, who was afterwards the widow of John Bringhurst, and who brought her son, George Bringhurst. The last named, born May 15, 1697, married September 1, 1723, Anna, daughter of John and Sarah (Sellers) Ashmead. Their son William married Mary Morris, June 4, 1769, and they were the parents of six children, of whom the eldest was Israel, who was born Feb- ruary 28, 1770, and died in February, 1807. Israel married, September 27, 1792, Mary Lewis, a daughter of Isaac and Sarah (Jenkins) Lewis. She was a descendant of Jenkin Jenkins, who was born in Wales in 1659, came to America and settled in Gwynedd in 1729. Isaac Lewis was a son of Enos, who was a son of Lewis, who in 1704 married Grace Johns, at Gwynedd Meet- ing. Sarah Jenkins was a daughter of John and Sarah (Hawksworth) Jenkins, and her mother was a daughter of Peter Hawksworth, who died in 1769, and who was buried at St. Thomas. Israel and Mary (Lewis) Bringhurst were the parents of seven children, among whom was Wright A. Bringhurst, who was a member of the state legislature and a noted humanitarian, who, at his death, bequeathed a large sum for the support of the poor in Norristown, Potts- town and Upper Providence. He died in 1876.
W. Super, D. D., (deceased), was during his life president of Ursinus College. His widow is still living, and resides in Collegeville, Mont- gomery county.
Frank M. Hobson, only son of Francis and Matilda (Bringhurst) Hobson, was born Janu- ary 22, 1830, and was educated at Washington Hall, Collegiate Institute, Trappe. When eight-
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MONTGOMERY COUNTY.
een years old he removed from the homestead to Trappe, where he taught school and engaged in farming. In 1856 he became identified with a mercantile business in Collegeville, which he continued until 1880, when he relinquished it to enjoy comparative ease. His life has been one of great activity and usefulness. He was a prac- tical surveyor and a conveyancer and general bus- iness manager, and acted in many fiduciary capac- ities, settling numerous extensive estates, among them that of his uncle, Wright A. Bringhurst, who left a large sum of money for the support of the poor of Norristown, Pottstown and Up- per Providence township, and he was a trustee of the Bringhurst fund from its founding until 1900, when he resigned. Mr. Hobson, also con- tinually occupied with the duties of important positions, was at various times postmaster, audi- tor or school director. He was also treasurer of the Building & Loan Association of College- ville; president and director of the Perkiomen & Reading Turnpike Company; a director of the First National Bank of Norristown, and of the Iron Bank of Phoenixville for nearly twenty years; and for many years the secretary and treasurer of Ursinus College.
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