History of Lehigh county, Pennsylvania and a genealogical and biographical record of its families, Vol. II, Part 38

Author: Roberts, Charles Rhoads; Stoudt, John Baer, 1878- joint comp; Krick, Thomas H., 1868- joint comp; Dietrich, William Joseph, 1875- joint comp; Lehigh County Historical Society
Publication date: 1914
Publisher: Allentown, Pa. : Lehigh Valley Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 948

USA > Pennsylvania > Lehigh County > History of Lehigh county, Pennsylvania and a genealogical and biographical record of its families, Vol. II > Part 38

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Jonas; Jacob; Philip; Levi; Aaron; a daugh- ter, who married Jonas Everett; a daughter, who married Tobias Everett, and Phoebe, who married Jonas Fenstermacher.

Jonas Clauss, son of Adam, was born on his father's homestead in Lynn township. He died

and is buried at New Tripoli. He was a car- penter in Heidelberg township. His wife was Barbara Fenstermacher, daughter of Philip Fen- stermacher, and their children are: Phoebe, who married George W. Metz, of Shamokin, Pa .; Katie, who married William Hock, of Shamokin, Pa .; Nathan, mentioned later.

Nathan Clauss, a blacksmith and farmer of the Stony Run in Albany township, Berks county, was born September 6th, 1839, in Heidelberg township, Lehigh county, and attended the old "pay schools" for several years and later the free schools. He served as a hired man on a farm until he attained. the age of sixteen years, when he learned the blacksmith trade in Lynn township. He was employed with one Heinrich Snyder for five years, when his employer favored him by renting him the shop and tools. In 1865 he conducted a smithy in Lynnville and the fol- lowing year, 1866, moved to his present farm and erected a blacksmith shop, which he has con- ducted to the present time, and the people of his community for miles around patronize his shop. His farm at first consisted of 16 acres and he con- tinually made additions until now it covers an area of 88 acres. Mr. Clauss built the present house and barn.

Mr.'Clauss is a short, heavy-built man, has a full, fresh face, a light red beard and a generous heart and congenial spirit. He is a popular citi- zen of his township and a Democrat and for ten years was a member of the school board. He and family are members of Frieden's church at Wesnersville, in which church he served as dea- con for many years and is now an elder.

In 1864 he married Catharine A. Schuman. Mrs. Clauss was born in 1844 and died in 1902. They had the following children: Sylvester, Es- ther, Alvin, Sinora, Levi, Jonas, and Samuel.

CHARLES E. CLAUSS.

Charles E. Clauss, the retired first brush man- ufacturer at Allentown, from 1858 to 1878, was born May 6, 1827, at Traben, on the Moselle, in Germany. After his preliminary education in the local seminary, he entered a gun factory in Belgium and was employed for some years until his health failed, when he was obliged to discon- tinue working there. In 1849 he emigrated to Pennsylvania, and from Philadelphia he proceed- ed up the Schuylkill Valley, to Reading and Pottsville, remaining at the latter place until 1857. While at Pottsville he carried on brush- making and took great interest in music. He taught classes in vocal culture and playing on various instruments, and he filled the position of organist of the German Lutheran church. He then visited his parents in Germany, and re

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HISTORY OF LEHIGH COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

mained a year. Upon returning to Pennsylvania he located at Allentown and resumed his trade of brush-making, starting the first brush-factory at this inland town, along the Lehigh river. He carried on the establishment for twenty years when he retired from active business and he has continued to live in retirement until the present time. In 1870 he also embarked in the business of manufacturing materials for mak- ing tables, chairs, and bedsteads, and he had continued in it for three years when the hard times arose and he suspended operations by dis- posing of the plant. It was also the first en- terprise of the kind started at Allentown.

Mr. Clauss, having been a musician of skill and culture, became one of the organizers of the Saengerbund, of Lehigh county, and the first director of it, which position he filled for five years. He also identified himself with the Et- tinger Brass Band, of Allentown, and he is now the last survivor of this famous musical organi- zation. This band was engaged to participate in the reception at Harrisburg to President-elect Abraham Lincoln, on his way to Washington, and on that great occasion Mr. Clauss, who was one of the performers, was enabled to secure a seat in the representative chamber, through the courtesy of Hon. W. C. Lichtenwalner, of Al- lentown, one of the assemblymen from the Le- high district, a personal friend, and he heard Mr. Lincoln's address to the excited multitude. Dur- ing the Civil War he was enlisted in the Emer- gency Troop of 1862, 5th Regiment of Penna. Vol. Inf., Co. G, commanded by Capt. George B. Schall.

Mr. Clauss married Agnes Henry, of Cres- sona, daughter of John Henry, master mechanic of the Penna. R. R. Co. shops, at that place. She was born at Gettysburg, Pa. They had ten children: Henry Otto, m. Louisa Meister ; Car- oline Amelia, m. Harmer H. Knauss; Amelia Bertha, m. Jacob Naef ; Louisa ; Flora ; Rudolph, m. Minnie Huber; Louis, m. Anna Schoudt; and three died in infancy. His wife died in 1876.

His father was Johann Peter Clauss, a wine merchant of Traben on the Moselle, where he died in 1881, at the remarkable age of 94 years. He was married to Dorothea Moog, of Trar- bach, a town on the opposite bank of the Moselle from Traben. Two other sons also emigrated and located in New York city: Rudolph and Henry Otto. A daughter of the former be- came the wife of Charles Ettinger, of Allen- town. The latter was a practicing physician and he had a son, also named Henry Otto, who is a practicing physician in New York City.

CLEAVER FAMILY.

The ancestor of the Cleaver family was Der- rick Cleaver, of Berks county. He was a Quaker in religion, and his name is found among the records of Douglass and Amity townships, where he owned large tracts of land. He died in 1768 in Douglass township. His last will was dated Oct. 25, 1767, and probated Feb. 26, 1768. In it he mentions a son, John, and a daughter, Mary; also grandchildren: John Hatfield, Na- than Hatfield, Mary Keely, John Short and William Short.

John Cleaver, the son of Derrick, was born in Douglass township, where he was reared on a farm and came to be a very prominent man, hav- ing owned an estate of 1,000 acres. He, too, was a Quaker in religion, having been identified with the Quaker meeting of Maiden Creek town- with the Friends of the Exeter and Maiden Creek township Meeting Houses. During the Revolution he served as a captain, and was known as the "Fighting Quaker." He was married twice. His first wife, Rebecca, was a Quakeress, and by her he had three children: Joseph, born in 1764; John; and Ruth.

After the death of his first wife, he married a woman not of the Quaker faith, and upon his refusal to make a confession of his errors as to serving in the Revolution and marrying a woman not of his own religion, contrary to his profes- sion of faith, he was "Read out of the Meeting." By his second wife he had seven children : Peter, Derrick, Issac, Jonathan, Nathan, Martha, and Rebecca, who was married to John Lykens.

Nathan Cleaver, a son of John Cleaver, was born in 1800 in Douglass township, and reared on a farm, and in the religious faith of a Quaker. He located at Pottsville, in Schuylkill county, and was there in the service of the Philadelphia & Reading Railroad Company for a number of years. He was twice married. Among his chil- dren by the first marriage were John Oliver, Clinton De Witt; Hannah, who died single; and Mrs. Edward Hughes. By his second marriage he had no children. In his later years he resided with his daughter, Mrs. Hughes, who resided near Shickshinny, located at the line of Columbia and Luzerne counties. There he died in 1876 and was buried at Shickshinny.

John Oliver Cleaver, the eldest son of Nathan Cleaver, was born in the year 1823, in Columbia county, Pennsylvania. He became identified with coal operations in Carbon county, and conducted the "Coleraine Colliery" from 1849 until his decease in 1852. He took an active interest in the local militia affairs of Mauch Chunk, having

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organized a company called the "Cleaver Artil- lerists," about 1850, which he commanded as captain until he died in 1852. He was married to Elizabeth Newton, a daughter of Baxter B. Newton, of Norwich, Vermont, and they had two children: Albert Newton; and Mary, who died in infancy. They were members of the Episcopal church at Mauch Chunk and there he was buried. His widow is still living, now over 84 years of age.

ALBERT NEWTON CLEAVER, banker and trust official of South Bethlehem, in Northampton county, was born Feb. 25, 1848, at Norwich, in the state of Vermont. He received his education in the Saunder's Institute in West Philadelphia, and at the Eagleswood Military Academy, at Perth Amboy, N. J. He was connected with coal operations for many years until 1896, more especially at the "Stockton Collieries," in Lu- zerne county, operated by Linderman & Skeer. From 1897 to 1902 he filled the positions of comptroller and treasurer for the Bethlehem Steel Company; then he became twice president of the Jeanesville Iron Works, at Hazleton, and served the company until 1909; and from 1909 to the present time he has been engaged in the ad- ministration of the large trust estate of Robert H. Sayre, who was his father-in-law. He assisted in organizing the Lehigh Valley National Bank of Bethlehem in 1872, and officiated as its first cashier ; and he has served as a director of the E. P. Wilbur Trust Company since 1896.

In 1876, Mr. Cleaver was married to Eliza- beth K. Sayre, whose father, Robert H. Sayre, was very prominent in railroad and banking af- fairs of eastern Pennsylvania, for many years.

Kimber Cleaver, the distinguished engineer by whom Shamokin was laid out in 1835, was a native of Roaring Creek township, Columbia county, Pennsylvania, where he was born on the 17th of October, 1814, and was the youngest of five children born to Joseph and Sarah ( Brook) Cleaver, who was a son of John and Rebecca Cleaver, and was born in Berks county, Penn- sylvania, in October, 1764.

Kimber Cleaver began his career as an engineer during the construction of the Danville & Potts- ville Railroad, located at Shamokin shortly after the town was laid out, and was a member of the firm of Fagley, Cleaver & Company until 1844. During this period he was also connected with the Mount Carbon Railroad, constructed a map of the middle anthracite coal field from personal surveys, and located the route for a railroad from Shamokin to Pottsville. He was principally en- gaged in professional work in Schuylkill county from 1844 to 1850, and in the latter year laid

out Trevorton. He was chief engineer in the survey and construction of what is now known as the Herndon branch of the Philadelphia & Reading Railroad, and was subsequently con- nected in a similar capacity with the Philadel- phia & Sunbury Railroad; he also performed a large amount of very important engineering work at the various collieries of the Shamokin coal field. In politics he was closely identified with the Native American or Know Nothing party, of which he was the candidate for governor, sur- veyor general, and canal commissioner of Penn- sylvania, member of Congress, etc. The sugges- tion of the Atlantic cable was originally due to him, and a variety of ingenious and useful in- ventions also emanated from his fertile brain. He died on the 19th of October, 1858.

Kimber Cleaver was married Jan. 1, 1839, to Elizabeth Montelius Taylor, a daughter of Isaac and Elizabeth Taylor, and was born Sept. 10, 1819, while they resided at Mifflinburg, Union county, Pennsylvania. Five sons and five daugh- ters were born to this marriage, all of whom died in infancy and early childhood except Reynell C., and Kate, the sixth and ninth born.

Reynell C. was drowned while bathing in the Susquehanna river, Aug. 19, 1865, while a stud- ent at Dickinson Seminary, Williamsport, Pa. Kate married, in 1876, Elmer Heffelfinger, then editor of the Shamokin Herald. Mrs. Cleaver died March 3, 1886.

HENRY S. CLEMENS, M.D.

Henry S. Clemens, M.D., late of Allentown, was a member of the learned profession who was a credit to the vocation he had chosen, and to the city itself. Dr. Clemens devotes himself assidu- ously to his practice and the scientific investiga- tions which enhanced his professional knowledge and skill.

His father, Jacob Clemens, was a tanner by trade, but devoted the greater part of his life to farming pursuits, carrying on his agricultural la- bors in South Bethlehem. He died in 1872. The grandfather of our subject was Christian Clem- ens, a native of Doylestown, Bucks county, Pa. Our subject's mother, Catherine, was the daugh- ter of Jacob and Mary Ott, natives of Pleasant Valley, Bucks county, Pa. She was born in that place Nov. 21, 1811, and died in South Bethle- hem, March 11, 1890.

Dr. Clemens was the third in order of birth of a family of eight children, and was born Nov. 15, 1838. In his boyhood he was a student in the public schools of his native place, and later at- tended Tremont Seminary, at Norristown, and Union Seminary, in Union county, Pa. After a short time spent in teaching school in North-

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HISTORY OF LEHIGH COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

ampton county, this state, he pursued his studies in the seminary at New Berlin, this state, and in 1857 carried out his long-cherished desire of studying medicine. His first studies were con- ducted in the office of Dr. Abram Stout, of Beth- lehem, later he was with Dr. Kitchen, and then he entered the medical department of the Uni- versity of Pennsylvania, from which institution he was graduated in 1861. After receiving his diploma he began the practice of his profession

as his second wife Miss Elizabeth S. Jones, of Sinking Springs, Berks county, Pa.

In politics the Doctor was a . Prohibitionist. He was of a very religious bent of mind, and at the age of fourteen was converted and professed sanctification in the true Biblical sense on the 9th of June, 1890. He took the four-year's course of theology laid down in the Methodist Episcopal discipline, after which he served for many years as a local preacher in the Methodist Episcopal

DR. HENRY S. CLEMENS.

in Hosensack, Lehigh county. Later he removed to Friedensville, where he remained for seven years. He then came to Allentown, where he built up a lucrative practice, and lived until his death on March 27, 1901. He is buried on the family plot in Union cemetery.

February 2, 1862, Dr. Clemens married Miss Emelie, daughter of David Hartman. She died in Allentown, in October, 1870, after having become the mother of four children. He chose

Church. Later he filled a similar position in the Evangelical Church. He was also a gradu- ate of the Chautauqua School of Theology and the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle. The Deacon's Orders conferred upon him by Bishop Bowman endowed him with all the func- tions of the ministry.

One of the chief ambitions of Dr. Clemens was to give advantages to those who had none. In his labors of love he was called upon to preach

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the Gospel and establish Sabbath schools in vari- ous obscure and neglected places throughout the county of Lehigh, and, as a result of his work, many Sunday schools were established and chap- els built. He served many congregations without fee or earthly reward, and induced the prejudiced to come to Sabbath school, for in most of the localities the public generally were prejudiced against Methodism. For years, at great personal expense and sacrifice, he gave the children expen- sive rewards in order to induce them to come to church and Sabbath school, and thus cultivated a taste for a moral and religious life. In this way he was perhaps one of the greatest philan- thropists who ever lived in this community, for he ministered both to the temporal and spiritual wants of the people. Not only did he preach regularly to his parishioners the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but also, without remuneration, he buried the dead, and baptized and married his people.

When the great split took place in the Evan- gelical Association in 1892, he did not connect himself with any branch, but went about far and wide preaching holiness to both sides of the divi- sion. God having sent Luther into the world to revive the Bible doctrine of justification by faith, and John Wesley to revive the Bible doctrine of santification by faith, these doctrines the Doctor maintained, were the true foundation upon which the Evangelical Association was based; and for wandering from this old and true foundation the people were being punished and they must get back to it again.

Nor was the Doctor less active in temperance than in religious work. He traveled through this county and elsewhere establishing divisions, cir- culating temperance literature, and lecturing without any remuneration whatever. In the Sab- bath school, also, he inculcated in the minds of the children his own strict temperance principles, thus aiding them to start aright in the world. As a physician he was prominent, and had a large and profitable practice in the county, until he made chronic diseases a specialty, when his fame spread through the United States. He has treated patients also from Canada and Europe. Early in life he made a special study of the lungs, and pneumonia was the subject of his thesis when he was graduated from the University of Penn- sylvania, at Philadelphia, in 1861.

Probably no other physician has done as much as has Dr. Clemens to demonstrate the value of oxygen as a therapeutic agent. He manufactured it of the sesqui-oxide of iron in combinations

with various other chemicals, all the particulars of which he specifies in his will to his wife and children, so as to make it perpetual. He dis- covered that by combining various chemical gases and medicated vapors a system of therapeutics could be established effectual in nearly all dis- eases, and which could be administered by inhal- ation alone, this being more potent in effect than by stomach medication. By throwing remedies into the circulation by the medium of the lungs he discovered that they acted more effectively than by sending them into the circulation (where all curative agents must go), through the stom- ach. He was the first to discover that from twenty to thirty pounds of beef could be forced into the circulation in the form of essence, by compelling or increasing the powers of assimila- tion, which is a great boon in all wasting diseases. He was also the first to discover that the vital calibre of the lungs could be enlarged from sev- enty to one hundred, two hundred, three hundred, or even four hundred cubic inches in consump- tives, who are not too far gone in the work of de- cay in all tubercular affections, by inhaling oxy- gen in various combinations.

These two facts, the Doctor said, were part of the secrets of his great success in restoring consumptives or all persons suffering from wast- ing diseases. It was Dr. Clemen's discovery that the heart can be shrunk by inhaling oxygen in various combinations in cases of hypertrophy ; that all tumors can be scattered by increasing the power of both secretion and excretion, and re- storing every function to normal action by the oxygen treatment. He also discovered that all brain workers, who keep up a good physique by taxing the muscles as well as the brain, can great- ly increase the powers of brain function or capa- bilities by an occasional inhalation of oxygen, whether they are sick or well. When the brain is not too much compressed, occasional inhala- tions of oxygen will so elevate and refine the higher and finer functions of the brain as to make a Christian (especially a minister) capable of expounding any subject wherewith he may be familiar almost with the eloquence of an angel, so that his influence will be increased two-fold. Man's brain, when treated physically by oxygen in a proper manner, can be subjected to enor- mous strain and lifted to heights of ecstatic rap- ture in men of intellect, addicted to no bad habits. This is a discovery that Dr. Clemens had made after many experiments and extended experience. Oxygen, he thought, is yet in its in- fancy as a therapeutic agent.

VOL. II-13

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HISTORY OF LEHIGH COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

CLEWELL FAMILY.

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF FRANTZ CLEWELL. (Original name John Franz Clavell). Translated from the German Moravian Church Records of Schoeneck, Northampton County, Pa.

I was born on September 24, 1720, in Auer- bach, Baden-Durlach. My Grand Parents were French Protestant ( Huguenots), who fled from Dauphine, France, with their children, leaving all their possessions behind. It was quick flight or sure death for them. They be- came members of the Reformed church at Auer- bach, where I was born and baptized, and in my fifteenth year after careful instruction in Holy Writ and the doctrine of the Reformed Church was baptized and admitted to the Holy Com- munion. In my tenth year of age I had the mis- fortune of losing my father, Francis Clavell, by death, who in the full blessed assurance of Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, passed from time to. eternity.

After a lapse of one year my mother married again, John G. Fallens (Feller) who was born in Switzerland but owing to the French wars, which brought ruin and desolation, they emi- grated to North America, arriving in Philadel- phia in the Fall of 1737.

On our arrival my dear mother handed me over to my future master, and she begged him earnestly to see to it that I attend church regu- larly, as well as attend to my private devotions, and admonished me to continue in the fear of the Lord.

In the home of my new master, in the vicinity of Oley, Pennsylvania, during the five years of my service, I fared well, but there was little opportunity to attend religious services, because there was no church near. On one occasion I passed a house where there was a large gather- ing, so that many had to stand on the outside. I thought it was a public sale, and tied my horse and went in. I inferred it was a Roman Catho- lic Seminary, but was informed they were the "Herrnhuter," Moravians, who a short time ago came to this country and preached a new doc- trine. Upon further investigation I found the new doctrine the same which my sainted father held fast and in which he instructed me. The teaching of these truths engraved themselves upon my never dying soul, and through Grace and Mercy sprang up in due time and bore fruit. Amen !

In September, 1744, I married my dear wife, Salome Kuchley (a daughter of my mother's third husband), and we moved into the Oley

Hills. The next year we sold our possessions there and moved with our first born child, Mag- dalene, to near Nazareth, now Aluta, commonly known as Gold farm, in Northampton county. We suffered pioneer hardships, and frequently the Indians menaced us. Our greatest sorrow was that we had no minister or place of worship. In 1755, the Brethern of the Synod held at Bethel on the Swatavia, sent us a preacher. On one occasion, while my family was gathered around the table, I listened to the conversation of my children, and watching them closely, a terrible fear came upon me, lest I fell short of my duty and perchance one or another of them might go astray. I could not refrain from tears. In the distress of my heart I left the table and went out into the woods, where I expected to work, but my feelings overcame me when I fell on my knees and earnestly besought the Lord that He might take them into His own hands and guard them from all evil, since I lacked the needed wisdom to train them up in His fear. Then and there I experienced such a blessed as- surance that he had heard my prayers that I have since felt that they were safe in His hands.

These and many similar experiences which the dear Saviour made plain to my poor heart be- side the testimony of the blessed Gospel by the Brethern who preached statedly in my house, brought me into closer fellowship with Him: Since the year 1760, when they ceased to hold services in my house, we attended services at Nazareth, until October, 1762, when the first chapel in Schoeneck was dedicated. On that day I was admitted into the Society and on the first anniversary day of the congregation in No- vember admitted into full communicant member- ship. On the sixth day of August, 1763, I was permitted to partake of the Holy Communion, for which I had anticipated.

But I had another experience. Oh! the blessed assurance I received I cannot describe. Heart and eyes overflowed with thankful, penitential tears. Here I experienced fully what free grace really is. On this Grace my dear Saviour I will steadfastly lean until mine end.

Thus ends his own recital, but his obituary, preserved in the archives of the Schoeneck Mo- ravian Church, and from old documents, the following is culled :

Tradition stated, upon his arrival in Phila- delphia he was bound over to a Dr. Heister. a planter.

His wife, Salome, was born in Neureuth, in Baden-Durlach, January 15, 1728. She came to America in 1737, and also served a time as "Redemptioner" in Oley. After the death of her

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History of Lehigh county, Pennsylvania and a genealogical and biographical record of its families, Vol. II, Part 38

Author: Roberts, Charles Rhoads; Stoudt, John Baer, 1878- joint comp; Krick, Thomas H., 1868- joint comp; Dietrich, William Joseph, 1875- joint comp; Lehigh County Historical Society Publication date: 1914 Publisher: Allentown, Pa. : Lehigh Valley Publishing Co. Number of Pages: 948

Author: Roberts, Charles Rhoads; Stoudt, John Baer, 1878- joint comp; Krick, Thomas H., 1868- joint comp; Dietrich, William Joseph, 1875- joint comp; Lehigh County Historical Society
Publication date: 1914
Publisher: Allentown, Pa. : Lehigh Valley Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 948