These are some things I deduced from a careful review of the estate inventory of tangible personal property prepared for my 4GGrandfather Jacob Brumbaugh’s 1799 estate in Hagerstown, Washington County, Maryland, where he lived on a 900-acre wheat and grain farm, while owning 12 more farms in Morrisons’ Cove, Bedford Co, Pa,; he was survived by his widow Mary Elizabeth and 7 children (1 daughter Mary married to Dunker minister Samuel Ullery, and 6 sons: Jacob, John, David, Daniel, Henry and George):
Some key facts pertinent to the Brumbaugh story are confirmed and others revealed by a close examination of the inventory. He owned no firearms at his death which supports the conclusion he was a Dunker and in further confirmation the listing notes “16 benches and a Table Upstairs.” This fact is consistent with holding home church and with stories that many Dunkers homes had second stories where they drew together with their neighbors as a congregation.
Brumbaugh also owned two stills and all the accoutrements of a significant distillery along with 450 gallons of whiskey in inventory, confirming his secondary occupation as a distiller of what were then referred to as ardent spirits.
Brumbaugh’s farm was well stocked with a myriad of tools and equipment, supplies for a rainy day, and products to maintain his buildings and grounds, plus crops in the ground mostly grains, and several species of livestock . His farm had all the indications of a thriving ongoing operation despite Brumbaugh 73 years .
In addition, Brumbaugh owned “12 old books,” an indication of some literacy (though letters he wrote were probably scribed by the schoolmaster). Lastly the inventory shows how self-sufficient the Brumbaugh family was on their home farm. This enables one to gauge their thrift, a major contributor to the accumulation of wealth . According to a recent study of a general story in a neighborhood like Brumbaugh’s in the approximate time frame, alcohol and textiles (including clothing) made up 57% by dollar volume of sales that other people spent money on. As Brumbaugh ‘s family did not need. to buy these products, their cash outflow was reduced and they could keep more of the gross receipts of the sales of their farm products.
A review of inventories filed in the estates of five of his children also reveals an absence of any firearms. The remaining two children, for which there are no inventories extant , were John and Mary. John was a Dunker preacher and Mary was married to one, so it is unlikely as well that either of them owned firearms.
The List of Articles Sold at the vendue of Jacob Brumbaugh, deceased, was also illuminating:
The vendue held on Wednesday and Thursday, June 5 and 6, 1799, drew more than 77 people to bid on the 330 lots into which the auctioneers had arranged his goods and chattels. Brumbaugh family members bought in 138 items or 41% of the total number of lots. The widow Mary only bought in 15 lots for herself with four of her seven children buying in the rest. Son David had a fondness for horses and furniture, sons Jacob, Daniel, and Henry for farm equipment and supplies. Neither daughter Mary (or husband Samuel Ulery) nor son John, who all lived 80 miles away, nor youngest son George, a minor, purchased anything.
Over 77 persons purchased at least one lot, and the only women doing so were widow Mary and one other. Of those persons who purchased one lot or more, 33 men or 43% of the purchasers had German surnames (e.g., Engle, Butterbaugh, Volgamott, and Ridenour, etc.) and the rest either English, Scots, or Scots Irish names (e.g., Watt, Halbert , McFerrin, McLaughlin, Johnson, Jones, and Ferguson, etc.).
Probably many persons attended who bid on nothing, coming principally for the liquid or other refreshments as 49 men or 64% of those who purchased something purchased three items or less. Another hint that a good time was had by all is that 440 gallons of whiskey had been inventoried, yet only 356 gallons were listed as sold at the vendue. All of 84 gallons of good whiskey seemingly disappeared into thin air! About a gallon per person.
Of the 16 benches listed in the original inventory as found “Upstairs,” only 9 were disposed of at the sale and they were bought in for £1 and change, purchased by son Jacob, Jr. whose wife was a confirmed Dunker per her obituary (chances are they were passed on to whoever was currently holding house church).
The eight-day clock, often viewed as an heirloom in many estates, had been appraised at $25 and was sold outside the family to a Hershberger for £12. A gray mare and a gray gelding were the highest priced items, selling for £45 each.
A sign of the confusing monetary system at the time is that while the estate inventory and appraisement was listed in dollars and cents, the list of articles sold at the vendue was listed, and the auction presumably conducted in pounds, shillings, and pence.
List, Washington County Register of Wills (Accounts of Sale), 1787-1802, Maryland Hall of Records #16,278, pp. 259-269.
Jacob Brumbaugh, deceased: Inventory of Personal Property
Liber B, Folio 307, 4 pages (images 253-56), Maryland Archives
[Author’s transcription of manuscript appraisal filed in Washington County court, but now kept in the Hall of Records in Annapolis.]
Inventory of the Goods and Chattels of Jacob Brumbaugh late of Washington County Deceased appraised in Dollars and Cents by the Subscribers being lawfully authorized and Sworn this Twenty-first day of May 1799.
To wearing apparel $ 8.00
To 1 Bed and Bedstid the old womans 18.00
To 1 Bed Do. 12.00
To 2 Beds and Bedstids upstairs 24.00
To Womans Saddle 5. 1 Table 4 9.00
To 8 Windsor Chairs 6. 1 old Clock 32 38.00
To 3 old chairs .45 1 ten plate Stove & pipe & port Mantau 25 26.45
To 1 old Stove Do. 5. 1 old chest 12 old Books 3.60 9.50
To 1 flower Chest and Dough Trough 6.50
To 1 Table & 16 Benches up Stairs 4.00
To 1 Cross Cut Saw 5. 1 spinning wheel .50 5.50
To 1 Copper Kittle 20.00
To 1 old Chest & 13 old flower Barrels 4.00
To 1 pickling tub 1. 2 Brass Kittles 12 13.00
To 1 Butter Tub .50 3 old Back & pan 3 old spinning wheels 4.60
To 1 Check reel old .30. dry apples @ .50 p. Bushel .30
To Salt & Pepper Leather 3. 9-½ B. Buckweat 4.75 7.75
To 1 Woollen Cloth @ 50 Cents per yard 9.50
To 295 lb. of Bacon @ 12 Cents per 35.52
To 1 old Chest & 1 old Bell .50 1 pt of hackels 4 4.60
To 88 Bushels of Oats 25.40
To hemp Tod [sic?] & flax Yarn 6. m. of Wool 3.50 9.60
[Subtotal $ 295.22 ]
[page 2]
To 16 old Bea? Scabs 1. 2 Big Spinning wheels 1.50 2.50
To 2 Bed Stids 2.50 2 old Chairs and 4 old Baskets .50 3.00
To 1 washing tub & 2 riddles 2. 1 Cleaner 1 rope 1.60 3.60
To 1 Shovel Plough, tub & Branding Irons .90
To 1 Gusting? how & 2 Choppers 2.50 5 Iron Forks 1. 3.50
To 2 Brass Casks 2. 1 Barrel with Chop rye .60 2.60
To 1 hammer .50
[ Subtotal $ 1563.07]
[Total $ 2485.09 + 16.04] $2501.13
John Schnebely, Ludwick Young, appraisers
Daniel Brumbaugh, David Brumbaugh, Henry Brumbaugh,
Washington County : On the 3 day of August 1799 came Jacob Brumbaugh, [Jr.] one of the admrs. of Jacob Brumbaugh Deceased and made Oath* on the holy Evangels of Almighty God that the foregoing is a true and just Inventory of all and singular of the Good and chattels of the said Deceased, that hath come to his hands and Possession at the time of the making thereof and that what hath been or shall hereafter come to his hands or possession he will return an additional Inventory that he knows of no concealment being part of parcel of the Deceased Estate by any person whatsoever, and that if he shall hereafter discover any Concealment or suspect any to his he will acquaint the Judges of the Orphans’ Court with such concealment or cause of suspicion that it may be inquired into according to Law.
Certified by Thomas Belt, Register
[Editor’s note: *If Jacob Brumbaugh Jr. “made oath” by swearing to the truth of this Inventory so publicly, he surely was making a statement that he was no Brethren.]
Although Jacob owned a successful farm, surviving records do not indicate that Jacob owned slaves; grain did not require year around labor unlike tobacco. A tax assessment from 1783 included a column for slaves, and he was listed as having none.[1] “The economically rational antebellum wheat farmer almost always employed wage labor,” concluded historical geographer Carville V. Earle, because the crop’s seasonal labor requirements made hired farmhands “decidedly cheaper and more efficient than slaves.”[2]
Jacob had as many as three to six sons at home working his fields from the late 1770s to the late 1790s, along with a wife and one daughter who did necessary harvesting, spun wool and prepared meals and drinks. They fulfilled traditional female roles within this household. Jacob gave or sold his son John a piece of the big farm to cultivate as his own in 1780, after turning twenty. He also gave or sold his eldest son Jacob, Jr. a 140-acre tract named Good Luck in Antietam Hundred at about the same time.
The 1783 Washington County Tax Assessment indicated that Jacob Sr. owned 431-½ acres on Clalands Contrivance and Timber Bottom. Althoughincorrectly listed to Jacob, Jr., documents revealed that Jacob Sr. owned them at death. His son John was listed in the same tax assessment for Salisbury and Conococheague Hundreds. “Jacob, Jr.” — his father’s real listing— owned 332 acres of woods, nine acres of meadow, ninety acres of arable land, nine horses, and twenty black cattle, according to this document. His son John had at the time 34 acres of woods, three acres of meadow, 35 acres of arable land, four horses and ten black cattle. Neither of the Brumbaugh property owners paid a tax on slaves, although some neighbors did so.[3]
A farmer such as Jacob could look out on his surroundings before the Revolution, and sense the bustling activity, the mounting population, and men and women of about four ethnic strains and diverse religious beliefs. The population of Maryland had swelled rapidly during the eighteenth century. While at the beginning of the century in 1700 there were about 34,000 people, of whom twelve percent were slaves, by 1782 there were over 250,000 of which thirty-three percent were slaves. In 1770, Eddis sent this account of his view of Maryland back to England: “the inhabitants are enterprising and industrious, commerce and agriculture are encouraged; and every circumstance clearly evinces that this colony is making a rapid Progress to wealth, Power and population.”[4]
By the 1770s, however, Hagerstown, or Hagerstaun as the German language printer Adam Gruber called it in his later almanacs, no longer sat on the Maryland frontier where people could find inexpensive, unoccupied land. For that, one would have to look further west. In 1770, Maryland’s populace included about five percent planters and merchant elite at the top, twenty-five percent middling farmers and townspeople such as Jacob.
[2] Max L. Grivno, Gleanings of Freedom,Free and Slave Labor along the Mason-Dixon Line, 1790-1860 (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2011), 92. He cited Carville V. Earle, “A Staple Interpretation of Slavery and Free Labor,” Geographical Review 68 (January 1978), 51-65.
Jacob Brumbaugh’s original name was Johann Jakob Brombach.[1] His parents were Jakob Brombach and his wife, Anna Catharina. They lived in the tiny village of Osthelden where they recorded Johann Jakob’s birth as having occurred between two and three in the afternoon of February 8, 1726, in the area around Siegen, Westphalia, Germany. They were part of the Protestant parish of Ferndorf, Kirchenkreis Siegen. They had Jakob baptized there, recording it in the baptism registry book on February 17, 1726. His parents asked Johannes Plim[m] to serve as his sponsor.[2] There in nearby Ferndorf was an “Evangelisch” church, which indicated that parishioners followed either the Lutheran or Reformed tradition.[3]
Jakob’s parents had married on the first of February, 1720, Jakob’s father, born April 1, 1690, died October 12, 1738, and was buried two days later at the age of 48 years. Jakob was the eldest son and had five siblings: one older sister, Anna Maria, born 1723, and three younger sisters, Anna Christina, born 1728, Anna Catharina, born 1734, and Maria Catharina, born 1737. His probable younger brother, Johannes Heinrich, was born 1731.[4]
Back then his small village offered the Brombachs marginal agriculture, and few raw materials, including stands of beech and oak trees on steep slopes. The valleys of the surrounding area were not broad. Forests covered the majority of the territory mid-way down the Rhine River valley, toward the port of Rotterdam in Holland. The Brombachs lived on the edge of this forest with a little farming, some pasturing, and a trade. This served to circumscribe their lives; they barely eked out a living for their growing family.
Most German immigrants to America in that era were palatines. Oddly, Jacob was from a land area then known as the Principality of Nassau-Siegen, now the German state of Westphalia, but located just a couple miles outside what was commonly thought of in the eighteenth century as the Palatinate. In 1743, these lands became part of the territory united under Prince William of Orange-Nassau and he was the ruler, dying in 1751, from whose territory Jacob emigrated. Siegerland, as it was sometimes called, had iron mines and forges. Forges require high-quality fuel to smelt ore, and the forests could provide that. The forests had many charcoal burners’ huts producing charcoal, which they transported westward, overland to the forges of Siegen. Jacob could have stayed and become part of that limited economy, but he chose not to do so.
In the era of Jakob’s birth, the areas surrounding Jakob’s home village still operated as feudal states. Farmers, such as his father, were subjects of the legal authority of minor nobles. The nobles had enormous power over the personal and economic circumstances of their subjects. There was not enough land for men such as Jacob to earn sufficient money to support their families. Men in his position therefore leased extra land for eight-year periods from the Count or the parish. Taxes and fees consumed any possible profits the farmer could have—fees on cattle, poultry, other livestock and firewood, charges were imposed for the Count’s messengers, watchmen, and threshers as well. One-tenth of the farmer’s grains, hay, sheep, and calves had to be delivered to the Count’s farms. Alone these fees and taxes were not great, but in the aggregate they caused a great deal of hardship on men like Jakob. In addition, a farmer had to perform certain services for the Count, including hunting for him, transporting wood for him, and working for set periods on the Count’s farm. The cumulative effect of these taxes, fees, and service obligations created altogether a crushing economic weight.[5] From 1700, for the better part of the next century, the Germans in Osthelden and surrounding communities began to migrate to whatever region they thought offered better opportunities for their families.
However, to do so, a man like Jakob could either travel east, where by far the greatest number of emigrants went, to Russian or Ukrainian or other Eurasian towns whose princes sought good farmers and settlers. One could also travel west a few miles to board a boat on the Rhine traveling downriver through various, additional fee-charging points to the city of Rotterdam, in Holland. There it was possible to board a ship bound for the British colonies in North America for payment of fee about £5 or board without paying anything on the condition that upon arrival, the ship captain could sell by indenture of servitude the passenger’s time for five to seven years working for a settler there, either another German or a person of English or other origins who became one’s master.[6]
To get to Rotterdam, Jakob needed to travel 200 miles. To emigrate from most places in the Rhineland or near it, most people had to apply first for manumission. The overlord had the power to grant it, and it often came with taxes imposed. Because of these taxes some emigrants did not apply for a visa. One study says that about twenty-five percent of émigrés left without the exit visa; they left secretly.[7] Those who left without express permission forfeited any inheritance from family one may have left behind. As Jakob is alleged to have arrived with £50, he may have carried his inheritance with him (as we previously learned, his father died in 1738), and he seems never to have revealed his birth family or village of origin. At least we have found no record of his revealing these matters.
Once in America, Jakob dropped his Germanic name Johann, in favor of his second or ‘call name,’ the spelling of which he Anglicized to Jacob, while his last name became Anglicized, his full name thus becoming Jacob Brumbaugh. Because eighteenth-century individuals treated spelling casually, Jacob’s name appeared in many various spellings, mostly as Brumbach, Brumback, Brombach, Broombach, Brumbaugh, Brombaugh, or Broombaugh. Although not a common German name, other individuals arrived and resided nearby with the same surname, even with the same Christian names as those of his children. These were Jacob’s probable brother, Johannes Henrich Brumbaugh, and his four sons and his daughters.[8]
[1] Anne Schmidt-Lange-Brumbaugh Report dated June 7, 2014 (author’s copy), based on LDS Film 0596749, Protestant Church Records of Ferndorf, Kirchenkrais Siegen, Principality of Nassau-Siegen (in 1726), now Westphalia, Germany; Baptisms, 1716-1781, p. 86, no. 8 for the year, top of page. Gaius Marcus Brumbaugh’s compiled study Genealogy of the Brumbach Familiesincluding those using the following variations of the original name, Brumbaugh, Brumbach, Brumback, Brombaugh, Brownback, and many other connected families (New York: Hitchcock, 1913) became the bible for research and study of families of this surname and for its time was one of the best of the genre, not only for its comprehensiveness, but also for its liberal reference to and reproduction of land records and its dozens of primary source documents illustrated throughout the book. It did not, however, solve the mystery of where Jacob Brumbaugh was born or when. A typescript genealogy “Descendants of Johann Jacob Brumbach” showing the line of descent from Johann Jacob Brumbaugh was published in 1999 in limited form by Richard Lee Hartle. It is available in the John Clinton Frye Western Maryland Room of the Washington County Free Library in Hagerstown, Maryland. Mr. Hartle added a good deal of information on many branches of the tree and had a hand in inspiring the present work before, sadly, passing on in 2012, his 91st year. G.M. Brumbaugh (1861-1952) was a descendant of Jacob’s brother, Johannes Henrich Brumbaugh (1731-ca 1760), and a physician who for twenty-five years, 1917 until 1942, served as editor of the National Genealogical Society Quarterly. G.M. Brumbaugh’s Genealogy contained many and varied clues to the villages of origin of the Brumbaughs, but not to Osthelden from which German genealogist in 2014 found Brumbaugh to have emigrated. The city of Müsen had been suggested by other sources, and near there the towns of Osthelden and Ferndorf were found, particularly the Protestant church in Ferndorf, where Brumbaugh was baptized.
[2] LDS Film 0596749, Protestant Church Records of Ferndorf, Kirchenkreis Siegen, Westphalia, Germany, Baptisms 1716-1781, 86:8. All secondary sources searched to date used a birth year of 1728, which is inconsistent with Jacob’s own later assertion in 1776 that he was age fifty. No other source had ever been found prior to the 2014 report with any further explanation or reference to primary sources for that year 1728; accordingly, 1726 has been established for his birthdate. See, e.g., G.M. Brumbaugh, Genealogy, 144.
[3] It consists of a late Romanesque hall church and a western tower and three-halled nave with a tower built before it. (A current photo of the church can be found online).
[4] LDS Film 0596756, PCRF, KS, G, Deaths, 157; LDS Film 0596749, Ibid, Baptisms 1716-1781, 68, 107, 138, 167, and 199.
[7] Duane M. Broline and Robert A. Selig, “‘Emigration and the ‘Safety-Valve’ Theory in the Eighteenth Century, Some Mathematical Evidence from the Prince-Bishopric of Würzburg,” in Yearbook of German American Studies 31 (1996): 145.
[8] Johannes Henrich Brumbach arrived in Philadelphia on the ship Neptune in 1754. He had four surviving sons, Jacob (called “Jockel”), George (called “Yarrick”), Conrad, and Johannes (called Johannes the Strump Weber in German or “the stocking weaver” in English). Documentation of the father is hard to find, but the sons are well documented. G.M. Brumbaugh, Genealogy, 349. Martin Grove Brumbaugh, governor of Pennsylvania 1914-1919, and Gaius Marcus Brumbaugh, M.D., the genealogist who wrote that 1913 book of family genealogy, were both descendants of Johannes Heinrich.
Primary Sources (printed, digitized, and otherwise):
Archives of Maryland, Edward C. Paperfuse State Archives Building, Annapolis, Maryland.
Ledger of Commissioners for Emitting Bills of Credit, vol. 1767-1779 (manuscript accounting); MSA No. S752.
Archives online for Land Records, especially images of pre-1800 manuscript surveys and records of land warrants issued.
Archives of Pennsylvania, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania:
Land Records including images online of pre-1800 manuscript surveys as well as chronological registers of land warrants issued.
Bedford County, Pennsylvania, 1786-1791 Tax Duplicates, images of manuscript found on Brethren Archives, Ministers & Congregations site http://mincon.brethrenarchives.com. Thanks to A. Wayne Webb and Gale E. S. Honeyman for posting these documents.
Daughters of the American Revolution (National Society), Library, Manuscript Collection 277 (Genealogical Archives of Gaius Marcus Brumbaugh, M.D.—National Genealogical Society editor, 1917-1942), photographic copy of manuscript Minutes of the Committee of Observation of Hagerstown, Maryland, 1775-1777, Washington D.C.
Drinker, Elizabeth Sandwith, Diary of Elizabeth Drinker, Elaine Forman Crane, ed., (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1991) 3 volumes. Drinker mentioned thousands of names in her fifty years of diary writing, and when she mentioned “Jacob Brombaugh” for a visit Jacob, Jr. paid to her husband, Quaker merchant Henry Drinker, she added that he had breakfasted with HD on that August 23, 1803, to pay him some money (vol. 3: 1677).
Drinker, Henry (1734-1809), Henry Drinker Papers 1756-1869; Henry Drinker Business Collection #176, Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
Duplicate [Tax Roll] for the Residentors in Woodberry township for the Year 1786, photocopy of manuscript (Bedford Springs, Pa.: Pioneer Library of Bedford County Historical Society, unknown date).
Eddis, William, Letters from America, Aubrey C. Land, ed. (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of the Harvard University Press, 1969).
Faris, William, The Diary of William Faris, The Daily Life of an Annapolis Silversmith, Mark B. Letzer and Jean B. Russo, eds. (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, 2003). A wonderful accomplishment, creating a history of personalities on many levels of Maryland society in old Annapolis from this modest diary of an observant craftsman, father, friend, active citizen. It contains many beautiful surprises.
Journals of the Continental Congress, 1774-1789, Worthington Chauncey Ford, ed., vol. VIII 1777 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1907).
Juniata College, Beeghly Library, Archives: Manuscript Collection #1, Archives of Martin G. Brumbaugh; Manuscript Collection #2, Archives of Gaius Marcus Brumbaugh, M.D.; Huntingdon, Pennsylvania. Collection #2 contains much primary source material submitted by Brumbaugh descendants in connection with publication by G.M.B. of the 1913 family genealogy.
Lancaster County Committee of Observation, Broadside dated July 11, 1775, imprint of John Bailey, King’s-Street, Lancaster. Lititz Moravian Museum and Church, Lititz, PA.
Lowry, Jean, A Journal of the Captivity of Jean Lowry and her Children, Giving an Account of her being taken by the Indians, the 1st of April 1756, from William McCord’s, in Rocky-Spring Settlement in Pennsylvania, With an Account of the hardships she suffered, & c. (Philadelphia: William Bradford, 1760; reprint of the original text Mercersburg, Pa.: Conococheague Institute & Museum, 2008).
Mack, Alexander, Jr., The Day Book/Account Book of Alexander Mack, Jr. (1712-1803), Weaver, Brethren Elder, Apologist, and Chronicler in Early America, transcription and translation by Edward E. Quitner, annotated by Donald F. Durnbaugh (Kutztown, Pa.: The Pennsylvania German Society, 2004). A remarkable resource concerning Brethren in the eighteenth century both in the city and in rural areas, written by a sensitive and thoughtful minister with much good wisdom to impart.
Minutes of the Proceedings of the Committee of Observation of Elizabeth Town [Hagers town, Washington County] for 1775, 1776, 1777 in the Maryland Historical Magazine (Baltimore, Md.: Maryland Historical Society, 1917-1918) volume 12 (1917), 142-163; 261-275; and 324-347; and volume 13 (1918), 28-53; and 227-248. Photographic copy of manuscript Minutes of the Committee of Observation of Elizabeth Town [Hagerstown, Washington County], Maryland, 1775-1777, in archives of Gaius Marcus Brumbaugh, M.D., Library of National Society, Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR), Washington D.C.
Mittelberger, Gottlieb, Gottlieb Mittelberger’s Journey to Pennsylvania in the year 1750 and Return to Germany in the year 1754, Containing not only a Description of the Country According to its Present Condition . . . ., Carl Theo. Eben, trans. (Philadelphia: John Jos. McVey, 1898).
Wills, administrators’ accounts in Hagerstown office.
Estate papers before 1800 in Archives of Maryland, Hall of Records, Annapolis.
Return for different species of Grains Purchased by Henry Schnebley in Washington county, by order of an Act of assembly, April 16, 1780; Maryland State Papers, Red books, vol. 23, location: 01/06/04/022 MdHR#4590: MSA: S989-34.
Revolutionary War Military Collection, Manuscript MS.576 (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, Manuscript Division). The treason trial in Frederick town, Frederick County, Md., 1781.
Western Maryland Historical Library, online at www.whilbr.org.: online collections:
Tax Assessment for Washington County, Maryland, 1783,
Tax Assessment for Washington County, Maryland, 1803-04,
Washington County, Maryland, Land Patents 1730-1830,
Washington County Maryland, Court Dockets 1779-1793,
Sheriff Nathaniel Rochester’s Records, Washington County, 1804-06
Slavery in western Maryland.
This resource is invaluable for 18th c.-Washington County research and it is a great credit to the library that it publishes this online in a very accessible format.
Brown, Helen W., ed., “Marriages and Deaths 1830-1837 Recorded in The Republican Banner;”typescript, compiled 1962 (Hagerstown, Maryland: Washington County Historical Society, 1962).
Weiser, Frederick J., trans. and ed., Maryland German Church Records, vols. I-XVIII.
Coldham, Peter William, ed., Settlers of Maryland, 1751-1765 (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1998).
Strassburger, Ralph Beaver, and William J. Hincke, eds., Pennsylvania German Pioneers (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania German Society, 1934).
Pennsylvania’s Civil War Conscientious Objectors Databasefound online at the public portion of the Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania website: http//:gsp.org.
Proceedings of the Maryland Convention, 1775 to October 1777.
Revolutionary War Military Collection, Manuscript MS.1146 (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, Manuscript Division).
Wahll, Andrew J., ed. and compiler, Braddock Road Chronicles 1755 (Bowie, Md.: Heritage Books, Inc., 1999).
Secondary Sources:
Adams, Willi Paul, “The Colonial German-language Press and the American Revolution,” in The Press & the American Revolution, Bernard Bailyn and John B. Hench, eds. (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1981), 151-225.
Africa, J. Simpson, History of Huntingdon and Blair Counties, Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: Louis H. Everts, 1883).
Anderson, Fred, A People’s Army, Massachusetts Soldiers and Society in the Seven Years War (1984).
_______, George Washington Remembers: Reflections on the French and Indian War (New York: Rowan and Littlefield, 2004).
_______, The War that Made America (New York: Penguin Group, 2005).
An Index to Hager’s-town Newspapers, Jan. 1820-Dec. 1824 (Hagerstown, Md.: Washington County Free Library.
Ankrum, Freeman, Sidelights on Brethren History (Elgin, Ill.: Brethren Press, 1962).
Arnold, Joseph and Anirban Basu, Maryland: Old Line to New Prosperity (Sun Valley, Ca.: American Historical Press, 2003).
David Skaggs, The Roots of Maryland Democracy; Ronald Hoffman, A Spirit of Dissension; and U.S. Census Bureau, historical statistics of the U.S.
Bach, Jeff, Voices of the Turtledoves, The Sacred World of Ephrata (University Park, Pa.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2004). A wonderful resource for feeling the eccentricities of this community of Brethren outliers of outliers.
Bailey, Chris H., compiler, The Stulls of “Millsborough,” A Genealogical History of John Stull, “The Miller,’ Pioneer of Western Maryland (compiler, 2000), 2 volumes.
Beiler, Rosalind J., Immigrant and Entrepreneur- The Atlantic World of Caspar Wistar, 1650-1750 (University Park, Pa.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2008). Beautifully researched and constructed.
Bell, Herbert C., History of Leitersburg District, Washington County, Maryland (Leitersburg, Md.: author, 1898). This is a marvelously well researched little volume which is very useful for people tracing their ancestors from this region, which is northeast of Hagerstown and immediately to the east of Jacob Brumbaugh’s property.
Besse, Joseph, A COLLECTION of the SUFFERINGS Of the PEOPLE called QUAKERS for the Testimony of a Good Conscience, from the TIME of their being first distinguished by that NAME in the Year 1650, to the TIME of the Act, commonly called the Act of Toleration, granted Protestant Dissenters in the first Year of the Reign of King William the Third and Queen Mary, in the Year 1689 (London: Luke Hinde, 1753), 2 volumes; found online at https://archive.org/stream/collectionofsuff01bess#page/n3/mode/2up). The Quaker equivalent of the Martyrs’ Mirror.
Bittinger, Emmert F., Allegheny Passage, Churches and Families, West Marva District Church of the Brethren(Camden, Me.: Penobscot Press, 1990).
_____, “The Maryland Brethren During the Revolutionary War: Interpretations and Clarifications,”Mennonite Family History, January 1997 (Lancaster: Lancaster Mennonite Historical Society, 1997).
Bodle, Wayne, The Valley Forge Winter, Civilians and Soldiers in War (University Park, Pa.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2002; paperback edition, 2004).
Breen, T. H., Tobacco Culture: The Mentality of the Great Tidewater Planters on the Eve of the Revolution (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1985).
_____, American Insurgents, American Patriots—The Revolution of the People (New York: Hill & Wang, 2010).
Brethren Genealogy List, archives: http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/index?list=brethren . Join the list for guidance by some very long experienced and generous Brethren genealogists and researchers all over the country.
Bricker, Calvin, Jr. and Dr. Walter L. Powell, Conflict on the Conococheague, 1755-1758 Terror in the backcountry of Pennsylvania and Maryland (Mercersburg, Pa.: Conococheague Institute & Museum, 2009).
Browne, William Hand, ed., Journal and correspondence of the Maryland Council of Safety July 7-December 31, 1776,Archives of Maryland, vol. XII (Baltimore: 1893).
Brugger, Robert J., Maryland: A Middle Temperament, 1634-1980 (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988; Merrick edition).
Brumbaugh, Gaius Marcus, Genealogy of the Brumbach FamiliesIncluding Those Using the Following Variations of the Original Name, Brumbaugh, Brumbach, Brumback, Brombaugh and Brownbackand Many Other Connected Families (New York: Frederick Hitchcock, 1913). The book is a magnificent work for its comprehensiveness and for all the primary source documents reproduced photographically and transcribed for inclusion. Dr. Brumbaugh (1862-1952), a direct descendant of Jacob’s brother, Johannes Henrich Brumbaugh, was a medical doctor and genealogist who became editor-in-chief in 1917 of the National Genealogical Society Quarterly, serving in that position for twenty-five years while also publishing some books of his own. He was also a devoted lay leader of the Church of the Brethren and a long time board member of his alma mater, Juniata College, one of seven Brethren colleges.
_____, ed., Maryland Records: Colonial, Revolutionary, Court and Church from Original Sources (Baltimore, Md.: Genealogical Publishing Co., reprint, 1975), 2 volumes.
Brumbaugh, Martin Grove, A History of the German Baptist Brethren in Europe and America (Mount Morris, Ill.: Brethren Publishing House, 1899). This Dr. Brumbaugh (1862-1930) was a direct descendant of Jacob’s brother, Johannes Henrich Brumbaugh. Dr. Brumbaugh was the first Brethren to earn a Ph.D. (1894- University of Pennsylvania), a leading educator nationally of his time, a leading historian of the Church of the Brethren at that time as well, the first professor of pedagogy at the University of Pennsylvania, president of Juniata College (two terms, the first beginning when he was 32), a Brethren lay preacher, the Superintendent of Schools of Philadelphia (1906-1915), and, though an avowed pacifist, the proud “war governor” (elected as a Republican) of Pennsylvania (1915-1919).
_______, Acceptance Address, Upon Presentation of the Memorial Arch by the United States to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Valley Forge, June 19, 1917, (Harrisburg: Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 1917) (Delaware State Archives).
_______, “The Church in the Homeland,” chapter One of Three Centuries of The Church of the Brethren or the Beginnings of the Brethren, Bicentennial Addresses at the Annual Conference Held at Des Moines, Iowa, June 3, -11, 1908 (Elgin, Ill.: Brethren Publishing House, 1908).
Burdge, Edsel, Jr. and Samuel L. Horst, Building on the Gospel Foundation, The Mennonites of Franklin County, Pennsylvania and Washington County, Maryland (Scottdale Pa.: Herald Press, 2004).
Christopher Saur (variant spellings Sauer, Sower), website curated by John Byer, http://www.johnbryer.com/saur.htm. A very helpful site for a quick view of the impressive Saur legacy and some images of Saur objects.
Clemens, S. Eugene, and F. Edward Wright, eds., The Maryland Militia in the Revolutionary War (Silver Spring, Md.: Family Line Publications, 1987)
Cooper, H. Austin, Two Centuries of Brothersvalley Church of the Brethren 1762-1962, An account of the Old Colonial Church, the Stony Creek German Baptist Church and the area of Brudersthal [Somerset County, Pa., contiguous to Bedford County on the west] in which the Brethren settled in the summer of 1762, and organized by George Adam Martin, presiding Elder (Somerset, Pa.: Cooper, 1962).
______, A Pleasant View, Pleasant View Church of the Brethren, Burkittsville, Maryland (Baltimore, Md.: Pleasant View Church of the Brethren, 1998). Rev. Cooper, who was minister of this church, elaborated on the Johann Jacob Brumbaugh Braddock Campaign story here late in his life, but provided no primary sources.
Crackel, Theodore J., “Revolutionary War Pension Records and Patterns of American Mobility, 1780–1830” in Prologue Magazine of the National Archives and Record Administration, vol. 16, no. 3 (Fall 1998), found online (1/2012).
Dalzell, Robert F., Jr., and Lee Baldwin Dalzell, George Washington’s Mount Vernon: At Home in Early America (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998).
Davey, H. D., and J. Quintner, eds., Minutes of the Annual Meetings of the Brethren (Dayton, Ohio: Christian Publishing Association, 1876).
Davis, Vernon A., Early Hagerstown as Seen by John Gruber (Hagerstown: Venture Enterprises, 1976).
Dreisdach, Daniel L. and Mark David Hall, eds., The Sacred Rights of Conscience, Selected Writings on Religious Liberty and Church-State Relations in the American Founding (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2009).
Drinker, Henry S., “History of the Drinker Family,” typescript (1961) (Historical Society of Pennsylvania).
Durnbaugh, Donald F., ed., The Brethren in Colonial America (Elgin, Il.: The Brethren Press, 1967).
____, “Was Christopher Sauer a Dunker?,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, vol. 93 (1969), 383-391.
____, ed., The Brethren Encyclopedia (Philadelphia, Pa.: The Brethren Encyclopedia, Inc., 1983), vol. 1.
____, The Donald F. Durnbaugh Archive, The Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, Elizabethtown College, Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania.
Eby, Lela, The History of the Church of The Brethren in the Middle District of Pennsylvania (1924).
Eshleman, H. Frank, Historic Background and annals of the Swiss and German Pioneer Settlers of Southeastern Pennsylvania, and of their Remote Ancestors, From the Middle of the Dark Ages, Down to the Time of the Revolutionary War (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1917, reprint, 1982).
Fischer, David Hackett, Washington’s Crossing (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004)
Fogleman, Aaron Spencer, Hopeful Journeys: German Immigration, Settlement, and Political Culture in Colonial America, 1717-1775 (Philadelphia, Pa.: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996).
Fox, Francis S., Sweet Land of Liberty, The Ordeal of the American Revolution in Northampton County, Pennsylvania(University Park, Pa.: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000). An independent researcher’s quirky but excellent collection of essays on the American Revolution in this backcountry county with numerous sectarians.
Fuller, Marsha Lynn, ed., Naturalizations of Washington County, Maryland Prior to 1880 (Hagerstown, Md.: Desert Sheik Press, 1997).
Gerzina, Gretchen Holdbrook, Mr. and Mrs. Prince: How an Extraordinary Eighteenth-Century Family Moved Out of Slavery and Into Legend (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2008). Inspirational research and close analysis.
Gillis, John, The Affirmation for Quakers, Menonist [sic] and Dunkers, MSS, Red Book, vol. 19, folio 83, Archives of Maryland, Annapolis.
Gilpin, Thomas, Jr., Exiles in Virginia: With Observations on the Conduct of the Society of Friends during the Revolutionary War, comprising the Official Papers of the Government Relating to that Period, 1777-1778(Philadelphia: Thomas Gilpin, 1848).
History of Bedford, Somerset and Fulton Counties, Pennsylvania (Chicago: Waterman, Watkins & Co., 1884).
Hoecker, Edward W., The Sower Printing House of Colonial Times (Norristown, Pa.: The Pennsylvania German Society, 1948), 1-125.
Hofstadter, Richard, America at 1750: A Social Portrait (New York: Vintage Books Edition; Feb. 1973; Random House, Inc., 1971).
Hooker, Edward W., Genealogical Data Relating to the German Settlers of Pennsylvania and Adjacent Territory from Advertisements in German Newspapers Published in Philadelphia and Germantown, 1743-1800 (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1981). A real find for those who cannot read the German newspapers of that era.
Houpt, James W., Jr., In His Own Words: The Diary of James McCullough, 1722-1781, One Man’s Chronicle of Colonial History (Mercersburg, Pa.: James W. Houpt, Jr., 2013). Images and editorial comment on a surviving manuscript diary by a Scotch-Irish farmer and linen weaver residing in the Pennsylvania portion of the Conococheague district between 1753 and 1758.
Hunter, Brooke, “The Prospect of Independent Americans: The Grain Trade and Economic Development During the 1780s” in Explorations in Early American Culture, vol. 5 (2001) (University Park, Pa.: Historical Association for the McNeil Center for Early American Studies, 2001).
Jones, U. J., History of the Early Settlement of the Juniata Valley (Harrisburg, Pa.: The Telegraph Press, 1940).
Kaylor, Earl C., Jr., Out of the Wilderness, 1780-1980, The Brethren and Two Centuries of Life in Central Pennsylvania(New York: Cornwall Books, 1981).
_____, Martin Grove Brumbaugh, A Pennsylvanian’s Odyssey From Sainted Schoolman to Bedeviled World War I Governor, 1862-1930 (Cranbury, N.J.: A Juniata College Publication at Fairleigh Dickenson University, 1996).
Kessel, Elizabeth Augusta, “Germans on the Maryland Frontier: A Social History of Frederick County, Maryland, 1730-1800,” unpublished Ph.D. dissertation (Rice University, 1981). Based on case studies of many immigrants and government records, the author of this valuable resource refers to “the subtle balance between cultural persistence and accommodation these settlers achieved” by the end of the eighteenth century.
Knauss, James O., “Social conditions Among the Pennsylvania Germans in the Eighteenth Century, as Revealed in the German Newspapers Published in America” in Pennsylvania — The German Influence in its Settlement and Development (Lancaster: The Pennsylvania- German Society, 1922).
_____, “Christopher Saur The Third” (Worcester, Mass.: American Antiquarian Society, 1931). This is an incisive article on the prominence of the Saur family dynasty of German printers in Germantown.
Kraybill, Mary Jean, Gerald R. Brunk, and James O. Lehman, “A Guide to Select Revolutionary War Records pertaining to the Mennonites and other Pacifist Groups in Southeastern Pennsylvania and Maryland 1775-1800” (typescript)(Harrisonburg, Va.: Eastern Mennonite College, 1974).
Kurtz, Elder Henry, ed., The Brethren Encyclopedia, containing The United Counsels and Conclusions of the Brethren, at their Annual Meetings carefully collected, translated (from the original German in part) and arranged in alphabetical and chronological order, accompanied with Necessary and Explanatory Notes, &c. (Columbiana, Oh.: editor, 1867).
Lehman, Daniel R., Mennonites of the Washington County, Maryland and Franklin County, Pennsylvania Conference(Lancaster: The Publication Board of the Eastern Pennsylvania Mennonite Church and Related Areas, 1990).
Lehman, James O. “The Mennonites of Maryland During the Revolutionary War,” The Mennonite Quarterly Review, vol. 50 (July 1976), 200-229.
Lemon, James T., The Best Poor Man’s Country, A Geographical Study of Early Southeastern Pennsylvania (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1972). A classic study of immense value.
Long, Henry Lawrence,“The Big Long Family In America, 1736-1979, Descendants of John Long, 1728-1791, of Bakers Lookout, Washington County, Maryland” (Mount Morris, Ill.: Henry L. Long, 1961).
Main,Jackson Turner, The Social Structure of Revolutionary America (Princeton: Princeton University Press,1965).
Mann, Bruce H., Republic of Debtors, Bankruptcy in the Age of American Independence (Cambridge, Mass.: The Harvard University Press, 2002).
Manning, Barbara, ed., Genealogical Abstracts from Newspapers of the German Reformed Church 1830-1839(Baltimore: Heritage Books, Inc., 1992).
_____, ed., Genealogical Abstracts from Newspapers of the German Reformed Church 1840-1845 (Baltimore: Heritage Books, Inc., 1995).
Maryland Historical Magazine (Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society, 1900 to present).
Meacham, Sarah Hand, Every Home a Distillery: Alcohol, Gender, and Technology in the Colonial Chesapeake(Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009).
Mekeel, Arthur J., The Quakers During the American Revolution (York, England: Sessions Trust, 1996).
Messer, Peter C., “‘A Species of Treason & Not the Least Dangerous Kind’: The Treason Trials of Abraham Carlisle and John Roberts,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, vol. 123, no. 4 (Oct. 1999), 303-333.
Miller, Mrs. Warren, and Mrs. S. L. Greenawalt, eds., Records of St. John’s Evangelical Lutheran Church, Hagerstown, MD (1966, indexed), vol. 1 (The John Clinton Frye Room, Washington County Free Library, Hagerstown, Maryland).
Morrow, Dale W., ed., Washington County, Maryland, Cemetery Records (Westminster, Md.: Heritage Books, 2009), vol. 6.
Nelson, John H., “‘What God Does Is Well Done,’The Jonathan Hager Files” (Hagerstown, Md.: City of Hagerstown, 1997).
Christian Newcomer, The Life and Journal of the Rev’d Christian Newcomer, Bishop of the Church of the United Brethren in Christ, John HIldt, transc. and trans. (Hagerstown, Md.: F.G.W. Kapp, 1834).
Ousterhout, Anne M., A State Divided, The Opposition in Pennsylvania to the American Revolution, 1775-1783 (New York: Greenwood Press, 1987). A fascinatingly detailed narrative of the politics in Pennsylvania, mostly Philadelphia, which concentrates much more on the Whigs, Tories and the Quakers, and contains relatively little, if any, on the specifics on the other pacifists.
Overfield, Richard A., “A Patriot Dilemma: The Treatment of Passive Loyalists and Neutrals in Revolutionary Maryland,” Maryland Historical Magazine, vol. 63 (summer 1973).
Palmer, John G., “The Palmer Papers” (Papers of Surveyor and Genealogist, John G. Palmer (1867-1956)), Conococheague Institute & Museum, Rock Hill Farm, Mercersburg, Pa.
Pastorius, Francis Daniel, “Pastorius’ Essay on Taxes,” Henry J. Cadbury, ed., Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, vol. 58, no. 3 (1934), 255-259.
Peden, Henry C., Jr., ed., Revolutionary Soldiers of Washington County, Maryland (Baltimore: Family Line Publications, 1998).
Pinkett, Harold T., “Maryland As a Source of Food Supplies During the American Revolution,” Maryland Historical Magazine, vol. 46, No. 3 (Sept. 1951) p. 157 et seq.
Ridenour, C. William, compiler, Marsha L. Fuller, CGRS, ed.; Washington County Maryland Obituary Locator, 1790-1943 (Westminster, Md.: Willow Bend Books, 2001).
Roeber, A.G., Palatines, Liberty, and Property: German Lutherans in Colonial British America (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993).
Russell, George Ely, Washington County, Maryland Genealogical Research Guide (Catoctin Press, 1993).
Ruth, John L., ‘Twas Seeding Time, A Mennonite View of the American Revolution (Scottdale, Pa.: Herald Press, 1976). This is a marvelous book for inhaling the Mennonite view of this seminal series of events. This book cites no sources in its text, but nevertheless has a good bibliography. And one can feel the texture of the emotions of the plain folk of that time.
Sachse, Julian Friedrich, The German Sectarians of Pennsylvania, 1708-1800: A Critical and Legendary History of the Ephrata Cloister and the Dunkers, 2 vols. (Philadelphia: Sachse, 1899-1900; reprinted by AMS Press, New York, 1971).
Saladino, Gaspare John, “The Maryland and Virginia Wheat Trade From Its Beginnings to the American Revolution,” unpublished master’s thesis (University of Wisconsin, 1960).
Scott, Kenneth, and Janet R. Clarke, eds., Abstracts from the Pennsylvania Gazette 1768-1755 (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co.; 1977).
Scharf, J. Thomas, History of Western Maryland (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co. reprint, 1995), 2 vols.
Schooley, Patricia, Architectural and Historic Treasures of Washington County, Maryland (Hagerstown: Washington County Historical Society, 2004).
Steinmetz, Rollin C., Loyalists, Pacifists and Prisoners (Lancaster, Pa.: Lancaster County Historical Society, 1976). Lamentably, this book contains no references to original sources.
Stievermann, Jan, “A ‘plain, rejected little flock’: The Politics of Martyrological Self-Fashioning among Pennsylvania’s German Peace Churches, 1739-1765,” William & Mary Quarterly, 3rd series, vol. 66 (2009), 287-234.
____, “Defining the Limits of American Liberty: Pennsylvania Peace Churches During the Revolution,” in Jan Stievermann and Oliver Scheiding, eds., A Peculiar Mixture, German-Language Cultures and Identities in Eighteenth-Century North America (University Park, Pa.: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2013).
Stoner, E. W., compiler, History of the Pipe Creek Church, Maryland (Hagerstown, Md.: compiler, 1906) (Durnbaugh Collection, Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, Elizabethtown College, Elizabethtown, Pa.; Box A, Folio 25).
Stotz, Charles Morse, Outposts of the War for Empire—The French and Indian War in Pennsylvania: Their Armies, Their Forts, Their People, 1749-1764 (Pittsburgh: Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania, 1985).
Tappert, Theodore C. and John W. Doberstein, eds., The Notebook of a Colonial Clergyman: Condensed from the Journals of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg (Philadelphia: Fortress Press: 1959; first paperback edition, 1975).
The Committee Appointed by the District Conference, History of the Church of the Brethren of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (Lancaster: The New Era Printing Co., 1915).
Vining, Elizabeth Gray, The Virginia Exiles (New York: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1955). The novel written about the exile to Virginia of 20 men, mostly Quakers, from Philadelphia in 1777-1778.
Wellenreuther, Hermann, ed., The Revolution of the People, Thoughts and Documents on the Revolutionary Process in North America 1774-1776 (Göttingen, Germany: Universitätsverlag Göttingen, 2006). Wellenreuther, a German scholar, is a careful and engaging interpreter of these 18th century German immigrants.
Western Maryland Genealogy, vol. 7.
Whisker, James B., Bedford County Archives (Apollo, Pa.: Closson Press, 1986), vol. 3.
Williams, Thomas J. C., History of Frederick County (Baltimore: Runk & Titsworth, 1906) vol. 1.
____, A History of Washington County, Maryland (Baltimore: Runk and Titsworth, 1906).
Wright, F. Edward, Western Maryland Newspaper Abstracts 1786-1798 (Silver Spring, Md.: Family Line Publications, 1985).
____, Western Maryland Newspaper Abstracts, vol. 2, 1799-1805 (Silver Spring, Md.: Family Line Publications, 1986).
_____, ed., Washington County Church Records of the 18th Century 1768-1800 (Silver Spring, Md.: Family Line Publications, 1988).
Weaver, William Woys, trans. and ed., Sauer’s Herbal Cures, America’s First Book of Botanic Healing (New York: Routeledge, 2012).
Wroth, Lawrence C. A History of Printing in Colonial Maryland, 1686-1776. (Mansfield Center, Conn.: Martino Pub., 2009).
Young, Alfred F., The Shoemaker and the Tea Party, Memory and the American Revolution (Boston: Beacon Press, 1999). A remarkable work and the source of much positive inspiration to the present author to recreate as fully as possible the life of an eighteenth-century person of modest means, who was not a celebrity, but who was present and accounted for in connection with historic events or dealings with personages of greater notoriety.
Research was conducted at the following institutions (Aug. 2010- Aug. 2014):
Archives of Maryland, Hall of Records, Annapolis, MD
Bedford County Historical Society, Pioneer Library, Bedford, PA
Blair County Historical Society, Hollidaysburg, PA
Braddock Monument, National Road, Uniontown, PA
Brumbaugh-Kendle-Grove Farmstead, family cemetery enclosed with iron railing, north of Hagerstown, MD, in the cornfield alongside route 11
Bucks County Historical Society, Spruance Library, Mercer Museum, Doylestown, PA
C&O Canal National Park in Williamsport, MD
Cecil County Library, North East, MD
Conococheague Institute & Museum, Mercersburg, PA
Carroll County Historical Society, Westminster, MD
Chester County Historical Society, West Chester, PA
Courthouse, Washington County, Hagerstown, MD
David Library of the American Revolution, Washington Crossing, PA
Delaware Pubic Archives, Dover, DE
Dr. Don Yoder Library, Devon, PA
Elizabethtown College, Young Center for Anabaptist and Pietist Studies, Elizabethtown, PA
Ephrata Cloister, Ephrata, PA
Frederick County Historical Society, Frederick, Maryland
Free Library of Philadelphia, Rare Book Dept., Philadelphia, PA
Ft. Frederick, Big Pool, MD
German Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
Germantown Historical Society, Philadelphia, PA
Haverford College, Megill Library, Special Collections, Haverford, PA
Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
James A. Lowry, Mennonite Library, Hagerstown, MD
Jonathan Hager House and Museum, Hagerstown, MD
John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Library, Williamsburg, VA
Juniata College, Beeghley Library, Archives, Huntingdon, PA
Lancaster County Mennonite Museum and Library, Lancaster, PA
Library of the American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia, PA
Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
Lititz Moravian Museum and Church, Lititz, PA
Lutheran Theological Seminary, Krauth Memorial Library, Philadelphia, PA
Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore, MD
Mennonite Historical Library, James and Mattie Lowry, Hagerstown, MD
Moravian Archives, Bethlehem, PA
Morrison’s Cove, Bedford County, PA:
Brumbaugh cemetery (Blair County, but Bedford before 1846)
Brumbaugh Mountain
Brumbaugh road
Frankstown township
Martinsburg Library, Martinsburg
New Enterprise
Roaring Spring, Blair County
National Archives and Records Administration, Philadelphia, PA
National Society, Daughters of the American Revolution, Washington, D.C.
New York Public Library, New York, NY
Pennsylvania State Archives, Harrisburg, PA
Philadelphia Museum of Art, Library, Perelman Building, Philadelphia’
Register of Wills of Washington County, Hagerstown, Maryland
Schifferstadt Architectural Museum, Frederick, MD
South Mountain, Washington County, MD
Schwenkfelder Library and Museum, Pennsburg, PA
Swarthmore College, McCabe Library & Friends Historical Library, Swarthmore, PA
The Library Company, Philadelphia, PA
U.S. Army Heritage & Education Center (Library), Carlisle, PA
Washington County Historical Society, Hagerstown, MD
Western Maryland Room, Washington County Free Library, Hagerstown, MD
Winchester-Frederick County Historical Society, Winchester, VA
Websites Visited by Correspondence
Brethren Heritage Center, Brookville, OH.
Brethren Historical Library and Archive, Elgin, IL.
Courthouse, Huntingdon County, PA
Courthouse, Franklin County, PA
Franklin County Historical Society Kittochtinny, Chambersburg, PA.
Maryland Historical Trust, Annapolis, MD.
National Society, Sons of the American Revolution, archives online
Western Maryland Regional Library, Hagerstown, MD.
Huntingdon County Historical Society, Huntingdon, PA.
The Jacob Brumbaugh-Henry Drinker Correspondence (1797-1799)
When examining most of Jacob’s long life, one must rely for the most part on official government records. There is, however, a cache of correspondence from Jacob and his eldest son Jacob, Jr. to the Quaker merchant prince Henry Drinker between the years 1797 and 1803, with some interesting connections also found in Drinker’s 1785 correspondence with others.
Henry Drinker was one of the wealthiest and most well connected Philadelphia merchants. He was a leader in Quaker Meeting circles as clerk of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, as a member of the Meeting for Sufferings, as a trustee of the Westtown School, and as a Quaker martyr, having notoriously been exiled for nearly eight months during the British occupation of Philadelphia which began on September 26, 1777.[1] Despite his notorious exile, Drinker continued after the occupation to be a key connector— he was on the board of the elitist American Philosophical Society, a treasurer of various Quaker committees and an elected member of the town council in 1790. He also became one of the leading land tract speculators, and even survived the bursting of that speculative bubble.
By the time of their correspondence, both men had aged—Jacob was 71 and Henry, 63. They were two hundred miles apart, but still found ways to bicker over contract details in their correspondence. At this time, Henry found himself beset by financial troubles, but still had a firm hand on the tiller of commerce, while Jacob was optimistic, energetic, and ingratiating even if forgetful, and struggling to keep himself on top of the deal.
The correspondence was certainly not on its face personal or intimate in any way even though Drinker calls his correspondent “Friend.”[2] It was the Quaker custom, even to the point, one might suppose, of disarming a business correspondent. How so? In common parlance the word implies that there is a special relationship of trust between the parties. With someone on the other side of a purely business deal, however, one should probably never infer that trust existed without some previous, clear and positive action indicating true friendship.
Partly, too, reviewing the correspondence can give one an insight into both Quaker modalities of speech as well as the difficult task of negotiating by mail. These letters also demonstrate how big city merchants used a network of agents in the country to carry out their business. Most importantly, it gives one a window into the personality and behavior of Jacob Brumbaugh, as well as Henry Drinker.
These letters focused on the Brumbaughs’ purchase of two land tracts from Drinker, located in Bedford County. Jacob had already paid for one, called Corunna (381 acres), but Drinker had not yet conveyed it to him because Jacob had not instructed him how precisely he wanted Drinker to do so at that time. Jacob also purchased Dorfans Barn (475 acres), on which he made a partial payment of £338 in 1797. He still owed a £988 balance at the time of Jacob’s death in April 1799.
Jacob’s first letter in 1797 to Henry Drinker discussed his payment of £338..90..0 to Drinker’s local agent John Canan. This statement illustrated that Drinker stood to make money in this deal. He added, “my son Jacob is concerned with me in the purchase as well.” He declared that he and Jacob, Jr. “wish to have articles of agreement with you for the purchase of said land.” He claimed the land had been formerly sold or leased to John Stouder. Commenting on the lease, he wrote, “I understand [the lease] is to continue for nine years which I did not know when I purchased.” One thus sees in this statement the lack of information he and other land purchasers dealt with as they tried to make deals. Launching into a complaint about the lessee Stouder, he argued:
I hope Stouder can be restrained from destroying the timber unnecessarily and confined to clear land where there is least timber. I am told his Brother is here who is a wagon maker [who] destroys a great deal [presumably of timber to make wagons].[3]
Jacob then volunteered to bring the money himself to Philadelphia, if Drinker instructed Canan to return it. He added that when in Philadelphia, he would “settle the balance of the three spring tract,” as well as “the cost of the Caveat you entered for me.” Evidently, these two had conducted business before, including the transaction that occurred in 1785. He further added, “the rest of the payments for the Yellow Creek land shall be regularly remitted to you by Mr. Jas. Ferguson of the place who goes to Philadelphia four or five [times] a year.” The “three spring tract” was the tract called Corunna.[4]
Drinker replied to Brumbaugh in September to say that John Canan had not come to Philadelphia for the convening of the assembly. On November 7, Drinker wrote again, telling Jacob that he had heard from Canan, which allowed Drinker to ratify and confirm the written agreement Brumbaugh signed with Canan.. Brumbaugh, however, wrote back explaining that he had given Canan the money already, and had asked for a receipt, which Canan refused to give. Jacob intended to deposit some money on the property, then “settle the price and the rest of the payments with you, and all I wanted of him was a receipt.” Canan, however, instead gave Jacob an agreement to sign. Brumbaugh retorted, “if I coud not make the two first payments my money was to be returned” which was never, of course, a part of the written contract he had signed.[5]
Brumbaugh agreed to “confirm the bargain on the following terms”: he would pay Drinker £261..11..0 by next June, which together with the first payment, would make a total of £600. He then agreed to pay Drinker a second £600 payment in four yearly installments of £150 in November 1799, 1800, 1801, and1802. He told Drinker that he had signed the agreement with Canan because Canan would not otherwise provide a receipt. So, having already signed an agreement for a £1327 purchase price, he countered with an offer of £1200, adding it “is double what was marked on the platt of the land and I hope you will think it enough for the land, should you agree to this proposition you may rely on punctuality in the payments.” He then wrote, “should the dispute not be settled with Fifes [another party] I shall expect Interest on the payments already made and to be made in the spring until possession is given me.”[6]
Henry Drinker then sent his next letter to Jacob on June 9, 1798, full of the measured tones of a systematic businessman:
while I am favoured with life & health, it is my desire, & I think it ought to be thine, that the Deed for the Tract formerly sold thee in Morrisons’ Cove should be executed, which may be done as soon as thou informs how the conveyance is to be made, to whom, the Township & County &tc as requested in my last Letter & when Executed how it is to be conveyed to thee?
He added that Fifes, the party with a claim to the property, gave up their claim and confessed judgment, so that the title to the land Jacob had bought from John Canan “is now clear of all incumbrance or debts…I therefore hope thou’ll speedily make the payments.”[7]
Two months later in August 1798, Jacob replied, “Honor’d Friend Sir, I hope to make you payment in and by sending you 100 Barrels of good Merchantable Flower [flour] well packed in [torn] Barrels and if you would rather have it sent around to Philadelphia it shall be Done at my proper Cost.”
Jacob did not want to leave any contingencies uncovered, so he added, “if said flower is not sufficient I will make up the Deficiency in Either Apple Brandy or Rie Liquor to the same Merchant.” Again he focused on the timber destruction by the lessee, Mr. Stouder:
“I hope you will write to Mr. Cannan to settle with said Stouder concerning the said land as he occupies it in every respect as if it were his own…What he has done is done but I will pay him for nothing but if after he gets notice what he does in good order is to be settled for but not for Clearing land for that he has nothing to do with nor is he to be settled for by any means. [Give] notice [to] said Stouder to refrain from selling and Destroying timbers in and on said premises and not Destroy and let the fruit Trees be Destroyed nor the fences or house or Barn be demolished.”
Again Jacob threatened to unravel the deal:
if you cant comply to these my proposals …I am willing to take my money that I paid you with Simple Interest which I think is no more than Reason between Man and Man in behalf of the same as I found the land not to be what I bought [the letter is torn here]… [the] plow land to be Barny [barrens or rough land] and Pine Land [page torn]. I Conclude and remain your Wellwisher, [8]
This letter contained strong, well–practiced, even modestly elegant, language. It is hard to determine, however, if this letter was written in Jacob’s hand. Jacob Jr. had help writing his letters, so his father may have also. This letter also contains legal phrasings, meaning Jacob likely contacted a lawyer about the points he wished to make. Jacob was a determined old man who tried to insert completely new terms at this juncture in the negotiations for payment of the purchase price to be delivered to Baltimore not in cash but in kind, viz., produce of Jacob’s farm such as “Merchantable Flower [sic- flour]” or “Apple Brandy or Rie.” Henry Drinker replied sternly to Jacob after three months. Again, in his measured tones, he chided Jacob:
All thou says about 100 barrels of Merchantable Flour, Apple Brandy, and Rye liquor is nothing to the purpose…in short Friend all thy long Story about the Land bought of Canan, the quality of it with many other ridiculous circumstances are too childish and affronting to common sense, that they deserve not serious notice. After having entered into a written contract, paid part of the purchase price, & prevented a sale of the property to other purchasers, to come forward with a number of new conditions and terms is really extraordinary.
Henry ended this firm rebuff to Jacob’s last attempt to renegotiate by calling attention to the payment dates and amounts, and warns that a resort to federal court might be his next move, closing with “thou art warned by thy Friend.”[9] This was strictly business, not the relation of friendship.[10]
One must wonder if Jacob declined in his energy and drive. Looking, however, at his multiple purchases at the age of 72 and his feisty correspondence, one sees a hustling, yet ingratiating old man determined to get a deal.
[1] See Wendy Lucas Castro, “‘Being Separated form My Dearest Husband, in This Cruel Manner’: Elizabeth Drinker and the Seven-Month Exile of Philadelphia Quakers,” Quaker History, 100, (2011), 40-63.
[2] This was one of the ways that Quakers set themselves apart from the world as all the peace sects also sought to do. Other ways the Quakers reminded themselves and others of their commitment to their strict religious principles were disciplines that included plain dress, plain talk, an emphasis on ethics, a numerical way of listing the date (3rd month, 2nd day, not March 2), affirmation rather than swearing, asceticism, and moderation in all things. See J. William Frost, The Quaker Family in Colonial America (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1973).
[3] J.B, Jr. to H.D., 21 August 1797, Box 21, D.C., HSP.
[5] H.D. to J.B., Jr., 7 November 1797, Box 21, D.C., HSP.
[6] J.B, Jr. to H.D., 15 November 1797, Box 21, D.C., HSP.
[7] H.D. to J.B., Jr., 9 June 1798, Box 21, D.C., HSP.
[8] J.B. to H.D., 15 August 1798, Box 21, D.C, HSP.
[9] The day Drinker wrote that warning letter, he himself warmed up for some tough negotiating by dictating a letter firmly rebuffing the attempts to renegotiate a bigger deal by another client, the then U.S. Senator from New York, Aaron Burr (later Thomas Jefferson’s vice president). See H.D. to Aaron Burr, 9 November 1798, Box 21, D.C., HSP.
[10] H.D. to J.B., Jr., 9 November 1798, Box 21, D.C., HSP.
1726—February 8: Johann Jakob Brombach born, Osthelden, Siegen, Westphalia, Germany. Baptized at the Evangelical church in Ferndorf.
1750—August 31: Ship Nancy from Rotterdam via Cowes, Master Thomas Coattam, docks in Philadelphia carrying Johann Jakob Brombach and 87 other German passengers who sign a list (only known signature of JJB that survives) acknowledging their allegiance to the King of England.
1753 – Sept. 23: Jacob purchases Clalands Contrivance, a ninety-acre tract in Frederick County (later Washington Co.), Maryland, from Conrad Hogmire for £64.
1754—Jacob purchases tract of one hundred acres called Ill Will (same area).
1755—Jacob purchases tract of fifty acres called Bromback’s Lott (same area)- total 240 acres.
c1757—Jacob marries Mary Elizabeth Angle, daughter of Henrich Engle.
1757-58—Jacob participates as a scout in Capt. Jonathan Hager’s company of Md. militia; he also quarters six soldiers for six days during the French & Indian War.
c1758 – son Jacob, Jr. born.
c1759—daughter Mary Elizabeth born.
c1760—son John born.
1763—Jacob acquires 420 acres of vacant land contiguous to Clalands Contrivance; same year he acquires Timber Bottom (260 acres) and Chance (23 acres). This brings his total landholdings to high water mark of 798 acres. Ten years after his first purchase he owned almost ten times as much land as he first held.
1772—son Daniel is born.
1773—on a plot of land in then Cumberland Co. (later Bedford County), Pennsylvania, an improvement is first built on land (in 1785 Conrad Brumbaugh in John Brumbaugh’s application for warrant affirmed that said improvement on Jacob’s son John’s land was built about 1773 “and not before”).
1775—January: Jacob shows up in Bedford Co. land office to apply for warrants on two land tracts later sold (only tracts he ever sold) to Martin Houser; no further recorded visits by Jacob to that county for ten years; all county histories report that Indian depredations during the Revolution kept settlers away for those ten years.
1776—March 11: Jacob acquires warrant on 280 acres called Albania in Bedford Co., Pa.
March 17: son David is born.
March 23: Jacob contributes two blankets to Committee of Observation of Elizabeth town (later renamed Hagerstown).
May 7: upon questioning as to why he does not enroll in militia, Jacob tells Committee of Observation that he is over 50 years old, thus establishing that he was exempt from the military draft for men age 16 to age 50; sons Jacob Jr. and John each pay 3 pounds in non-enroller fines after they and 113 other men are summoned for May 7th hearing to answer as to why they
Sept.: their portion of Frederick County is sliced off and named Washington County for a Virginia planter who has become the commander-in-chief of the Continental Army.
December 22: sons Jacob Jr. and John each pay the Committee of Observation of Elizabeth town a £3 fine as non-enrollers in the militia.
1777- Early March: son Henry born; Committee of Observation dissolves and new state government installed under the Maryland Constitution of 1776.
1778—March 1: by law of Md., before this date all men must swear or affirm their allegiance to the new government of the state of Maryland (the “test” oath); if refused, penalty of the triple tax for life and loss of civil rights; Brethren and Mennonites and others petition for relief as they cannot even affirm the new oath as it may commit them against their principles to militia service, even though the penalties include fines and loss of civil rights. Brethren do not take the oath.
1780—March 8: Jacob sells six bushels of wheat and four bushels of rye to Dr. Henry Schnebely, acting as Washington County purchasing agent for the state of Maryland under Army Quartermaster; daughter Mary Elizabeth marries Elder Samuel Ulrich/Ulery.
1783—Jacob is assessed taxes on his 431-acre Clalands Contrivance in Salisbury Hundred of Washington County; last of his 7 children, son George, born
1785—March 2: Jacob and son John show up at the land office in Bedford County, Pennsylvania to apply for a warrant on some land; same day as Conrad Brumbaugh.
1786—Jacob shown as a “non-residentor” in Woodberry Township, Bedford County’s tax assessments.
1790—First federal census: Jacob is a “head of household” in Washington County, Md.
1794—culmination of Whiskey Rebellion: Jacob’s name is not on the list of 116 men who were called to appear in Bedford County court in December that year to answer for whether they paid their federal tax on whiskey distillers.
1799—April 10: Jacob dies in Bedford County, Pennsylvania. His body is brought back to Clalands Contrivance in Md. to be buried in the family cemetery plot in the middle of the cornfield.
April 11: “duos for father” per Henry’s manuscript daybook.
June 9, 10: Public Vendue (auction) of Jacob’s personal property.
1800 – in second federal census widow Mary Brumbaugh is shown as doing something Jacob never did: owning a slave; sons own slaves as well: Daniel – 3; David – 2; and Henry – 5.
1803—April 2: Mary Elizabeth and Jacob, Jr. as administrators of Jacob’s intestate estate, petition the court for appointment of a commission to decide if the Md. real estate owned by Jacob “might admit of being divided without injury or loss to all the parties entitled, and to ascertain the value of such Estate in Current money according to law.”
June 18: widow Mary Elizabeth releases her dower interest in all Jacob’s real estate for consideration of £35 per year to be paid to her by the 7 heirs.
August 23: Jacob, Jr. breakfasts with Henry & Elizabeth Drinker at their home in Philadelphia and pays Henry the final balance on Dorfans Barn. This gives this land tract to the estate as Jacob Sr. had originally contemplated when Jacob Sr. signed an agreement in 1797.
Feb. 5: Pa. conveys patent to Jacob and son Daniel on Good Intent 407 acres on Piney Creek in Morrison’s Cove, Bedford County, Pennsylvania.
Amicable settlement of Jacob’s Maryland estate.
1806—Nov. 28: Mary Elizabeth Brumbaugh dies, according to Henry Brumbaugh daybook.
1807—amicable settlement of Jacob’s Pennsylvania estate with conveyances of deeds to various tracts there and monetary consideration passing back and forth among the seven siblings in several separate, but coordinated, legal transactions (one land tract Springfield farm is not settled until 20 years later).
Subsequent Deaths of Jacob’s and Mary Elizabeth’s Seven Children and Spouses:
1814—Jacob Jr. dies in Washington County at 56.
1820—Jacob Jr.’s widow, Catharine, dies.
1822—Elder Samuel Ulery, young Mary Elizabeth’s husband, dies Bedford Co.
1824—Daniel dies in Washington County at 52.
1828—Mary Elizabeth Ulery dies after this year in Bedford County at 69.
1829—John dies in Bedford County at 61.
1837—George dies in Washington County at 53.
1840—George’s widow, Mary Louisa dies in Washington County.
1842—David dies in Franklin Co., Pennsylvania at 66.
1845—David’s widow, Eve, dies in Franklin County.
1849—Henry’s widow, Margaretha, dies in Washington County.
1854—Henry dies in Washington County at 77.
1860—Daniel’s widow, Elizabeth, dies in Washington County.
PORTRAIT of a PACIFIST as a PATRIOT 