Editor's note: These are the facts as they are known. This story will be
rewritten several *more* times as new facts come to light. Many thanks to
the first, second, third and even fourth cousins several times removed, who
have shared their information. I will work on a list of credits, but I'm so
afraid I will leave out somebody important! -- Rich Barnhart,
RBarnhart@aol.com
Rev. John Barnhard
Once upon a time, there were two brothers and a sister by the names of Jonathan,
David and Catherine Barnhard. They were born in about the year 1800. Just guessing,
Jonathan was the eldest and Catherine was the youngest. They lived in England for
a while. Jonathan married a lady by the name of Rebecca Price. David married
Margaret Walker, and Margaret's brother Jesse married Catherine Barnhard. Now just
to keep everyone confused, Margaret and Jesse had a sister Catherine as well.
This entire clan lived in Maryland, where Jonathan's wife Rebecca died after giving
birth to Nehemiah. Jonathan did the obvious thing, which was to marry Catherine
Walker. As time went on, they had several children, including Herod, who was born
in 1820.
John Barnhard was born in 1821 to David and Margaret Walker Barnhard.
The household already contained an older sister, Mary, as well as several cousins
nearby. This whole clan of Barnhards and Walkers lived in Frederick County, Maryland,
which was barely civilized at the time. John's grandfather, David Sr., was the
patriarch of the family until he died in 1827.
Two more sisters, Rosanna and Ruth Ann, arrived while they lived in Maryland.
Several people from the Fredericksburg area had migrated westward to the strange
and wonderful land of Ohio, where the land was free for the taking and the oak
trees were so thick that one had to cut down one or two of them to make room for
a house. Jonathan packed up his little family and set out for the promised land
against his father's wishes. After the four children were born and Grandpa David
had died, David decided to take the family westward to join his brother Jonathan
and many others from the area, in what is now known as the northern
townships of Knox County. There was a whole colony of old Germans who had come
to Berlin Township (named after Berlin, CT, where many of them were from) and
Pike Township, and some from this group founded Fredericktown, named after
Frederick County, MD. John was about 12 years when the Barnhards arrived in 1833.
David decided to build his house and general store about five miles east
of Fredericktown, near the site of a new church that was organized but did not
yet have a building. David grew tobacco and made whiskey on the side, which he
sold in the store and also to to wholesalers. The church was to be Methodist
Episcopal, a denomination that is still in existence today. Jonathan had set
up shop as a blacksmith in Pike Township. During the "raising" of David's house,
a log fell on Jonathan and injured both of his legs. Fortunately, Jonathan
survived, but he could no longer stand for long periods of time and lift heavy
items, so he became a teacher in the township school, and later he became Justice
of the Peace of Pike Township.
In 1834, when John was 13 years old, his father David was working with a machine
that pressed tobacco into "plugs" for sale. The handle suddenly flew back striking
David in the head and killing him instantly. Margaret was left a widow with four
children. Jonathan, of course, helped her as much as he could, and Margaret went
to live with another nearby family, the Lamberts. John's older sister Mary married
Francis L. Lambert in 1836 and Margaret lived with them for a while. Later on,
Margaret went to live with another daughter, Ruth Ann, who had married Thomas Smith.
Let us follow a little rabbit trail for a moment and talk about the Lamberts,
because the lives of the Barnhards and the Lamberts became intertwined to a
large degree. Francis Lambert brought his wife Elizabeth to this same area of
Knox County. Elizabeth had fifteen children, including Francis L., the seventh,
Nancy, and Aaron who was the youngest. Francis died in 1837 when Aaron was only
six years old. At this point in time, we have two widows, Margaret Barnhard
and Elizabeth Lambert, and they were close neighbors and friends. There were at least
four Lambert "boys" and John Barnhard ranging in age from 16 to 35, so the ones
still "at home" would have done the farm work while the women and girls took care
of the cooking, spinning and preserving. What education the children received was
probably from Uncle Jonathan Barnhard. (Note: Both David and Margaret signed their
wills with an "X", reason unknown.)
At the end of our rabbit trail in the early- to mid-1840s, we find that Francis L.
Lambert had married Mary Barnhard, Margaret was living with them, and John Barnhard
had married Nancy Lambert. When John and Nancy set up housekeeping, Aaron Lambert
came to live with them, so the saga of the Barnhard-Lambert alliance was not over yet. (Actually, I'm thinking that they lived close enough for a while that Aaron was always
over there, sort of "underfoot". In any case, John Barnhard was a beloved big brother
and sort of a father-figure to Aaron. John's personality was probably like his
grandson Dee Barnhart, whose younger siblings, nieces and
nephews practically worshipped the ground he walked on.)
At some point, John had become a born-again Christian and felt called to the ministry.
He became a M.E. minister even though he was without formal training. He preached
in several churches around the area for several years. His cousin Herod also became
a preacher and preached for over 30 years, both in this area and in Morrow County.
Herod took care of his mother, Margaret's sister and Jonathan's widow Catherine,
until she died. (Catherine lived with stepson Nehemiah for a while, at first.)
1856 was a turbulent year. First, John's older sister Mary died, and his mother went to live with his sister Ruth Ann and her husband, Thomas Smith. And then John "got the
spirit" and became charismatic. This did not set well with the congregations on his
circuit, so he soon found himself not being invited to preach anymore.
Between one thing and another, he decided to migrate even farther west, some 50 miles
to Allen County, near Lima. He packed up his family and made the journey to Beaverdam,
Richland Twp. At this time, John and Nancy had four sons and a daughter. Their
names were Melvin, Virgil, Quigley (Leonidas Q.) and Sylvester, and the daughter
was Philena. There was another daughter who died in infancy.
Side note: The
Evangelical Association
in Columbus was organized in 1857 by a Rev. John Barnhard. It is remotely possible that
this was "our" John and that he arrived in Allen County sometime after that. In 1857,
that congregation numbered only fourteen.
All of the good land in Allen County had already been taken, so John rented a farm
and became what was known as a "sharecropper". His estate in life was vastly
superior to sharecroppers in the American South, however. He worked that farm until
failing health forced him to retire many years later.
When word came of the great War Between the States, three of John's sons joined the
Ohio 74th Volunteers. At the same time, Nancy's brother, Aaron Lambert,
joined the Union Army and worked his way from Corporal up to Captain by accepting
the command of a Negro regiment, the 1st Mississippi Heavy Artillery.
(Even on the Union side, prejudice was great enough that he was apparently discharged
from the "regular" Army to accept the command of the 1st Miss.)
One more small rabbit trail of intertwined families:
In 1862, a neighbor, Jacob Huber, lost his wife Anna in childbirth, leaving
Jacob with at least five children under the age of 11. John and Nancy took the baby,
John Thomas Huber, and raised him as their own. They never adopted John, and he grew
up, attended Oberlin College, married Rosa Conrad, and they were together for over
sixty years. John Thomas was a station agent for the railroad, then a telegrapher for
AT&T in Beaverdam. He was active in community life as a member of the town council and
school board. He died in 1953 at age 90 and is buried in Beaverdam.
All of the men returned from the war, mostly in one piece. (It is said that it was
at this point that the spelling of the family name was changed from "Barnhart" to
"Barnhard", because the latter was the spelling on the discharge papers of the three
sons.) There were several wounds, and Virgil could not return to active duty. Melvin
and Quigley each got married within a year of their return, and Virgil married in
1867. Philena married Madison Edgecombe, a prominent fellow in Allen County.
Sylvester married Amanda Kunkleman, and so Nancy got to see all of her children
grown and married before she passed away in 1879.
After the war, Aaron Lambert came to the wonderful land of Allen County to settle
down with his family. Aaron was quite sickly after the war, and although he is listed
as a "merchant" in Bluffton, it was probably his wife Elizabeth who ran the business,
said to have been a dry goods store. When Aaron desired a pension, John Barnhard
swore out an affidavit stating that Aaron was indeed in the Civil War and was
deserving of the pension. (Whether the health problems were "service-connected"
is not known for certain, but it would appear that the pension was granted on that
basis; and here again it would appear that Aaron's service with the 1st
Miss. was not regarded as "regular" and hence the need for an affidavit.)
Later, the Lamberts moved to Van Buren, about a day's ride to the
north. It is not clear whether this occurred before or after Aaron's death in 1876.
(A good guess is that Elizabeth left Curtis or Charles to run the store.
We find that Elizabeth is back in Bluffton at least by 1910.)
John's elder sons all moved west to Nebraska, and Virgil in particular was a prominent
citizen of Cedar Rapids, NE. Sylvester, the baby of the Barnhard family, was also the
problem child. Some of his troubles were self-inflicted and some were not. He continued
spelling name "Barnhart" at
his marriage to Amanda who bore him two children, one of whom died in infancy and
the other who died of typhoid in the same epidemic that took Amanda in 1888. Always
the nonconformist, Sylvester married the divorcee Mariah Jones six months after Amanda's
death, and the two of them boarded a westbound train soon after, never to be seen or
heard of again by the Barnhards. (Virgil's biography of 1912 speaks of Sylvester as
still living, but Sylvester was killed in 1911 in a railroad accident.)
After Nancy's death, John married the widow Amanda Cooper Jennings, by whom he had
one more child, John Williams Wesley Barnhard. After the death of his second wife
in 1900, John became too feeble to take care of himself. He went to live with the
Lambert family in Bluffton, about seven miles north of Beaverdam. (This is said to
be the "Aaron Lambert" family; but Aaron's sons were Curtis and Charles so something
isn't quite right. One of them was probably still running the family business in Bluffton. Or not.)
A lady by the name of Elizabeth is reported to have cared for old John; undoubtedly
this is Aaron's wife, now back in Bluffton. (She died in 1919.) John died in 1911 at
the ripe old age of 89 years 10 months, as the Scripture says, "old and full of years."
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Place mouse cursor on face for identification
John Barnhard and family. Date is about 1870, judging by Sylvester, who was
born in 1854. The older ones apparently had returned from the Civil War, and
Sylvester was not yet grown up. John Thomas Huber, lower right, was born in 1862 and
his mother died of complications the following day. The Barnhards took him in as his
father could not care for a tiny baby, already having four or five surviving children
under 11 years of age.
Philena was married in 1872.
Epilogue
The three eldest Barnhard brothers, in keeping with family tradition, migrated west to
Nebraska, where two of them are mentioned in the state's history. Philena remained
with her husband in Allen County, near her father until her death in 1882. Sylvester
ended up on a homestead
some sixty miles northwest of Spokane, Washington, where he built a cabin on "ground
so poor you couldn't raise a disturbance." (They never could tell that boy anything!)
John's two wives, Nancy and Amanda, share a most beautiful monument in the Beaverdam
cemetery, right at the side of Old U.S. 30 as you come into town from I-75 -- you
literally can't miss seeing it. Sylvester is buried in a tiny cemetery in the middle
of wheat fields where you have to hike in about a half-mile. (We're still looking for
Rev. John's grave.)
A century later, in the 1980's, one of Virgil's
descendants, Neva Baar, had the
perseverance to locate one of Sylvester's grandchildren, after which many of the
family began to correspond with each other. We are eternally grateful to Neva, without
whose help this whole site wouldn't exist, nor would the family portrait above.
(One of these days, we need to get her a computer....)