Anna Maria Ellsworth

'https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/107520568/anna-maria_elizabeth-...

* Reference: FamilySearch Family Tree - SmartCopy: May 28 2018, 15:13:55 UTC

She was born August 2, 1731 at the Macungie Creek German Settlement, Upper Bucks County (now Lower Lehigh Co.), Pennsylvania, daughter of John Justus "Yost" Henckel and Marie Magdalene Eschmann Henckel. She was christened August 22, 1731 in the New Goshoppen Lutheran Church on Macungie Creek, probably then Bucks Co.(now Montgomery Co.), Pennsylvania by Rev. John Peter Miller. Sponsors were (John) Valentine Griesemer and wife (Uncle and Aunt) and Marie Elizabeth (Dentzer) Henckel (Grandmother). She married Moses Ellsworth about 1750, Dutchman's Creek, Anson Co. (Rowan Co. in 1753, now Davies Co.), North Carolina. Most researchers have them located in present day Davidson Co., NC, but looking at a map where Ellsworth Creek flows into Dutchman's Creek, the area is actually in Davies Co., NC. Their first three or four children were born while they lived on Ellsworth Creek, at Dutchman's Creek.

About 1760, the Moses Ellsworth family joined the Henckel families and other German families that left North Carolina to settle the beautiful valley in Augusta Co., Virginia, now known as Germany Valley in Pendleton County, West Virginia near Riverton. In 1761, Moses patented 60 acres of land on the North Fork of the South Branch of the Potomac River, near Deep Springs in Augusta Co., Virginia (about two miles above present day Riverton). By 1771 nearly 300 more acres had been added and by 1778 the area became Rockingham Co., VA. Their land was about one mile west of the land of her parents and the Hinkle Fort, which her father built for families of all his children, as protection against the Indians. Mary and Moses had eight or nine more children while in this area. It is known they had a total of four sons and a possible eight to nine daughters. During the Revolutionary War, Moses and Mary were given credit for "supplies furnished the American Army for military use." Any descendant that can prove lineage back to these grandparents can join the adult organizations of Daughters of the American Revolution, or Sons of the American Revolution or a child the Children of the American Revolution, if they so desire.

They sold their holdings in Rockingham Co. in 1787 and migrated to Harrison Co., VA (now WV), where in 1788 land was bought in the valley south of Coburn's Creek Road [as it was marked in the 1970s when I was there], about ten miles below Clarksburg, near present day Good Hope in Union Township.

--from "Sketches of the Life and Labor of James Quinn, Who was Nearly Half a Century a Minister of the Gospel in the Methodist Episcopal Church" by John F. Wright of the Ohio conference in 1851 -- Chapter XIV, page 248: "In every age of the Church there have been persons of sterling worth, not only in the ministry, but also in the membership who in their day were pillars of the house...I now propose to give some account of the Ellsworth family in their generation...[1799] I became acquainted with Moses Ellsworth, the pious patriarch of this extensive, pious, and amiable family. He was of English descent. His pious wife was a German. They often used the German tongue in conversation...Here [Harrison Co., VA/WV] he opened his house to receive the first Methodist missionaries and his heart to receive the Gospel of the Grace of God, which ultimately proved to be the power of God to the salvation of his own soul, the souls of his household, and many of his neighbors...sons were all praying men...daughters... were pious with their husbands...The old patriarch and his good wife held onto the even tenor of their way till death came..." Excerpts from a letter written by the Rev. Wesley L. Cheuvront of Clarksburg, WV, to Willard Ellsworth M.D. on January 29, 1949: ..."On February 14,1802, John [son of Moses and Mary] and his wife Mary Richards Ellsworth made a deed for one acre of ground, situated on the West Fork River, to nine trustees [of the M.E. Church]...church that was to be built...took the name Ellsworth Church [also known as The Ellsworth Meeting House]...[Later known as Bethel Church and still later Old Bethel Church. The church is long gone.]...The Old Bethel Church Cemetery [now known as Bethel Cemetery] occupies the the entire acre...and has been filled with graves for years, many unmarked. Prior to building the Ellsworth Church in 1802, a Methodist Society was formed, with Moses Ellsworth as leader, as early as 1786 [or 1787]...they met in various homes..."

Moses died before the church was built and is believed buried in the cemetery there. Mary went to Ohio with some of her children before 1812 and settled in Champaign County. Her nephew, Reverend Paul Henkel located his aunt during his trip in 1812 to the German Settlement on Mad River, Champaign County, Ohio (in 1818 a part of Clark Co.). According to the Henckel genealogy she died in 1824 at age 93. She is buried in Clark Co., Ohio.
(lt)

PLEASE: You are welcome to use this bio in part or whole, but if you do, please give me credit with reference to Find A Grave. (lt 2014) Thank you, Louise Taraba.

• Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Sep 23 2022, 13:23:30 UTC