Isaac Franklin Hammer

http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=5868912

Occupation: Hatter and fuller (worker who cleanses wool of oil and impurities).

Thomas Jefferson Hammer, in his 1917 Biography of Seth Hammer, wrote, “About the year 1778, the Tories impressed Isaac into the British army. He was about eighteen years of age at that time, and being a Quaker, he refused to serve. For such refusal he was struck over the head with a sabre, the scar of which, as a memento of his moral heroism, he carried through life. Finally, through the entreaties of his mother, together with his youth and doubtful value as a recruit to the Tory army of George III, he was released.”

Tories were American colonists who remained loyal to the Crown in the American Revolutionary War. If our birth year for Isaac (1763) is correct and if this incident did take place in 1778, then Isaac was about 15 at the time. Dr. Marian R. Hammer, in his 1930 book Biography of Jesse & Curtis Hammer and Family Reminiscences, places the incident just before or after the battle of Guilford Court House, which was on March 15, 1781, in Greensboro, Guilford County, NC, which makes Isaac about 18.

Birth: Nov 20 1763 - Randolph, North Carolina, United States
Death: Apr 4 1837 - Madison, Jefferson, Indiana, United States
Spouses: Elizabeth Hammer (born Bogart), Mary Stanley Hammer (born Underwood), Lydia Hammer (born Mendenhall)

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Isaac Hammer in Nancy Miller Thompson Smith's 2015 book The Genealogy of the Rash and Hammer Families:

ISAAC AND LYDIA (MENDENHALL) HAMMER

ISAAC HAMMER (56)
Born: 20 November 1763
Where: Orange County, North Carolina
Father: Abraham Hammer (112)
Mother: Rachel Meeting (113)
Married: (1) ca. 1784
Where: Jefferson County, Tennessee or Guilford County, North Carolina
Wife: Lydia (Mendenhall) (57)
Married: (2) 10 January 1798
Where: Jefferson County, Tennessee
Wife: Hannah Mills
Born: 16 August 1776
Father: Aaron Mills
Mother: Charity Mendenhall
Died: 30 July 1812
Where: Jefferson County, Tennessee
Married: (3) 8 December 1815
Where: Jefferson County, Tennessee
Wife: Mary Stanley Underwood (widow)
Died: After 1850
Where: Huntsville, Madison, Indiana
Died: 4 April 1837 (tombstone date)
Where: Huntsville, Madison, Indiana
LYDIA (MENDENHALL) (57)
Born: ca. 1764
Where: Pennsylvania (probably)
Father: (Benjamin?) Mendenhall (114)
Mother: (Hannah Wilson?) (115)
Married: ca. 1784
Husband: Isaac Hammer (56)
Died: January 1795
Where: Jefferson County, Tennessee

Children of Isaac and Lydia Mendenhall Hammer:
1. Jesse Hammer 13 July 1785
2. Elisha Hammer (28) 1 May 1789
3. Aaron Hammer 30 June 1792
4. Jonathan Hammer 20 January 1795

Children of Isaac and Hannah Mills Hammer:
5. Lydia Hammer 17 February 1799
6. Henry Hammer 22 May 1801
7. Charity Hammer (died 1815) 26 June 1803
8. Rachel Hammer 9 February 1806
9. John Hammer (died 1836) 15 January 1808
10. Nathan Hammer 3 February 1810
11. Laban Lee Hammer 11 January 1812

Children of Isaac and Mary Stanley Hammer:
12. Hannah Hammer 27 December 1816
13. Isaac Aaron Hammer 9 May 1818
14. William Hammer (died age six)
15. Delilah Hammer (died age four)
16. Joanna Hammer (died age two)

Isaac Hammer was born November 20, 1763, in Orange County, (now Randolph County) North Carolina. His birth date is recorded in the Friends Lost Creek MM in Jefferson County, Tennessee. (Hinshaw, William Wade, Encyclopedia of American Quaker Genealogy, Vol. I, Edward Brothers, Inc, Ann Arbor Michigan, 1936, p. 1) When Isaac was a young man, he experienced the beginnings of the British Colonies’ growing unrest. His parents were members of the Cane Creek MM in Orange County.

“Because of their Quaker faith, no Hammers in this line served in the military during the Revolutionary War. However Isaac, a young boy of seventeen, ran into difficulty with a British officer about the time of the battle at Guilford County Courthouse in North Carolina in 1778.” (Record of the Cane Creek Monthly Meeting) This was later known as the Battle of Alamance, at which his father Abraham was a “Regulator.” (Refer to Abraham and Lydia Mendenhall Hammer in the Table of Contents)

“During the War of the American Revolution, in about the year 1778, the Tories impressed Isaac into the British Army. He was about fifteen years old, and being a Quaker, refused to serve. For such refusal, he was struck over the head with a Saber, the scar of which was a memento of moral heroism he carried through life. Finally, through the entreaties of his mother, together with his youth and doubtful value as a recruit to the Tory Army of George III, he was released, to the great joy of his mother, and the satisfaction of his friends as well as his own.” (Dr. Marion R. Hammer, Biography of Jesse and Curtis Hammer, Newton, Iowa, 1930. Note: This was his second book. This record is also documented by the Cane Creek Friends MM.)

This recorder researched in the North Carolina Friends MM Archives which are housed in a vault in the Guilford College Library in Greenville. The foregoing record may be found there in the Cane Creek Friends MM of Orange County. This record makes Isaac Hammer’s decedents eligible for membership in the Sons of the American Revolution or the Daughters of the American Revolution.

Isaac Hammer married Lydia (Mendenhall?) ca. 1784. Their first child, Jesse Hammer, was born July 13, 1785. Where they married was not recorded. The Lost Creek MM was established in May of 1797, in New Market, Jefferson, Tennessee. However, only three books of MM have survived: one book of births, one of deaths and marriages, one book of men’s meetings (1797-1731), and one book of women’s meetings (1817-1873).

When the MM was established Isaac Hammer and family, Mordecai and Hannah Marshall Mendenhall, Sr., their son, Mordecai Mendenhall, Jr. and his wife, Phebe Cannady, as well as well as several members of the Mills family, were organizing members. (ibid., Hinshaw, “Lost Creek Monthly Meeting”)

Lydia Mendenhall Hammer was born ca. 1764, and died in 1795 in Jefferson County, Tennessee after the birth of her fourth son. There were several Mendenhalls in the Lost Creek MM in Jefferson County; they came there from the Cane Creek MM in Orange County, North Carolina, and also the Hopewell MM in Guilford County, North Carolina. Isaac Hammer knew the Mendenhall families before he came to Tennessee, and he and Lydia may have married in North Carolina. Family tradition states that she was a cousin to Charity Mills, the daughter of Aaron and Charity Mendenhall Mills who married Isaac Hammer after Lydia’s death. A thorough search of the Mendenhall and Mills families found one “Lydia” who was the right age to have married Isaac Hammer, although there were several children named “Lydia” in both families. This Lydia Mendenhall was born ca. 1760. She was the daughter of Benjamin and Hannah Wilson Mendenhall. Her father Benjamin was the son of Joseph and Ruth Gilpin Mendenhall. Joseph was the third son of Benjamin and Ann Pennell Mendenhall. There are very few records concerning the family aside from the names and approximate birth dates of their four children. (Able, Russell Newlin, A Mendenhall - Newlin Alliance, pp. 103 - 106, pub. by Russell Newlin Able, 1989) However, there is no proof that she is the right Lydia, and the record states, perhaps in error, that she died young.

There are many Friends records that are missing. Prior to “1850 Quakers did not have their vital statistics recorded in civil offices.” (ibid., Hinshaw,“ Foreword”.) Mr. Hinshaw endeavored to find and copy as many of the records as he could. Still, some records were lost, and as other ones are found, they are published. Since she was married before the Lost Creek MM began, she would not have been recorded as a Mendenhall child.

Dr. Marion R. Hammer (Jesse1, Elisha2, Isaac3) of Newton, Iowa, went to Tennessee and North Carolina in the early 1900's to learn what he could from research and family members still living there. After his journey, he wrote a large book in 1920. Dr. Hammer wrote another book in 1930 which added additional Hammer members, and reaffirmed his earlier findings. He was the founder of the Hammer Genealogical Society, which he actively pursued the rest of his life. He named Lydia Mendenhall the first wife of Isaac Hammer, his great grandfather. He did not find her parents’ names, but learned that she was “a cousin to Charity Mills.”

However, no positive traces of Lydia Mendenhall’s parents have been found. The Mendenhall family was from Concord Township, Delaware (then Chester County, Pennsylvania). Benjamin Mendenhall, Jr. (1691-1740) married Lydia Roberts, the daughter of Owen and Mary Roberts. They were the progenitors of almost all the Mendenhalls in North Carolina and Tennessee. He had a brother, John Mendenhall (1659-1758), of Delaware County, Pennsylvania who may have been the forefather of Lydia Mendenhall. (New Jersey Microfilm, No. 420)

Isaac Hammer’s first Land Grant was issued September 20, 1787, in that part of North Carolina that became the State of Tennessee. Isaac Hammer, perhaps with his wife, Lydia, and young son Jesse, journeyed along the newly accessible Cumberland Gap trail. When Daniel Boone cleared the wilderness trail to Kentucky, it opened the ancient buffalo and Indian trail into Tennessee. When this recorder visited this historic area, I gazed in wonder at the deep canyon. It was awesome to imagine the long train of settlers winding through that narrow wilderness trail with their goods loaded on horses and donkeys to find a new home in Tennessee.

“In 1754 a small colony from North Carolina tried to settle here, but it was soon driven out by the Indians. Three years afterward there was another settlement at Fort Louden, on the Tennessee River, thirty miles from Knoxville. In 1760 the Indians captured the fort, and the colonists surrendered on condition that they be allowed to return to North Carolina; but they were butchered the following day.

“When the treaty of peace was made between England and France, in 1763, the restless spirit of adventure led many from North Carolina and Virginia to return to the area. Settlements were made on the Watauga and Holston Rivers in 1769, 1771 and 1772, called the Watauga Association.

“The settlers composing this association were the commonwealth of Tennessee, and as early as 1772, they decided to establish some kind of government for the protection of the colony, and to dispense justice among themselves. ‘They were the first men of American birth,’ said Theodore Roosevelt, ‘to establish an independent community on the Continent.’”

“In 1776 the territory was represented in the Colonial Assembly of North Carolina, and the region was officially called the District of Washington, the first place in America named in honor of Washington. In 1777 Washington district became Washington County and embraced the whole of the present State of Tennessee.

“North Carolina ceded the territory of what is now Tennessee, to the General Government February 25, 1790, and it was accepted by Congress on April 2. Willam Blount was appointed by President Washington, governor of this territory, June 8, 1790.”

(Note: William Blount was of Royal Descent, as are the descendants of Daniel and Ruth Muncy Rash, who married Hammers and Janeways in Iowa.) “On June 1, 1796, Tennessee was admitted into the Union, and was the first State carved out of the territory belonging to the United States.” (Hammer, Thomas Jefferson, The Biography of Seth Hammer, 1917, Los Angeles, California, pp.6,7)

There was a land grant on record for Isaac Hammer in the state of North Carolina in the part that became Green County, Tennessee. The first one dated September 20, 1787, for 200 acres lying in the County of Green on the Fork of Tuckaho Creek, costing 100 shillings (Grant # 458); however, he was likely there before that time. This deed reads in part: “a Certain parcel of land containing two hundred acres be the same more or less lying and being on a creek known by the name of Lost Creek. Bounded as follows: Beginning at a pine thence West seventy six poles to a black oak South one hundred and fifty nine to a post oak East seventy six poles to a pine the same course continued one hundred and twenty six poles to a stake thence North one hundred and fifty nine poles thence West to the Beginning.” (Tennessee State Archives) His second deed was dated July 12, 1794, for 200 acres of land in North Carolina adjoining the land that he had previously purchased. (ibid.) Jefferson County, Tennessee, where the Hammers lived, was taken from Green County and Hawkins County in 1792 (Grant # 676). On February 22, 1795 in North Carolina Isaac Hammer purchased 250 acres near the head of Weavers Spring, south of the Holston River in that part of Hawkins County that became Jefferson County. (Grant #676) [Early Land Grants are recorded in the Land Grant Office of the State Division of Archives]

“Isaac Hammer’s House was built in 1793 on the old stage road. Isaac Hammer was a pioneer preacher of the Church of the Brethren. The renovated log building is now owned and occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Sam Humphreys. The house is a two story structure with a basement.” (Alderman, Pat, The Overmountain Men, 1970, The Overmountain Press, Johnson City, Tenn., p. 252.) This entry includes a picture of Isaac Hammers house, which was located near the Holston River. The Holston River “enters the historical picture early in the white man’s westward expansion. Settlers were staking claims along the headwaters of the Holston River before the French-Indian War.” (ibid., Hammer, Thomas Jefferson)

In 1796, the year Tennessee was admitted into the Union, Isaac Hammer purchased two tracts of land in Jefferson County. The first deed was issued February 25, 1796 for 200 acres lying on Lost Creek. The second deed was issued October 19, 1796, for 129 acres on Cap Creek. (Tennessee State Archives) This recorder made a copy of these deeds. The deed descriptions were typical, but interesting. The first of these deeds reads in part: “a Certain parcel of land containing two hundred acres be the same more or less lying and being on a creek known by the name of Lost Creek. Bounded as follows: Beginning at a pine thence West seventy six poles to a black oak South one hundred and fifty nine to a post oak East seventy six poles to a pine the same course continued one hundred and twenty six poles to a stake thence North one hundred and fifty nine poles thence West to the Beginning.”

“Isaac Hammer was a hatter and tailor by trade, and it is further said of him that he used no liquor, tobacco or profanity. (op. cit., Hammer, Thomas) He married his second wife, Hannah Mills, on October 1, 1798 at the Lost Creek MM in Jefferson County. She was the daughter of Aaron and Charity Mendenhall Mills. Hannah was born in Guilford County, North Carolina on August 16, 1776. Her family were members of the Friends Deep River MM. (op. cit., Hinshaw, pp., 1771) Isaac was appointed “overseer” on December 21, 1799 of the Lost Creek MM. Hannah was chosen assistant clerk of Lost Creek MM on March 19, 1803, and on July 23, 1803 she was appointed “overseer.” An “overseer” had pastoral care of the Monthly Meeting members. Isaac was appointed Elder on January 31, 1807. On March 28, 1807 Hannah was recommended for church Elder. She died January 30, 1812 in Jefferson County, Tennessee. (op. cit., Hinshaw, Lost Creek MM) They were the parents of seven children.

The parents of Hannah Mills Hammer were early members of the Friends Church, and their families married several members of this lineage, and also related lines. Aaron Mills was born December 22, 1794, the son of Henry Mills and Hannah Thornburgh. He married Charity Mendenhall who was born January 18, 1754. She was the daughter of Mordecai and Charity Beeson Mendenhall.

On December 8, 1815, a marriage bond was issued at Knoxville, Tennessee signed by Simon Adamson for Isaac to marry a young widow, Mrs. Mary Stanley Underwood. On October 20, 1815, he was “complained of for accomplishing his marriage contrary to discipline. This meeting therefore disowns him from being a member of our Society and the clerk is directed to furnish him with a copy of this minute.” (Lost Creek MM) A year later on October 26, 1816, “Isaac Hammer requests to be joined in membership with Friends, and he being present at this meeting grants his request.” (ibid, Hinshaw, Lost Creek MM) He and Mary parented five more children.

On March 27, 1830 Isaac Hammer requested a transfer from the Lost Creek MM to the Duck Creek MM in Henry County, Indiana. He was received at the Duck Creek MM on April 21, 1831. His sons, John Hammer, was received July 26, 1832 and, Jonathan Hammer, on December 20, 1832 by the Duck Creek MM. However, they likely traveled together, but did not transfer their certificates until later. The other Duck Creek MM record of a John Hammer who died there on March 14, 1836, was the son of Elisha and Elizabeth Moore Hammer who married Nancy Anne York. (Heiss, Willard, Abstract of Records of Society of Friends in Indiana, Book VII, pt. 4, pp 158, 180.) Other children who came to Indiana were: Lydia who married Hezekiah Morgan, Henry who married Frances Perkins, Nathan who married Ruth Lee, and Laban who married Rachel Cox. The 1840 Federal Census of Madison County listed the Hammer family living in Anderson Township with Mary the widow as its head. She was born in South Carolina and living with a Roach family. Isaac Hammer died in Huntsville, Madison, Indiana on April 4, 1837. (Indiana State Historical Society, Unpublished Cemeteries of Madison County.) His name was the first burial listed.
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Isaac in the 1894 book Portrait and Biographical Record of Jasper, Marshall and Grundy Counties, Iowa, page 283:

The genealogy of the Hammer family, traced to the original emigrant in the United States, is as follows: In the early part of the eighteenth century, the progenitor of the family in America, who was a German by birth, emigrated to Bucks County, Pa. His son, Abraham, was born in that county in 1731, and in 1760 moved to North Carolina, where his children, four sons and three daughters, were born. The second of his sons, Isaac, was born in North Carolina, in 1764, and migrated to Tennessee, where were born by his first wife, Jesse, Elisha, Aaron and Jonathan; by his second wife, Lydia, Henry, Charity, Rachel, John, Nathan and Laban; by his third wife, Hannah, William, Joanna, Delila and Isaac A. Afterward he removed to Indiana and settled in Huntsville, where he died.

• Reference: MyHeritage Family Trees - SmartCopy: Apr 12 2019, 15:10:44 UTC

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https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Hammer-421

ISSAC FRANKLIN HAMMER (20 Nov 1763-04 Apr 1837) was a Quaker, born in Guilford, Guilford Co, North Carolina, twelve years before the Revolution began. He would live in Cane Creek, Orange County, NC, then later, as a man with his young family, he would move to Greene Co, TN, Randolph Co, TN, Jefferson Co, TN, and finally to Hunstville, Madison Co, In where he died, on 04 Apr 1837. He is buried in the Huntsville Cemetery, Fall Creek Township, Madison County, Indiana, USA[1]

He would marry three times, losing two of his beloved wives to childbirth and fever. .

His first wife, LYDIA MORGAN MENDENHALL HAMMER, would die on the 20th of March 1795, in New Hope, Greene Co, TN, seven days after giving birth to her youngest son and child.
Jesse Hammer, b. 13 Jul 1785, Randolph Co, NC d. 1860 OR 1870, Blount Co, TN
Elisha Hammer, b. 1 May 1789, Jefferson Co, TN d. 1 May 1847, Pleasant Plains, Jasper, Iowa
Aaron Hammer, b. 20 Aug 1792, Jefferson Co, TN d. 22 Sep 1865, Plymouth, Lyon Co, KS
Jonathan Hammer, b. 20 Jan 1795, Jefferson Co, TN d. 1860, Huntsville, Madison Co, AL

Issac's second wife, HANNAH MILLS HAMMER, died on the 30th of January 1812, twenty days after the birth of her youngest child, LOBAN HAMMER (Loban was Ancient Celt spelling of the surname of LOGAN) born on the 11th day of March 1812 in Lost Creek, Jefferson Co, TN.
Lydia Hammer (1799 - 1855)
Henry Hammer (1801 - 1874)
Charity Hammer, b. 26 Jun 1803,
Rachel Hammer Beals (1806 - 1870)
John Hammer (1808 - 1836)
Nathan Hammer, b. 3 Feb 1810,
Laban Hammer (1812 - 1889),

Issac's third wife was MARY (nee) UNDERWOOD STANLEY would give birth to five children, three of them would die within weeks of each other in 1824, from Typhoid Fever.
Hannah A Hammer Shipley (1817 - 1892)
William Hammer (1818 - 1824)
Jonah Hammer (1820 - 1824)
Delilah Hammer (1822 - 1824)
Isaac Aaron Hammer (1827 - 1895)

https://ourlineage.tripod.com/0hammer/xjohn-desc-orig.html
ISAAC5 HAMMER (ABRAHAM4, JOHANNES (JOHN)3, HENRICH2, JOHN1) was born November 20, 1763 in Cane Creek, Orange Co, North Carolina, and died November 04, 1837 in Huntsville, Madison, Indiana. He married (1) LYDIE MENDENHALL Abt. 1784 in Lost Creek, Jefferson, Tennessee. She was born Abt. 1765, and died Abt. 1795 in Lost Creek, Jefferson, Tennessee. He married (2) LYDIA MORGAN Abt. 1796. She was born 1765 in North Carolina. He married (3) HANNAH MILLS January 10, 1798 in Lost Creek, Jefferson, Tennessee, daughter of AARON MILLS and CHARITY MENDENHALL. She was born August 16, 1776 in Deep River, Guilford, North Carolina, and died January 30, 1812 in Lost Creek, Jefferson, Tennessee. He married (4) MARY (STANLEY) UNDERWOOD December 03, 1815 in Lost Creek, Jefferson, Tennessee. She was born Abt. 1795 in South Carolina, and died Aft. 1850 in Indiana. He married (5) RACHEL JONES June 26, 1834 in Westland, Greene, Tennessee. She died January 08, 1852.
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Children of Isaac Hammer and LYDIA MORGAN MENDENHALL:
Jesse Hammer 1785-1860 OR 1870
Elisha Hammer 1789-1847
Aaron Hammer 1792-1861 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/69677635
Jonathan Hammer 1795-1860 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/43345282

Children of Isaac Hammer and HANNAH MILLS:
Lydia Hammer Morgan 1799-1855 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/97705063
Henry Hammer 1801-1874 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/23468189
Charity Hammer 1803-
Rachel Hammer Beals 1806-1870 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/50302948
John Hammer 1808-1836 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/114040921
Nathan Hammer 1810-
Laban Hammer 1812-1889 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/98544244

Children of Isaac Hammer and MARY UNDERWOOD STANLEY:
Hannah A Hammer Shipley 1817-1892 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/55492983
William Hammer 1818-1824 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/97705569
Jonah Hammer 1820-1824 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/97706878
Delilah Hammer 1822-1824 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/97707272
Isaac Aaron Hammer 1827-1895 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/135434021

GEDCOM Note

Penciled on Beals Pedigree Sheet is notation, "Lost Creek Meeting, N.C." between the "married" and the "death" lines. Also the notation, "3 wives?"