Abraham de LaBarre

How the LaBar family name came to be.

De Boise was one of the Royal Guards of the King of France. He was sent by the King on an important message with orders to execute it with all possible speed, and with strict orders to stop at nothing and under no circumstances to delay in the executing his orders. On his return, as he was passing a private garden and as he approached the gate, he heard a woman scream, and looking through the gate, he saw she was being assaulted by a man. He dismounted from his horse and leaping over the gate, drew his dagger and slew the assailant. The woman swooned. He then thought of the instruction and orders of the King, and hastily remounted his horse, returned to the King, and delivered his message. The King was highly pleased in having so faithful a messenger, and complimented him upon the execution of his orders.

Just then, information was brought to the King that the messenger on his return journey had stopped and entered the private garden. The penalty for disobeying the order of the King was death, and no excuse would be received by him. When the King asked the royal messenger if the report was true, he admitted that it was. The King said he was sorry to lose a royal guard who was so faithful in the past, but the penalty must be inflicted, for if it was not, then other guards and messengers would presume that they, too, could disobey the orders of the King. De Boise said the decision of the King was just, for he knew the penalty of disobeying the command of the King, and would willingly submit to the punishment.

Just then the King's daughter rushed into the presence of the King, and told him that she had just been assaulted in one of the King's private gardens by a stranger, and that another stranger leaped over the garden gate and slew her assailant, with a dagger. She immediately swooned and became unconscious, but when she recovered from her consciousness, her rescuer had departed, and now she had come to the King to tell him of the assault upon her. While she was speaking to the King, looking aside, she saw De Boise standing there awaiting his sentence. She immediately recognized him as the man who had saved her life. Then she told the King that De Boise leaped over the gate rushed upon her assailant and slew him with a dagger. And as the dagger was withdrawn from the body of her assailant, the point was tipped with blood, and she immediately lost consciousness.

When the King had heard all of the story from his daughter, and had it confirmed by the royal guard, He stepped forward, drawing his own sword and striking it on the left shoulder of De Boise, said "Instead of pronouncing the death sentence, you shall no longer be called De Boise (of timbers) but De La Barre (of the bar), for you saved the life of my daughter and the name which I now bestow upon you is to signify and commemorate your noble and brave act at the gate of my private garden. Hereafter, your coat-of-arms shall be a handed arm with a dagger in hand with a drop of blood upon its tip." This is a true historical account, duly authenticated, as the origin of the name De La Barre, now commonly written LaBar.

LaBar, LaBarre, LaBarr, Lubbar, and LeBar (“dearly beloved”) are now all variations of the name from the same family tree. In La Flamengrie, France in 1673, Poulain De La Barre wrote a treatise favoring feminism before he converted to Calvinism after being a priest there five years. He was under King Louis XIV.

In France, the Catholics had also been killing Protestant Christians who could not worship openly in Europe. In 1761 in France, Louis XVI condemned Chevalier De La Barre to torture and death. This was for speaking disrespectfully and not kneeling and removing his hat for Catholic monks passing by 30 yards away. The LaBars descended from French Huguenot Protestants, and emigrated from Europe between 1728-1730 to gain religious freedom from the Catholics.

The Uckermark Prussian Huguenot Settlement

The Uckermark became part of Brandenburg-Prussia in 1618, but was ravaged during the Thirty Years' War. Frederick William, the Great Elector, invited large numbers of French Huguenots to resettle the Uckermark and his other territories by announcing the Edict of Potsdam. These Huguenots helped to develop the economy and culture of the Uckermark. In 1701 the territory became part of the Kingdom of Prussia.

In 1815 after the Napoleonic Wars, the Uckermark became part of the Prussian Province of Brandenburg. Previously divided into the administrative units Uckerkreis and Stolpirischer Kreis, in 1817 a third district was created in the area, the district Angermünde, and the other two districts were renamed to Prenzlau and Templin.

The Uckermark is now divided between the Uckermark District of Brandenburg and the Uecker-Randow District of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern where Strasburg is located.

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uckermark

Sailly-sur-la-Lys in Nord-Pas-de-Calais, France, where Marie Jeanne Charles was born, was once part of the Southern Netherlands and gradually became part of France between 1477 and 1678.

Beindersheim in Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany, where Abraham De LaBarre was born, is only about 3 miles from Frankenthal where son Abraham was born.

In the second half of the 16th century, people from the Netherlands, persecuted for their religious beliefs, settled in Frankenthal.1

Strasburg, Uckermark, Brandenburg, Prussia, where Abraham and Marie Jeanne ended their days, was a French Huguenot refuge.2

People of the 17th century generally lived their entire lives in the same small area; they did not move long distances from where they were born. But the LaBarre family did. And from Uckermark, some family members later left for the "NEW WORLD".

Abraham De LaBarre (1650-1711) was born in the town of Leme’ of Province Picardie in France. He had a son Daniel LaBarre (born 1680). Daniel LaBarre had a son Abraham LaBarre (about 1708-1750) and a son Willhelm (aka William or John William) De LaBarre (1704-1761) born in Alsace-Loraine, France.

Daniel’s son Abraham LaBarre came with his brothers Peter and Charles, landing in Philadelphia, followed the Delaware and settled in Mount Bethel, Bucks (now Northampton) County. From land records we believe the other brothers Philip and William also came here around the same time, maybe just a bit later. They settled in Pennsylvania and Peter and Charles intermarried with the Dutch who’d immigrated there. However, some records indicate this Abraham may have married a Delaware Indian.

Daniel’s son (Wilhelm) William De LaBarre may have come over separately from the above 3 brothers. He is mentioned in Philadelphia in 1734 and finally obtained a land warrant in Northampton County in 1754. He married in about 1729 and bore the next Charles LaBarre (1737-1790). Charles LaBarre married Margaret (surname unknown, born about 1740) before 1759 and bore (John George) George LaBarre and a (John Leonard) Leonard LaBarre (1776-1858). Charles died in Northampton County, PA in Upper Mount Bethel Township. (John George) George LaBarre (1759-1849) in 1785 married Catherine Bloom (1765-1831) and bore another Charles LaBar (1793-1875) in Northampton County, PA. Charles died in Tioga County, PA and is buried in the LaBar Family Cemetery in Sabinsville in Tioga County. Catherine probably died in Thompkins County, NY. Charles LaBar married Eunice Howell (1799-186x) and bore George Lafayette LaBar (1831-1906), born in Thompkins County, NY.

From the History of Northampton County Pennsylvania and The Grand Valley of the Lehigh under the supervision and revision of William J. Heller, 1920, published by the American Historical Society of Boston, New York and Chicago. Pages 546.

Here is what the history of Wayne, Pike and Monroe Counties, Pennsylvania, pages 1082-1083 has to say about the three brothers:

The first representatives of the family in this country were Peter, Charles and Abram La Bar, who emigrated about 1730, and landed at Philadelphia. After a few days of rest they determined to follow up the Delaware River, and make a settlement on the very outskirts of civilization. In three days they arrived at the forks of the Delaware and Lehigh Rivers, which was then the principal white settlement, the present site of Easton being occupied by an Indian village. Continuing their journey, they at length came in view of the Blue Ridge barrier. There were some small settlements back from the river, but none on the river above Williamsburg, except that of Nicholas Depui, who was comfortably planted at what is now Shawnee. After viewing the country between the river and the mountain for a day or two, they pitched upon a site for their cabin) about three-quarters of a mile from the river, on a somewhat elevated spot, in what is now Mount Bethel township, Northampton County, and soon had their primitive homestead erected. The Indians were their only near neighbors, and these they managed to make their true friends by many little acts of kindness. Here they dwelt together a number of years, engaged in the various occupations of pioneer life, until finally, as the tide of emigration from the north and south began to reach them, they each married a German or Dutch wife, and found it advisable to separate.

Charles remained in the old cabin homestead in Mount Bethel. Peter pushed a little farther on and bought a tract of land above the mountains of the Indians, southwest of where Stroudsburg now stands, and adjoining a tract Colonel Stroud purchased some time after. Here he cleared up a good home, after many years of hard labor, and raised a large family of children. Abram planted himself above the Delaware Water Gap Notch, not far from the Delaware Water Gap depot, where he lived many years and raised a large family. He cleared the island just above the Gap, which, with the garden flat around his house, made quite a snug farm. He lived there in 1741, when the Governor sent Nicholas Scull up to look after the state of things in the Smithfields.