Rev. Bennett Jacobs

Descendant of Revolutionary Soldier Ancestor #: A061325

Early pioneer of Union Township, Johnson County, Indiana - http://www.archive.org/details/historyjohnsonc00brangoog

pages 192 - 196

UNION TOWNSHIP.

The political township of Union is co-extensive with the twelfth con- gressional township in the third range. The township is well watered. The North fork, south fork, middle fork and Kootz's fork of Stott's creek, flow westerly, partly through and out of this township, and draining into the White river. Moore's creek takes its rise in the northeast part, and runs into Young's creek to the east. The table lands lying upon the divide between the head waters of the Stott's creek and the Young's Forks creek tributaries, and also between the North, South and Middle forks, are level, and at the time of the settlement of the county, were extremely wet.

These table lands are true highlands of the township, and from their level to White river the fall is great. Hence, the streams flowing westward have, during the lapse of ages, cut deep channels through the soils and clays, and the high banks left on either side have, by the action of rain, frost and other agencies of nature, been molded into hills and knobs, which are now generally known as broken lands.

Some time in 1823, Bartholomew Carroll moved from Kentucky by the way of the Three Notched Line road, then newly cut, and found his way through the bnish to the South fork of Stott's creek, and settled in section 34, where John Vandiver afterward built a mill. Carroll had a family, consisting of his wife, three sons, William, John and Samuel, and two girls. The grandfather of his children lived with him — a very aged man, who died, it issaid, when he was one hundred and ten years old. Bartholomew Carroll was a genuine backwoodsman. He spent his time in the wilderness hunting game and wild honey. The country about him was well stocked with all kinds of game, common to the country, and an experienced bee hunter could take honey in vast quantities. It is said that Carroll would sometimes have as many as one hundred bee-trees marked in the woods at a time.

There is some uncertainty as to the time when many of the pioneers moved into Union township. It is next to impossible at this time to get the names of all who came in or the time when they came. In fifty years, much that was at the time of interest sinks into oblivion.

Growing upon the farm entered by Peter Vandiver is a beech tree, bearing in its rough bark, this date: "16th October, 1826." Strother Vandiver, then a good-sized boy, cut this inscription in that tree, to commemorate the day of his father's arrival upon the eighty-acre tract which he immediately entered. With Vandiver, when he moved from Mercer county, Kentucky, came his old neighbors, John Garshwiler, Joseph Simpson and Mrs. Christina Garshwiler. These settled over on the east side of the township. The same year, Thomas Henderson, living at the Big Spring, notified Simon Covert that a family had moved into the woods some miles to the west, and proposed they should go and see who it was. Taking their axes with them, they at length found Mrs. Gwinnie Utterback, a widow, with a family of eight sons, .Corban, Laban, Henry, Hezekiah, Perry, Joseph, Elliott and Samuel and a daughter, Rebecca, encamped by the side of a log, a little south of the present site of Union Village. Joining their help with the boys, Henderson and Covert soon had a cabin of poles raised and a shelter provided for the family. These are all who are now believed to have made settlements that year.

In 1827. George Kepheart moved to the township, and settled in section 23, and the same year Alexander Gilmer settled in the northeast comer.

In 1828 there was growth. Nearly two thousand acres were entered this year by twenty-two men, and at least ten or twelve moved in. Peter Zook and Samuel Williams and Henry Banta stopped in the Vandiver neighbor- hood ; Jacob List and Philip Kepheart located near the east boundary line of the congressional township; Benjamin Utterback moved near to his sister-in- law, who came in the year before, while Adam Lash and James Rivers moved farther to the north, and John Mitchell still further out, but toward the north-west corner of the township. Jesse Young located on the northwest quarter of section 27.

Rock Lick was a famous resort for deer during the early times. There was not probably in all the county a deer lick that equaled it. For miles and miles in every direction run-ways led to it. Jesse Young, who had settled on the Nineveh in 1825, and who was much of a hunter, visited this place, and was so impressed with the enormous mast crops thereabout, that he determined to make his home in the neighborhood. Accordingly, some time before he moved, he drove his hogs to the oak forests, and built a camp not far from the lick. Here he hunted, tended his hogs and read his Bible and Young's Night Thoughts. With these two books he was quite familiar, and in his old age it was his habit to interlard his discourse with apt quota- tions, especially from the last-named work. Young was a strict observer of Sunday, and on one occasion it is said he lost his reckoning, and kept the Jewish Sabbath instead of the Christian. The next morning he went into the woods and, killing a deer, brought it into camp. Soon a party of hunters came by, and finding Young engaged with a deer newly killed, they reminded him of his Sunday principle. But he vindicated himself by assuring them that he had kept the day before, which was Sunday. A re-count of the time convinced him that he was mistaken, and after disposing of his venison, he turned into camp and kept the rest of the day as sacred.

Young carried a large-bored and far-shooting rifle, which he affection- ately named "Old Crate. At the time he went to the Nineveh, a white deer was known to range the woods in the west and southwest parts of the county, and every hunter was naturally anxious to secure that particular game. But this deer became exceedingly shy, and it must have been two or three years after it was first seen before it fell a victim to a ball from "Old Crate." Young killed it, firing from a great distance.

Another of the successful hunters of Union township was Robert Moore, who afterward was elected to the office of associate judge.

In 1829, ten more men with their families moved into Union. Robert Moore and Joseph Young into what afterward came to be known as the Shiloh neighborhood, and William Bridges, John James, near Vandiver's place, and William Kepheart, James Vaughn in the Utterback neighborhood, and Henry Graselose, toward the northwest comer. Peter Bergen and Andrew Carnine moved into the east side adjoining the Hopewell neighborhood. About the same time John Mullis settled near Rock Lick.

The next year, Garrett Terhune settled at the Three Notched Line road, near Vandiver's. Gideon Drake moved out to within a mile of the Morgan county line. Bennett, Austin and William Jacobs moved up to the north side. Nicholas Wyrick settled on the North fork of Stott's creek, and David and Cornelius Lyster moved over to the east side.

By the close of this year, about forty families were living in the town- ship, as now constituted, and on the 5th day of July previous Union township was organized by an order of the board of justices. As then bounded, it wa& much larger than it is now. One tier of sections now on the south side of White river was attached, and two tiers extending the entire west side of Franklin and two sections out of the southwest comer of Pleasant. From time to time, however, changes have been made in the boundary lines of the township, until they have been reduced to the congressional township lines.

In 1831, Isaac Knox, John McColgin and Joshua Hammond, who were Virginians, settled in the northwest corner of the North fork of Stott's creek. Willis Deer and Wesly, his brother, and John L. Jones settled near Mrs. Utterback ; John Henderson to the northwest of them some miles ; George Kerlin and Peter Shuck on the east side of the township, and Garrett Vandiver not far from the present site of Bargersville, while Serrill Winchester and Jacob Core moved into Jesse Young*s vicinity.

The next year, Jacob Banta and Samuel Throgmorton moved in and in 1833, Daniel Newkirk, the gunsmith, Peter D. Banta, David Demaree, John Knox, John Gets, Joshua Landers and, probably, Jesse Harris, Peter Voris and John Shuck.

The families moving into the North Fork neighborhood were nearly or quite all Virginians, but all the others, with but few exceptions, were Kentuckians. Garrett Terhune was New Jersey born, but moved from Kentucky. Jesse and Joseph Young, Gideon Drake and Robert Moore were from Ohio. Out of more than seventy families referred to, three-fourths were from Kentucky.

The growth of the township was slow, but those who came came to stay, and the work of improvement went on. In 1828, Peter Vandiver built a horse-mill, the first mill in the township, which was run night and day and supplied the country for a great distance around with bread. In 1832, George Kerlin put up a horse-mill, which was long a place of general resort for grind- ing wheat and corn. About 1834, John Vandiver built a mill on the South fork of Stott's creek, where Carroll had settled, and in about two years after John Young built one lower down on the same stream, and Thomas Slaughter put one up near Rock Lick on the Middle fork. l.^p to the introduction of underground draining, the level lands of Union township were not esteemed as of very great value, but since the era of ditching has set in there has been > great and wonderful development in everything that goes to make up the welfare of a people.

The township has ever been remarkable for the absence of gross violations of law. But one murder has ever occurred within its precincts, and that was the murder of Peter T. Vannice, in 1863, by a stranger to the place, whom Vannice employed on his farm. Taking advantage of his employer, he shot him down in his own door-yard, and then robbed him of his money and fled, with a gun, up the Three Notched Line road toward Indianapolis. George F. Garshwiler and some others gave pursuit and, on overtaking the murderer near Greenwood, he turned aside and shot himself dead.

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page 351

Stott's Creek Baptist (Old School).

Some time in the thirties there was erected in section lo, near the present site of Union village, a log building which served as a place of worship for several denominations. In this house what is known as Stott's Creek Bap- tist church (Old School) was organized over sixty years ago. The following are the names of a few of the early members of the organization : Bennett Jacobs and wife, Austin Jacobs and wife, William Burkhardt and wife, David Vidito and wife, James Jacobs and wife, William Utterback and wife and Andrew Wysick and wife. Elder Bennett Jacobs was an early minister, Hiram Craig and Enoch Tabor preached for the congregation, as did others whose names are not now remembered. The building in which the congregation worshiped for many years was a small frame structure near Union village, erected about the year 1856 or 1857. The society was never strong numerically and the organization has been disbanded.

Bennet Jacobs was born June 26, 1783 in Hampshire County, Virginia (now WV) which lies on the eastern slope of the Appalachian Mountains. When he was a toddler, Bennet relocated 500 miles westward with his parents and extended family to Shelbyville, Kentucky County, Virginia (now KY) and occupied 100-acres of land earned by his father Samuel's 3+ years of service in the Virginia State Line during the Revolutionary War.

On June 7, 1802 Bennet and Nancy Watts were married in Shelbyville. Together they had eleven children; five boys beginning with Austin in 1803, and six girls ending with Lucretia in 1826.

As a young man, Bennet served as a Private in Captain Isaac Watkins' Company of Peter Dudley's Mounted Battalion with the Kentucky Volunteers during the War of 1812. His father, along with his brothers James, and Martin also fought in either mounted or rifle regiments of the Kentucky Volunteers.

In 1820, the extended Jacobs family moved to Indiana, initially to Washington County and then later Johnson County. These moves again are presumed to be in pursuit of land earned through Bounty Land Warrants for service in the War of 1812.

Beyond his service in the War of 1812, Bennet was a minister and performed marriages for many of his relatives. He died October, 27, 1861 at the age of 78. Bennet is buried in Pennington Cemetery, Sigourney, Keokuk County Iowa, alongside his wife who died in 1870 at the age of 87.

Gravesite Details
From 1930s WPA Graves Registration Survey
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/104962961/bennet-r-jacobs