BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES - SOUTH ANCESTORS SMITH 126-Thomas SMITH (my 4G Grandfather) settled in Hartford County, Maryland on the bank of the Susquehanna River where he farmed and operated both a tavern and a ferry. He married 127-Hannah (maiden name unknown) and they raised a family of thirteen children, Ralph, Hugh, Thomas, John, James, William, Nathaniel, Susannah, 63-Olive (also recorded as Alive, Allive, and Olivia), who became the wife of 62-Arthur Inghram), Elizabeth, Mary, Hannah and one additional boy, name unknown. In 1772 he sent his oldest son Ralph, then 21, across the mountains to what is now southwestern Pennsylvania, with an expedition, to select land for himself and younger brothers. Some of the party stopped in what is now Fayette County but Ralph and the others crossed the Monongahela River and traveled up Tenmile Creek to the present site of Jefferson, where he purchased 600 acres of land situated on both sides of the creek. He then proceeded up the creek to where Jackson’s Fort (Waynesburg) was later built and bought two tracts of land of 440 acres each on what became known as Smith Creek. Ralph then returned to Maryland to be married. In March, 1774, Ralph and his younger brother Thomas, then 18, along with a party of eight or ten others from the same neighborhood (probably including 62-Arthur INGHRAM) returned to start to clear and farm Ralph’s property. Those that were married planned to bring their families in the fall. It is not known when 63-Olive Smith migrated west but it was sometime between 1774 and 1777, when she and 62-Arthur INGHRAM were married. There is no indication that Thomas, Sr. ever came west to see the land where his children settled and lived the rest of their lives. 126-Thomas SMITH Sr. died in 1803, in Maryland, and willed his estate to 127-Hannah and his children. His Negro slaves were also willed to Hannah and other family members living in Maryland at the time. Upon 127-Hannah’s death in 1813 her six slaves (appraised value of $80 to $120 each) were left to the children with a stipulation that each be set free after a given period (fifteen to twenty-seven years). Thomas and Hannah are buried in Maryland. |