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Thomas Lemmon
THOMAS LEMMON, great-grandfather of Barclay Nulton, was a native of
eastern Pennsylvania, of Scotch-Irish descent. He as a soldier in the
Revolution, and the following story has been handed down in the family. One
day while on his way to join the Continental forces, tired and thirsty, he
asked a handsome young lady for a drink of water. Observing how worn-out he
was she brought him a glass of milk, and he was so touched by her sympathy and
thoughtfulness that he told her he would come back someday and marry her. He
kept his word, after the war was over. In 1797 he settled on a tract of land
in East Franklin township, Armstrong county, 211 acres, but soon afterward
removed to Lexington, Kentucky.Col. Daniel Lemmon, his son, moved in early life to Franklin township,
Armstrong county, where he farmed and kept hotel for many years, owning a
large farm near Tarrtown, and died in 1857, in his seventy-fifth year. He
served as colonel in the Black Hawk war. He was twice married, and by his
first marriage, to Charlotte Hannegan, had four children: Thomas McConnell,
William R., Margaret Rebecca and John H. By his second wife, Elizabeth Croyle,
he had a family of seven: Alexandria, Rebecca J., David, Lobain, Daniel, James
and Joseph. On April 12, 1838, the tract in East Franklin mentioned above was
vested in him by patent, and before his death he conveyed the principal part
of it to his son Thomas. Purpart “D,” 72 acres and 48 perches, was
not taken by any of his heirs in the proceedings in partition, but they joined
in releasing their respective interests to Joseph Lemmon, Jan. 30, 1865, for
$400 (that is $50 to each), who afterward conveyed it to his brother Thomas,
to whom it was assessed for a number of years. Daniel Lemmon agreed to sell 89
acres to Nathaniel Richey, July 11, 1834, who transferred his interests to
William Richey, to whom Lemmon conveyed the same, May 27, 1846, for $150.
Joseph Audibert byLobeau, his attorney in fact, conveyed twenty-eight and a
half acres of tract No. 304, call “Audibert” after its patentee,
Peter Benignus Audibert, to Daniel Lemmon, Jan. 21, 1828, for $156, and Marie
Touissant Audibert byLobeau, attorney in fact, conveyed 127 acres, 155 perches
of “Audibert” to Daniel Lemmon Aug. 24, 1848, for $446, probably in
pursuance of an agreement made prior to her death. Daniel Lemmon probably
settled on the smaller of these parcels ten or twelve years before it was
conveyed to him. In 1817 he was assessed with two tracts, each of 200 acres,
in what was then Buffalo township, one of them (and two horses and three
cattle) at $248, and the other at $200. He kept a hotel in the eastern part of
“Audibert,” the sign of which with two crosskeys was painted by
James McCulloch at his shop in Kittanning April 7, 1828, and he was first
assessed with his ferry at this point in 1827. He retained these two parcels,
the westernmost one containing the small parcel which had been part of No.
303, until his death, after which, in proceedings in partition, they, without
regard to their original quantities, were divided into two purparts. The
western one, marked A, containing 114 acres, 111 perches, was valued by
inquest Sept. 20, 1825, at $16.08 an acre, and the other one, marked B, forty
acres, ninety-four perches, at $13.41 an acre, as surveyed to Daniel Lemmon’S
heirs by J. E. Meredith Oct. 19, 1820. His surveys on these days included
those of several other tracts on both sides of the Allegheny river. The court
decreed purpart “A” to J. H. Lemmon, and purpart “B” to
Mrs. Margaret (Lemmon) NULTON. Daniel Lemmon was appointed a viewer with
Michael Mechling, Matthias Bowser, Allan ELLIOTT, John and Robert PATRICK,
viewers, in 1810, to locate a road. We find the following in a history of
Armstrong county published in 1883: “In July or August, 1812, a lively
sensation was caused by a report brought here by a Mr. Snyder, who was then
employed to distribute the pamphlet laws throughout this and the northwestern
part of the State (which he then conveyed to the various counties in a wagon),
that a large force of British troops and Indians were moving toward this
place, whereupon a public meeting was called. Thomas Hamilton was appointed
its chairman, who addressed the excited assemblage from a stump in Market, a
short distance below Jefferson street. Grave fears were entertained that this
town was in danger of being taken by the enemy. That meeting resolved, after
an interchange of opinions, to employ Daniel Lemmon to proceed to Meadville
and elsewhere in that direction for the purpose of ascertaining the
whereabouts and proximity of the supposed invaders. He soon started on his
mission, from which he returned in a few days with the welcome intelligence
that a false alarm had been raised by the rumor which Snyder had heard in his
travels, and which probably sprang from the general alarm that Governor Snyder
alluded to in his message of Dec. 3, 1812, to the Legislature, as having
prevailed in the town and vicinity of Erie, caused by the appearance of a
British and Indian force on the opposite side of the lake, in consequence of
which he had ordered, July 15, a portion of the Sixteenth division of the
Pennsylvania militia to be organized under General Kelso for the protection of
the frontier, which, he said, he was happy to add, ‘ prevented the British or
their savage allies from polluting our soil with hostile feet.’ ”Source: Pages 547-548, Armstrong County, Pa., Her People, Past and
Present, J.H. Beers & Co., 1914
Transcribed September 2001 by Nancy Cain Knepper for the Armstrong County
Beers Project
Contributed for use by the Armstrong County Genealogy Project (http://www.pa-roots.com/armstrong/)Armstrong County Genealogy Project Notice:
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