Ann Morgan and William Morgan, Sr. grew up in Scranton. Ann was to marry two times. She married Thomas Davis in Scranton, Pennsylvania, on September 8, 1853. Unfortunately, Mr. Davis died on April 8, 1854, within only a few months of their marriage. A daughter, Mary Ellen, was born to Thomas posthumously in 1854.
Three and a half years later, on December 13, 1857, Ann Morgan Davis married my paternal great-grandfather, William John Harned, Ann met William in Scranton, Pennsylvania. They were married there and continued to live in Pennsylvania for several years. William immediately adopted Mary Ellen Davis, Ann’s daughter by Thomas Davis. Ann and William, however, eventually produced their own children, five in all. They were Charles Joseph Harned (1858-1910/20?), Alfred William Harned (1860-1941), Francis John Harned (“Frank”) (1863-1934) (my paternal grandfather), Sarah Ann Harned (“Sadie”) (1865-1958), and Clara Belle Harned (1868-1892). Charles was born in Coaldale, Pennsylvania, while the other four were born either in Salem or Canton, Indiana. Francis John Harned, my paternal grandfather, was born in Canton.
In July 1860, the Harned family relocated to Canton. Ann’s husband, William John, died in Canton on December 13, 1870. December 13, coincidentally, was the very day of their 13th wedding anniversary. In our family, much was made of this coincidence.
William John’s mother, Ruth, died in January 1872. William John’s father, John Schyrock, died in June 1880, outliving his own son, William, by ten years. William John, Ruth, and John Schyrock are all buried in Blue River Orthodox Friends Cemetery in Salem.
In September 1881, Ann, still a widow, chose to leave her home in Canton and relocate with her children to Iowa. They first stayed in Indianola, Iowa (about 25 miles south of Des Moines), for a short while before finally settling in Grand Junction (about 65 miles north-west of Des Moines), a small town of less than 800 people, but then functioning as an important railroad junction.
Ann Morgan Davis Harned, 1834-1917
Paternal great-grandmother
Ann was born in Wales on February 7, 1834 in the small town of Penna Caa of Glen Morganshire (today Glamorgan County). Ann frequently recounted how she came to America in 1841 as a seven-year-old girl on a sailing ship with her father, John Morgan, her mother, Mary M. Morgan, and her two-year-old brother, William John Morgan, Sr., who was born in April 1839. (Their mother’s middle initial “M.” might have stood for “Morgan,” the same surname as her husband. Family lore remembers a marriage between two Morgans at one point.) Below is an 1841 poster in English and Welsh announcing free and subsidized passage to America for the people of Wales, probably similar to one the Morgans might have seen to help them get passage to America.
Upon arriving in America, the Morgans headed directly to the coal-mining area of Pennsylvania and settled in Scranton. I have not been able to find any birth or death records for Ann’s and William’s parents, John and Mary. However, we do know that John was intensely proud of his Welsh heritage and was active in the Welsh churches wherever he lived.
Mary Ellen Davis, the Harned adopted daughter from Ann’s first marriage, was the first to marry. In 1870, at the age of 16, she married John O. James (born 1850 or 1851), a young immigrant farm laborer from Wales. The James family stayed in Washington County, Indiana, for several decades but eventually moved to Grand Junction, Iowa, as her mother’s family had done. James and Mary Ellen had four boys and a girl, James Thomas James (1873-?), Frank C. James (1880-?), Rachel Ann James (1878-1923), David R. James (1886-?), and Maxwell Alfred James (1891-1967). In the early 1900s, the James family found it necessary to move to a drier climate to alleviate the asthma condition of their mother, Mary Ellen. They chose the town of Raton in northern New Mexico as their new home. On January 6, 1919, Mary Ellen’s half-brother, Francis John Harned, was notified of her death in Raton, due to complications from asthma and heart trouble. She was only in her early 60s. Her husband, John, died in June 1920.
William John and Ann Harned’s first two sons grew up to become Methodist ministers. These were Charles Joseph Harned and Alfred William Harned. Their third son, Francis John Harned, went into banking and accounting. Charles’ oldest son, William Ernest Harned became a stenography and typing expert, heading an academic department on those subjects for decades at Columbia University in New York City.
The three brothers had two sisters, Sarah Harned and Clara Belle Harned. In the mid-1880s, Sarah, or “Sadie,” married Furman (or Firman) Stephenson (1857-1941), who became a wealthy brick and tile factory owner in Mason City, Iowa. Clara Belle married Jacob T. Boos (1867-1947) in 1887. Sadly, Clara Belle died in 1892 at age 24, a few days after having given birth to her only child, a son, Clare Harned Boos (1892-1956).
William John and Ann had many grandchildren. Because William John died in 1870, only Ann was able to enjoy the births of their grandchildren before she died in 1917, at the age of 83.
The three Harned brothers: Alfred William, Charles Joseph, and Francis John