It was through the second marriage of William John Harned, my paternal great-grandfather, that my branch of the Harned family ended up in Iowa.
William’s grandfather, William Harned Sr., was the first to take the Harned family from Virginia to southern Indiana, about 37 miles from Louisville, Kentucky. Originally settling in Orange County, the Harned family eventually migrated into the adjacent Washington County. Therefore, it was possible for a Harned to be born in Orange County and to die and be buried in Washington County.
William Sr.’s son, John Schyrock Harned, William John’s father, moved to Canton in Washington County a few years before William John was born and married Ruth Green (1801-1872) in Canton in August 1820. Both John and Ruth were active Quakers and became esteemed members of their community. William John, although born in 1821 in Paoli, the county seat of Orange County, spent most of his life in Canton. William John was the first of John Schyrock’s and Ruth’s many children.
In the 1820s and 1830s, Canton was a growing and even thriving new business center. By 1835, the town already had a postmaster, a job held by William John’s father, John Schyrock. He kept this position for almost 30 years. John Schyrock also ran a successful general store in the town. The town actually went through several name changes before finally, in 1838, adopting “Canton” as its official name.
William John Harned, 1821-1870
Paternal great-grandfather
John Schyrock Harned
In January 1843, William John married Jane Elizabeth Marshall, in Canton. They had two children, John Marshall Harned and Elizabeth Virginia Harned. Little is known about his first wife, Jane, and the same can said about their two children, John and Elizabeth. Jane probably died, and William John was left a widower. When William John remarried again in December 1857, the two children, if they had even survived, would have been in their early teens. In any case, there is no record of his continuing to have cared for them after he remarried.
William’s second wife was my paternal great-grandmother, Ann Morgan, who, as a seven-year-old, had come from Wales with her family in 1841 on a sailing ship.
Like William John, Ann Morgan (1834-1917) had also been married previously. Ann 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. Mr. Davis never got to see their child, Mary Ellen Davis, who was born posthumously on July 9, 1854. Nothing more is known about Mr. Davis – when or where he was born, or what kind of work he did.
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 John, by ten years. William John, Ruth, and John Schyrock are all buried in Blue River Orthodox Friends Cemetery in Salem.
Ruth Green Harned and John Schyrock Harned
William John Harned Tombstone