The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1894-11-15
HISTORY OF ward family
Martha Ward Gleason, Of NeW York,
Gives 1t in Detail.
HIGHLY INTERESTING STORY
Ii Contains a Great Deal of heretofore
Unwritten History OF Scranton and
Its Early Settlers That VIII
BE Read with Profit.

My attention has recently been called
to an article which appeared In The
Tribune in August last, the subject OF
which was why Cedar street is colo
qually called Ward street; and Whlch
also pJrported to be reminiscence OF
the Ward families who settled there.
AS the article is in many points moor
rect j desire to publish the following III
relation to the subject
Strictly speaking the family is not
German, as stated by your correspond
ent. The name itself shows that. Fam
ily tradition states chat three brothers,
William Benjamin and Jacob Ward
came from England about 1851, set
tling at Chester William PENIS earlier
settlement. Subsequently William re-
move to New York State and Jacob TO
North Carolina, Benjamin remaining in
Chester, and it is from this one that the
present family descends.
Benjamin Ward. n descendent of this
Benjamin, lved at Williams township,
Northampton county, near Easton, ana
was a soldier of the Revolution, being
at Valley Forge ana at the battle of
Princeton. His wife was q MOraVian
Dutch woman named Barbara Schaet-
fer, from the vicinity of Nazareth, ana
it is here the SO called German ap-
pears. on the distaff side. This Benia-
min Ward had seven sons and one
daughter Conrad, one Of these sons.
married Barbara Kindt, daughter of
Martin and Sarah Kindt, this Martin
kindt being also soldier of the RevO-
luton. Conrad had also seven sons
and daughter and 1t is two of these
sons--John, born March H. 1897, in VIII
liams township, and Simon. born Janu-
airy 8, 1901. in the same place, that
settled Ward street. The five other
brothers and the sister, who married a
man named Benjamin Demuth emf
grated TO Michigan over sixty years
ago. settling at Jackson and Clinton.
Marriage of John Ward
John Ward married Mary Bishop,
more properly Bishoff, of Easton, and
Simon married Susan iKnecht, both
Pennsylvania Dutch. Both of the men
spoke that dialect ana both read and
wrote German in addition to English. /
often heard my grandfather say the
only schools in their vicinity We're Ger
man. Both men had an accent as both
We're born and brought up and educated
among the Moravians. There was
Dutch on the maternal side for two gen.
crations, as before stated. These facts
will account for the idea that the
Wards We're German. They We're Eng
lish and Moravian chiefly.
The Ward brothers removed their
families from Northampton county Ia
Monroe county. near Stroudsburg,
early in the thirties. Johns family con-
sisted of one son, Conrad, my father
named after his grandfather. Simon S
family consisted Of four, Reuben
Henry, Frank, and William. 1t was
through the influence of William
Henry, of Stroudsburg, the man who
was prime mover in the settlement OF
Scranton, that the Ward brothers alsc
came TO "Slocum Hollow"
1t was in August, 1910, that the firm oi
Scranton, Grant &, Co. was formed
William Henry being of the company
and on the llth of September the first
days work was done on the blast fur
mace by Simon Ward. He did not bring
his family for some time afterward, and
in November walked the fifty-two miles
back to Strooudsburg to vote for Gen.
eral Harrison, for the presidency
Brought Their Families TO Scranton.
John Ward and his son Conrad prob.
ably did not contemplate settling per.
manently when they first came, fol
they did not remove the family tc
Scranton till January, 1S47. 1 have
heard my mother and grandmother tel
of living in a haunted house in Strouds
burg in lS4S, alone among its strange
sights and unaccountable sounds, tn,
Two men being in Scranton at work
When mother did come she came ovel
the wild and desolate Pocono by stage
along the Drinker pike, and stopped
over night at an inn in Clifton town
ship; and by strange coincidence the
oldest child, a girl Of six years, owned
that house and lived in it in 1872. 6
quarter of a century afterward. 1t ha(
not been hotel then for some years
travel having been diverted from thC
Drinker pike on the opening of tht
southern division of the d. L. ~ w. rail
road in May, 1856.
The family did not Immediately settl,
IN Ward street. but lived in company
house on the hill above the old saw mill
In 1851 they purchased land and bull
the double house in Ward street il
which father and son lived 70
many years. 1t was on the corner o
Ward street, now Cedar avenue. an,
Hickory street.
Frank Ward, Simons son, lived in tn
first house above the bridge over til
Roaring Brook, bridge removed bu
q couple years ago. Simon ana his sol
Henry lived a few doors above my faith
er, little below Freuhan's and WEIGH
els. These houses were not log house
as your informer says; they were goo,
frame buildings and all are still stand
ing and occupied except the one owne
by my father, which was burned in 1866
about eighteen months after we ha
moved from it. 1t was then owned b
the late Jacob Schimpff, father of Car
Schlmpff, the pianist to whom my faith
er had sold IT,
Six Families of the Wards.
In addition to the six families O
Wards who lived in these four houses
Daniel Ward, of an entirely differen
family, relative of Judge Wards, 1 be
lieye. lived in the same block wit
Simon, just above where Anthem
Weinshenk lives. He was the father q
Christopher, Sylvester and Ware
Ward. remember watching him driv
home the cows one stormy. snowy nigh
in late fall. and hearing him tell m
grandmother it was the last time h
would drive them home that winter. /
was. he died q few days afterward. /
made a deep impression on my childis
memory and | have never forgotten i
His wife, a lovely old lady whom every
one called Aunt Becky" survived hll
nearly thirty years. dying January, 1888
II Is not true, as your corresponder
asserts, that ''in those days every fan
ily from the bridge to Birch straet n,