V
Delaware County, Indiana
KITH AND KIN CONNECTION

Vanarsdol, Cornelius-------------------------"Reminiscences"----------------------------------------------

Written on April 8, 1920 by Martha Van Arsdol, Fullhart, Bell.

One hundred yers ago today, on April 8, 1820, my grandfather, Cornelius Van Arsdol, landed here in Indiana in the dense forest wtih his wife and five little children. My father was seven years old. They landed on the bank of White River, 6 miles east of what is now the city of Muncie but what was then an Indiana village called Muncytown, and inhabited by the Muncy tribe of Indianas. All their possessions were in a covered wagon drawn by an oxen team. There was nothing here but Indians then. Peace had been made with them and they were harmless, but as they would pass by my grandmother, where she sat on a log with her little children, they would stand and look at them and laugh and jeer.

Grandmother came to Ohio from Pennsylvania in her young days and there she and grandfather were married. They came from Montgomery County, Ohio to Delaware County, Indiana, as pioneers. Grandfather came sometime in advance and entered his land, one-hundred-sixty acres. As he went back to Ohio, he blazed the trees for their guidance back. When he brought the family, he also brought a man with him to help cut the road and to help build the cabin. They went hurridly to work at the cabin, building it out of round poles covering it with bark which they peeled of large trees. They had just gotten it enclosed, without floor, when there came up a storm. They were hurrying their possessions into it when to their great delight and joy, another white family drove up, having followed their trail. They too, put their goods into the cabin and remained a few days, then settled a few miles further up the river. The name of this family was Richason. Thus the forrest began settling up.

At this time there were a great many wild animals in the forest. When evening came the settlers could hear the scream of the panther, the howl of the wolves and the hooting of the owls. Upon the wild game, such as deer, squirrels, rabbits, turkeys, etc. and upon the fish in the river, the settlers depended largely for their living. For a few years, grandfather would go back to Ohio at intervals and get food, seeds to plant, and tools with which to work. I think grandmother never made a trip back to her old home. At least I never heard of her doing so.

My grandparents landed at their new home April 8, and in the following August they had a little son, Isaac, born to them there in the wilderness. He is said to be the first white child born in Delaware County. They had a family of ten children, Mary, John, Flender, Martha, William (died in infancy), Isaac, Jane, Cornelius, Lucretia and Rachel.

Their new home became beautiful for those days. They grew so many beautiful roses and many other flowers. They remained on the old homestead until their children were all married. They were old and could not stay alone though they had a good comfortable home. Their home was finally sold to the Reese family who still own it, making but one transfer in the hundred years. Their children are all dead now. Grandfather was an old style minister of the Christian Denomination. As soon as they were settled enough for a little congregation, he commenced preaching to them. By that time he had built a big two-story log house and he used it for a chapel as well as a dwelling. He kept that up for many years, people coming for many miles all around to the services. Finally a little school house was built near by and then services were held in that.

My Grandfather Payton was also an early settler of Delaware County, but not a pioneer as grandfather Van Arsdol was. I do not have the exact date of his coming, but I think it was in the thirties. He came here from Pennsylvania. He was a short, heavy man and very strong. He had a mania for clearing farms. He would buy a farm in the timber, clear it, then sell it and buy another, clear and sell till he had cleared and sold 13 farm. Grandmother's maiden name was Mary Hoover. They raised a family of ten children, Jacob, William, Sarah, Margaret, Lois, Mariah, Matilda, Nancy, Mahalia, and Mary Ann. All have passed away.

Grandfather was an old time local Methodist preacher. Grandmother died many years before he did. She died and was buried in Iowa while they were there visiting their children in 1859. Grandfather died at Roanoke, Indiana. I do not have the exact date of his death but it was about 1870. The grave robbers took his body from the grave and took it to Ft. Wayne to the medical college. They had him on the dissecting table ready for dissecting. It so happened that one of the medical students was well acquainted with him and when he found his body on the dissecting table he refused to touch it or allow anyone else to do so. He notified grandfather's people and then stood guard over him till his people came and got him. The student said as good and useful a man as father Payton had been, he could not stand to see used for dissecting. They took him back to Roanoke, got him ready and took him to Iowa where they buried him by the side of his wife. I think he was 86 years old when he died. He was a soldier of the War 1812 and drew a pension. He was a jolly, happy old man, loved by all who know him.

My father, John Van Arsdol, married Lois Payton, daughter of William and Mary Payton. To them were born six children, William, Mary Jane, Isaac, Martha, Rachel and John Wesley. Father lived to be 84 and mother 86 years old. Isaac enlisted in the civil war in _____ at the age of 19 years and was killed in the battle of Bull Run in 1861. Mary Jane married Robert Shroyer who died _____. She later married Joseph Wade who died at Roanoke, Indiana. She passed away ____ and left ____ children, William, George, Mina, Frank.

William, Deaf and dumb from his fourth year as a result of scarlet fever, was educated at Indianapolis and married Lucy Christy at Roanoke where he lived until his death in 1920, age 81 years. To them were born three sons, Newton, Court Latin, and Audy. His wife Lucy died about ___ and the son, Audy some years later.

Martha was born Nov. 14, 1848. On October 28, 1866 she was married to George W. Fullhart, son of John and Charlotte Fullhart. To them were born three daughter, Anna Belle, Cora Alice (died in 1895) and May Evelena.

George Fullhart was born Feb. 2, 1844. He was a soldier of the Civil war, a member of Company K, 19th Regular. In May 1864, he was seriously wounded in a front of Petersburg and was sent to the hospital at Alexandria, VA, on the Potomic River. In the summer of 1865, the war being over, he got his honorable discharge. He was in the hospital more than a year and never fully recovered his health. He died February 20, 1877, aged 33 years and 18 days. He was a brave soldier and a noble man and was honored and loved by eveybody who knew him.

Martha Fullhart was married to Andrew J. Bell in 18__. To them was born one son, Charles Elmer, and one daughter, Edna Lois. Andrew J. Bell died February 8, 1916.

Rachel Van Arsdol married Francis Robinson, Methodist minister in _____. To them were born four children, Charles, Edward, Lois Gertrude and Don.

John Wesley married Martha Goff and to them were born five children, Curt, Irvin, Ethel, Glen (died in childhood) and Wilbur.

Source: This same sketch has come to me from three different sources. The copies I received were typed, probably on an old typewriter. I do think that Martha Van Arsdol wrote or told someone most of the story. She would have been 71 years old, and I doubt that she typed it. There seems to be a lot of blanks---perhaps Martha, herself was going to fill those blanks after she retrieved the information from somewhere. Or perhaps her memory was failing. However, it is worth noting that she did not remember the year of her second marriage and failed to mention her son, George M Fullhart, who was four years old in the 1880 census. So did someone else complete the story? As with many genealogical puzzles, it is left to the reader to decide. END




Vanarsdol, Mary------------Her Account of the Indians Leaving Delaware County, Indiana--------------
This account of the Indians leaving Delaware County was told by Mary Vanarsdol Brown (my 3rd great grandma) when she was 93 years old, in a human interest story from The Muncie Sunday Star, March 12, 1905. Only the portion of the article pertaining to the Indians is included here. Mary was 8 years old when her family was supposedly the first white family in Perry Twp, Delaware County. Her father, Cornelius Vanarsdol, is well documented in the Delaware County histories as an old warrior, blacksmith and preacher, who preached and sang to the Indians.

INJUN JIM AND INJUN SAL (Mary Vanarsdol Brown's daughter-in-law had urged Mary to tell the story of Indian Jim and Sally):

At this suggestion, the old lady seemed to stop in wonderment for a second then a child-like smile over-spread her countenance as she recalled from the hazy past one of her cherished memories. "Injun Jim' and 'Injun Sal,' that is what we called them," said the aged woman. "My brother now sleeps in the old Reese cemetery beside Injun Jim. They were an old Indian woman and her son. When the other Indians left Delaware county they asked to remain with us white folks and they lived with us from house to house until they died."

"I can remember how much I feared them when a little girl, but in reality they were the best friends the white people ever had. They used to come right in the house, some times as many as ten, and without ever saying a word, lie down and go to sleep beside the stove. Then other times, two or three of them used to come in and sit at the table with the family and after eating all they wanted they would go out and never say a word during all the time they were there."

"The white people liked them because they used to help them fight the wild beasts and when they left this county to go away off to the West everybody felt bad."

LEAVING OF THE INDIANS
"I remember the day. They started headed by their old chief early in the morning to walk, one by one making a line, I guess over four miles long. Every white person in the county was down near the White river to see them go and it required almost ten hours for all of them to pass." "When they passed by they would say 'Good by, good man, going far away.' Everybody left but Injun Jim and Sal, and everybody liked them for staying."

------------End-----------

Venard, William - see Albany


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