Elder, Catharine Jones (b. 20 JUL 1816, d. 1897)

Census: Date: 1880
Place: Harrisburg, Dauphin, Pennsylvania

Note: As the son of John Elder, the "Fighting Parson" of Paxton Church, it should not be a surprise that Thomas Elder first made a name for himself in the military. His involvement with local militia led to participation in the Whiskey Rebellion, after which he was appointed to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. He commanded the 66th regiment of Pennsylvania Militia from about 1799 to 1804. Though his militia experiences were confined to his early years, people in Harrisburg would refer to him as "Colonel" for many years.

Even before his short-lived military career, Thomas Elder was busy establishing himself as a lawyer. He was educated in Philadelphia and upon his return to Harrisburg, studied law with John Hanna, being admitted to the Dauphin County Bar in 1791. His legal career would span more than forty years, during which time many young men would in turn come to Harrisburg to study law under him.

He developed an intense interest in public improvements as he watched Harrisburg grow from a frontier trading post to a bustling town. He played an important role in the creation of both the Harrisburg Bank and the Harrisburg Bridge Company, and served long terms as president of each institution, being president of the Harrisburg Bridge Company from its creation until 1846, and serving as president of the Harrisburg Bank from 1816 until his death in 1853. As Harrisburg's leading banker for almost forty years, Thomas Elder was the man responsible for developing most of the town's economic infrastructure. He had maintained a correspondence with Joseph Heister for over two decades prior to Heister's election as Governor of Pennsylvania. That relationship led to Heister's appointment of Elder as state attorney general in 1820, a post he held until 1823.

The biographical details above constitute most of what is said about Thomas Elder during tours of the Harrisburg Cemetery. Seldom is the subject of Thomas Elder's slaveholding brought up. The practice of owning people was not uncommon in Pennsylvania during the early decades of his lifetime, and quite a few of the Scots-Irish families that worshipped with his father at Paxton Presbyterian Church held slaves. Thomas was thirteen years old when Pennsylvania passed its Act for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery in 1780. That act, together with a supplemental act in 1788, required that all slaves, and children of slaves, be registered with the county clerk. From those surviving registries we know that Thomas Elder registered two slaves, Lydia and Henry, both children born after March 1, 1780, who would by law be manumitted upon their 28th birthday.

Other members of the Elder family owned slaves. His brother Robert, a farmer in Swatara Township, placed a young Negro boy up for sale in 1808, advertising: he is stout, healthy, and active, and understands all labour on a farm, as well as any of the colour. He is likewise a good waggoner, and careful of horses, knowing very well how to feed, & to take care of them --Any person wanting such a boy, by calling on Samuel Elder, in Harrisburg, may know his price, or on the owner living in Swatara township, Dauphin county. (Dauphin Guardian, July 12, 1808) Note: Samuel Elder was Harrisburg's Constable at the time.

Another brother, Joshua Elder, registered at least a dozen slaves over several years, including one man named Charles, who escaped in November 1804. Joshua Elder advertised for Charles' return in the Lancaster Journal, January 11, 1805, describing the man as "forty years old, about 5 feet 8 or 9 inches high, a stout made fellow, has some scores down his cheeks common to the Guinea negroes, and is fond of strong liquor. He went off in a drunken frolick, and took with him only his wearing clothes, which were an old blue cloth coat with large metal buttons, broad striped swansdown jacket, coarse shirt and trowsers, half worn shoes, yarn stockings, and a good fur hat."

The Elder family was connected by marriage to other Pennsylvania families that enslaved people, including the Cox, McAllister and Simpson families, and thereby defined its relationship to local African Americans through this institution. Like many Pennsylvania slave holders, Thomas Elder kept slaves until the practice became economically impractical in this area. He had grown up with enslaved persons in the family, and apparently saw nothing wrong, either morally or legally, with the practice. Not all of his contemporaries, however, would hold those same views.

Census: Date: 1860
Place: Harrisburg Ward 2, Dauphin, PA

Census: Date: 1870
Place: Harrisburg Ward 2, Dauphin, PA

Note: b. April 29, 1824 , in Harrisburg, Pa. ; enlisted in the Cameron Guards in the war with Mexico ; appointed second lieutenant Eleventh infantry, July 24, 1847 ; disbanded August 17, 1848 ; at the breaking out of the Rebellion, appointed captain Eleventh infantry, May 14, 1861 , remaining in the service until January 6, 1864 . Captain Elder m. Mary Carpenter , daughter of Israel and Catharine Carpenter

Census: Date: 1860
Place: Newport, Perry, PA

Census: Date: 1870
Place: Newport, Perry, PA

Census: Date: 1880
Place: Newport, Perry, PA

Census: Date: 1860
Place: Newport, Perry, PA

Census: Date: 1870
Place: Newport, Perry, PA

Census: Date: 1880
Place: Newport, Perry, PA

Note: Patent index # 1 Series A-AA, Commission Books 1638-1781
Patent Date Oct. 13, 1770, pg 426, Bartram Galbreath, Area 10 - Warranter - Proprietariers (Island) - Name of tract, Round Island, date of Warrant Oct 18 1760

Patent Date Jun 4 1772, pg 493, Bartram Galbreath, Area 330 - Warranter - Bartram Galbreath - Name of tract, Limestone Knap, date of Warrant June 3 1773, County, Northhampton


"He received the best education the schools of that dayafforded, and studied surveying, a profession he followed for many years. During the French and Indian Wars, Colonel Galbraith served as an officer in a company of rangers formed for the protection of the frontiers. From 1760 to 1775, acting in his professional capacity, he surveyed the greater portion of the lands located in the present counties of Dauphin, Perry, and Juniata. He was a member of the provincial convention of January 23, 1775; delegate to the provincial conference of June 18, 1776, and a member of the Constitutional Convention of July 15, 1776. During that year was elected colonel of one of the Lancaster battalions of associators, and on duty in the Jerseys during the greater portion of that year, serving also as a member of the Assembly 1776-1777. On June 3, 1777, he was appointed county lieutenant; November 8, one of the commissioners to collect clothing for the army; and December 16, appointed by the Assembly to take subscriptions for the Continental loan. He acted as one of the commissioners which met at New Haven, Conn., November 22, 1777, to regulate the prices of commodities in the States. After four years of excessive and exhaustive labor, Colonel Galbraith was compelled to resign the office of county lieutenant, but remained in service as an officer of the militia until the restoration of peace. In 1789 he was appointed one of the commissioners to view the Juniata and Susquehanna, and mark the places where locks and canals were necessary to render these streams navigable. He was appointed deputy surveyor November 4, 1791, and, while acting as such took up large tracts in Lykens Valley, but, dying before patents were issued to him, his heirs lost them all in the numberless litigations which ensued. He died while on a visit with his brother, Andrew." From Pennsylvania Genealogies

b. September 24, 1738 , in Derry township, Lancaster , now Dauphin county, Pa. ; d. March 9, 1804 , in Cumberland county, Pa. , while on a visit to his brother, Andrew ; buried in Donegal church graveyard. He received the best education the schools of that day afforded, and studied surveying, a profession he followed many years. During the French and Indian wars, Colonel Galbraith served as an officer in a company of rangers formed for the protection of the frontiers. From 1760 to 1775 , acting in his professional capacity, he surveyed the greater portion of the lands located in the present counties of Dauphin, Perry , and Juniata . He was a member of the provincial convention of January 23, 1775 ; delegate to the provincial conference of June 18, 1776 , and member of the Constitutional convention of July 15, 1776 . During that year was elected colonel of one of the Lancaster battalions of associators, and on duty in the Jerseys during the greater portion of that year, serving also as a member of the Assembly 1776-1777 . On June 3, 1777 , he was appointed county lieutenant; November 8 , one of the commissioners to collect clothing for the army; and December 16 , appointed by the Assembly to take subscriptions for the Continental loan. He acted as one of the commissioners which met at New Haven, Conn. , November 22, 1777 , to regulate the prices of commodities in the States. After four years of excessive and exhaustive labor, Colonel Galbraith was compelled to resign the office of county lieutenant, but remained in service as an officer of the militia until the restoration of peace. In 1789 , he was appointed one of the commissioners to view the Juniata and Susquehanna , and mark the places where locks or canals were necessary to render these streams navigable. He was appointed deputy surveyor November 4, 1791 , and, while acting as such, took up large tracts in Lykens Valley , but, dying before patents were issued to him, his heirs lost them all in the numberless litigations which ensued. Colonel Galbraith was twice married; m., first, March 30, 1759 , Ann Scott , b. December 26, 1741 ; d. June 29, 1793 ; daughter of Josiah Scott , of Donegal.

Census: Date: 1850
Place: Upper Swatara, Dauphin, Pennsylvania

Census: Date: 1860
Place: Harrisburg Ward 3, Dauphin, PA

Note: Resides in California

Occupation: Date: 1880
Place: Coal Mine

Census: Date: 1850
Place: Upper Swatara, Dauphin, Pennsylvania

Census: Date: 1860
Place: Harrisburg Ward 3, Dauphin, PA

Census: Date: 1870
Place: Harrisburg Ward 4, Dauphin, PA

Census: Date: 1880
Place: San Francisco, San Francisco, CA

Note: Hugh Stewart, youngest son of Robert Stewart, No. 1, was born near Glasgow, Scotland, June 11, 1719, and was in his infancy when his father emigrated to County Down, Ireland; he accompanied his older brother, Samuel, who was 21 years his senior and his guardian, (his father, Robert Stewart, having died five years previously, in 1730 in Ireland,) in his emigration to America in 1735.

They settled at Chestnut Level in Lancaster Co., Pa., in the spring of 1735; he landed with a capital in coin equivalent to one dollar and twenty-five cents, which he spent for a jack knife to cut threads, considering it the most necessary tool in his business of weaving, an occupation he had learned in Ireland and which he followed here for many years.

Hugh Stewart’s ancestors having been Covenanters naturally assisted in (the) organizing a congregation of Seceders and establishing a church in which the family worshiped many years, which church and congregation have long since passed away, with nothing left but the little graveyard and since it has fallen into ruins there is nothing left but the D.A.R. monument, enscribed with the names of all that could be found on the scattered pieces of tombstones lying about. Personally, I am most grateful to these patriotic women." Minnehaha Finney, Sterling, Kansas.]

Hugh Stewart is represented to have been a very handsome man, above the ordinary height, complexion light, eyes light blue, features small and spare, but well formed, wearing a thoughtful aspect in repose, but animated in conversation. He retained through life his Scotch accent.settled in Lexington, Ky., at a very early day and his descendants settled in Indiana. He was born in Lancaster Co., Pa.

Census: Date: 1850
Place: Washington, Dauphin, Pennsylvania