Indian Valley Historical Society – Blog

Posts are ordered by oldest to most recent. (Last post 9/14/23)

When Did the Idea for IVHS Begin?

One year ago, Thanksgiving week, I’m walking my dog at the Camp WaWa Park in Lower Salford. A man starts talking to Jim and next thing you know we’re off on a rabbit trail – guess I should call it a dog trail. He tells me he grew up on a farm at the bend in Diebler Road, which meets Halteman Road around the corner from Pennypacker Mills, a Revolutionary War site. General Washington camped there with thousands of troops in October 1777. This conversation strikes a nerve – and he mentions there is a mass grave of soldiers next door to the farm he lived on, complete with a marker. This is new news to me – so I drive over to Pennypacker Mills, Jim in tow – he loves it with the back window down, and I get to talk to the curator. He confirms – certainly is a mass grave, and this is how you find it. Fascinating, I walk out the back of the property toward the upper parking lot and make a left down what the curator told me was formerly a very old road – probably dates back to the mid to late 1700s. It is now overgrown with low-lying grass and lined with trees on both sides. So I follow it down to a meadow-like setting and make a right turn and in about a hundred yards, and I am standing on a mound roughly 30 feet wide by 100 feet long. There is a stone marker with an inscription: “Soldiers of the Revolution Wounded at Germantown – Oct. 4, 1777. My guess is General Washington either walked the distance or rode Blueskin out to this gravesite. I just stood there in silent reverence – thinking, what were their names, were they Continental Army, Militia, or Associators, and where did they come from. It’s an unmarked grave. Only minutes prior, I told the curator that I plan to research and if possible, locate the identities of these soldiers, and if successful – talk to the Montgomery County Historical Society and have another plaque erected. All of these years later having lived in the Indian Valley all my life (this site is a stone’s throw from the edge of Lower Salford Township), I didn’t know until that day this moment in time still stands. November 30, 2020

Who was Henry S. Landes – (1871 – 1950) ?

This is a good place to start. There are local Revolutionary War names to follow. Hopefully someone knows of or is related to some of these. Let’s get started. My quest to locate the names of those buried in the mass grave at Pennypacker Mills, Schwenksville, took me to the Montgomery County Historical Society. Their website indicates they hold the Henry S. Landes papers, stored in a box, and he was a Revolutionary War historian. Henry was born to Henry C. Landes and Elizabeth H. Souder, and in 1891 he married Mary E. Hause. He is buried at the Souderton Mennonite Church Cemetery. I reviewed all of the material in the box containing his collection. Unfortunately, I didn’t find anything pertaining to the mass graves, so my search will continue and comment will follow in a later post. But I did find a lot of local names of settlers from the Indian Valley who served in the Revolution, and had it not been for Henry Landes I’m not sure we would learn of this information today. There are more names and burial locations and I will have to approach this one post at a time. Let me begin with two lists of soldiers buried at two separate locations – both close to Souderton and within the Indian Valley. Buried At Indian Creek – Christ Reformed Church – Telford – Henry Fuhrman (Foreman) DOB Oct 1, 1752 DOD Sept 12, 1822 / Jacob Gerhart DOB Nov 10, 1750 DOD Oct 10, 1829 / Johannes Gerhart DOB Jan 6, 1755 DOB Sept 14, 1829 / Michael Hertzel (Hartsley) DOB ? DOD Sept 29, 1784. At Indianfield Lutheran Church – Earlington – Abraham Wambold DOB Apr 5, 1750 DOD Aug 5, 1832 / George Ziegler DOB Mar 12, 1754 DOD Jan 3, 1829. If any of these soldiers of the Revolution are your ancestors or if you have any information, genealogical or otherwise, I’m sure there are people who will visit this post who will be interested in your comments. Thank you. December 4, 2020

“Diaries of William Souder Hemsing”

An Intimate Look at Souderton, Pennsylvania 1885-1888, 1902-1906, 1918. The book of diaries was commissioned in 1987 therefore it is now 33 years old. Hemsing, born in 1866, was the son of Henry and Mary Souder Hemsing. My guess is Henry was related to the original Souders who founded Souderton. I bring this book to your attention in the event you are unaware of its existence. Having read through parts of it many years ago, I plan to reacquaint myself with it – after all, there is material within it to be brought to light here. December 10, 2020

William Souder Hemsing – 1866-1940 – grandson of Henry Souder, founder of Souderton, PA

“An Old Old Road”

Previously I wrote in my idea for the IVHS. At Pennypacker Mills I walked across the parking lot over the slight hill, and there I found the very old road dating back before the American Revolution. Take a good look – what do you see? The road is tree lined, no doubt with younger trees, and the green grass has brown debris on each side. The road has been maintained to a degree over many years. Notice the larger evergreens at the bottom? Beyond them turn right and in about a hundred yards you meet history – American Revolutionary War history. Quiet speaks volumes in this setting. You may hear nature – that’s it. The mass grave of soldiers is before you and quietly, reverently, I just stood there, thinking. Take another look at the old road. See anything? I’m speaking of the ghosts of those who traveled that road. They were Continental Army, wearing blue frock coats and cream colored pants, and they proudly carried their Pennsylvania Rifle made in Lancaster. The three-cornered hat sat upon their head. Militia men had no specific uniform and neither did the Associators to my knowledge. They may have worn exactly what they left home dressed in. They left to fight – and now some of them drove a wagon down the hill filled with dead bodies to bury. Between 11,000 to 12,000 of his troops retreated to Pennypacker Mills on October 4, 1777, following the Battle of Germantown. The battle was a bloody fight – a bayonet charge. General Washington sitting upon Blueskin probably rode down this old old road. In my research I discovered that the General’s grayish-white horse, half Arabian, was named Blueskin. And Blueskin was nervous under battle therefore the General had two horses. That’s a very interesting thought provoking old old road. And it resides right here at the edge of our Indian Valley. December 11, 2020

“Sycamores or Buttonwoods, Whichever You Prefer – and the Lenape, the Original People”

Several years ago we’re standing at a tee box on the back nine at Pilgrim Oaks Golf Course near Peach Bottom. A creek flowed nearby and I pointed out a very thick trunk to a Sycamore tree, commenting it could be 200 years old. Someone said – many years ago the Lenape planted Sycamore nearby creeks and rivers so they could find water. Think about it – in the 1600s there were no roads, and by the 1700s there were but a few among mostly paths. The Sycamore grows to extremely large proportions with massive trunks and large crooked spreading white branches. If you live in the woods you must find water to survive. Guess you plant Sycamores – your eyes are drawn to those large white branches. The large picture at the top was taken this week along the Indian Creek as was the pic at the lower left. The pic in the lower right is of the Branch Creek and the upper right is too. While these Sycamores in the pics are younger, they are off-spring of those planted hundreds of years ago. There are massive old Sycamores in other places along the Branch Creek, in particular, but you have to know where to go to find them. Speaking of the Lenape – my brother-in-law used to talk about working on his grandparents farm along the Indian Creek as a teen. This would be more than sixty years ago. Take a look at the pic, lower center. See the two abutments on each side of the driveway? A narrow portion of the Indian Creek flows underneath. This is private property – his grandparents former farm. Beyond the abutments are Lenape burial grounds. He told me after they finished farming for the day, they walked the horses down to the creek, washed them, and put them in the barn. They never plowed nearby their burial grounds. Just another piece of history about our Indian Valley. December 13, 2020

“Who was Isaac McGlathery and Who was his Friend?”

Bare with me as I’m going to divert briefly from the geography portion of the purpose for the Indian Valley Historical Society’s chat group. There’s good reason – Whitpain is not so many miles south of the Indian Valley – and I wish to pursue Revolutionary War history and nearby Whitpain Township. Isaac McGlathery was born in 1752 in Whitpain Township and by 1777 – age 25 he was a Lieutenant in the 4th Batallion Philadelphia County Militia. What makes Isaac very important to me was his friendship with a prominent Revolutionary War figure. Isaac survived the war, later to pass away July 25, 1834 at Whitpain, age 88. The Norristown Register reported on August 6, 1834 – Isaac was one of the heroes of the American Revolution – and he was a friend and companion of Lafayette. Why was Isaac a hero? And how and why did he cement a valued friendship with Lafayette? I wish I knew.

Marie – Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert der Motier, Marquis de La Fayette – was a French aristocrat and military officer during the American Revolution. Can you imagine bearing a name that long? Born in 1757 he was 20 when he would have met Isaac, then 25, and also to become a most valued friend of General Washington. He was with Washington and in command of French and allied forces when General Lord Cornwallis surrendered his army in 1783 at Yorktown, thus ending the war. The following article was published in the Norristown Register Jan. 25, 1834. “The world may justly mourn his exit from the stage of action. As a friend to universal emancipation he stood unrivaled. His loss will be severely felt in France, more particularly, at this season of her political convulsions. General La Fayette passed away on Dec. 5, 1833 age 77 at his residence near Paris. One of his surviving children was a son – Georges Washington de La Fayette. December 31, 2020

“Where the Ridge Valley Creek Passes Underneath Hausman Road”

Around the corner from Camp Green Lane you turn onto Hausman Road. This picture was taken from a small bridge built over the Ridge Valley Creek. North of the Ridge, you are near the boundary of Salford and Marlborough Townships and have left the farmland of the Indian Valley behind. You pass through a much different environment with heavily wooded areas, narrow roads, some paved, some stoned, and many large boulders are strewn about, remnants of the ice age when these huge specimens descended from the north. Take a look at that huge boulder in the center of the picture. Nearly 275 years ago, I can see a family of Lenape sitting on the boulder – some bathing and if the creek is deep enough – maybe some young ones jumped off the boulder into the water. February 24, 2021

“So where is Moser’s Rock – Somewhere in Vernfield – Somewhere in the Indian Valley”

On a recent post “If You Grew Up in….” a bunch of local yocals posted about this rock. Don’t look too hard, there’s no picture of it up there, but in time we’re going to find it and have one. The first pic on the left was taken at the bridge on Indian Creek Road looking out to the confluence of the Indian and Branch Creeks. Notice the Branch on the right side joining in. Way up stream along the Branch is the rock, Moser’s Rock. Now the middle picture was taken off a cul-de-sac road that stems off of Price Road, which you can only get to from Indian Creek Road. The middle pic is looking W by NW down through a beautiful meadow and way in the distance you can see the Branch Creek. And I think if I walked over the septic mound through someone’s side-yard and down the hill and kept going, I’d find Moser’s Rock. So the pic on the right was taken from behind Landis Market off Shelly Road looking south. Probably toward guess what! And that’s the Branch Creek. Now I’m thinking if I back up to Shelly Road, head west a stone’s throw, cross the bridge over the Branch, and turn left down that long lane with permission from the one who lives there (I know them) – and keep walking, I’d come to the Rock. But I might be on the wrong side of the Branch to get a good pic facing the rock. Not sure. You Vernfielders will have to set me straight – but I know I’m getting warm. February 27, 2021

“The Warrior’s Path”

In my upcoming historical fiction novel there was cause to include a chapter about an ancient pathway through North America, including Pennsylvania. The Scots-Irish who migrated from Londonderry, in my novel, chose to settle in western PA, and they would have encountered, even used the Warrior’s Path. Part of the Pennsylvania Turnpike from somewhere near Carlisle to Pittsburgh may have been built over the Warrior’s Path.Some years ago, while visiting my nephew near Troy, PA, I drove west on Route 6 and stopped roadside for a break. I was looking at the sign – picture below, of the Warrior’s Path. Years later while driving through Phoenixville across the bridge over the Schuykill, I saw an identical sign for the path. For a moment we will divert from the purpose of the history of the Lenape since I inserted a segment from my new novel, and you will see that the path involves the Six Nations and the Shawnee.”A Shawnee word – Ath-ia-mi-owee – was used to reference the trails in the pathway – and the word meant “path of the armed ones.” The Warrior’s Path was built by wear and tear, the constant grinding of the earth’s vegetation to a level where animals and men used the route for travel. The pathway stretched outward in many directions and the system of trails existed for hundreds of years, well before Europeans explored continental North America. The athiamiowee was used extensively for war and hunting game because nomadic herds of buffalo and elk used the trails for migration. And so the Warrior’s Path could be a place of danger for the Lenape (Le-nah-pay), the Shawnee, or a tribe within the Six Nations.” I suggest to you, members of the IVHS, that there must have been branches of the Warrior’s Path running near or through the Indian Valley. It’s your turn – anyone know of any history? What can you add? For me, this is fascinating history. February 28, 2021

“A Collector of Revolutionary War History – William Summers of Conshohocken”

While researching at the Montgomery County Historical Society – specifically the files of Henry S. Landis (1871-1950) of Souderton, I came upon an old brown leather-bound booklet – 3 x 5 inches in size. On the inside cover there was inscribed, “William Summers – Conshohocken – personal notes and compilation of lists of American Revolutionary War Soldiers obituaries. Somehow, someway, Mr. Summer’s booklet found its way into the hands of Henry Landis. Below are a couple of the multiple entries in his booklet.

Henry Shots (possibly Schatz or Shatz) – Another Revolutionary War Patriot gone in Upper Salford Township December 24, 1834 at 83 years. By my math Henry was born in 1751 and could have been 25 years at the outbreak of the Revolution. General Henry Lee died at Cumberland Is. March 25, 1818. Norristown Herald April 13, 1818. There are many gravesites of Revolutionary War Soldiers right here in the Indian Valley. Once the weather improves it will be time to explore. March 1, 2021

“William Summer’s Booklet of Revolutionary War Heroes – Part II”

With my second visit to the Historical Society of Montgomery County, I took another look at William’s booklet. I’m glad I did. You know you don’t see everything there is to see the first time around. His printing was immaculate – and if he chose to write, his construction of each letter was very neat and precise. And this is a man who penned this listing of heroes between the 1810s to 1830s. He placed a number for each entry in the upper corner of the 3 x 5 inch page. There was 100 entries in total. Number 96 – he wrote the following: “T. Jefferson – died on Tuesday 4th – 1826 ten minutes before 1:00 o’clock. Author of the Declaration of Independence – at Monticello, Virginia. Aged 83 years 3 months and 2 days. Lafayette Aurora, Pottstown, PA July 13, 1826.” It took nine days after Jefferson’s passing to be printed in the newspaper. Blogger’s note – if you are a student of history you may recall, while Jefferson died on the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, so did John Adams, at his home in Peacefield nearby Boston, MA. March 14, 2021

“Soldiers of the Revolutionary War – Salford Mennonite Church Burial Ground”

Nine in total, and they are all located in a corner of the graveyard. And I am told once per year their gravesites are checked and new flags with 13 stars designating them as soldiers of the Revolutionary War are replaced if need be. There are four Alderfers and two Clemens – and I wonder if there is a pair of brothers or cousins, now resting together. Six of them served in the 8th Company. No doubt they knew each other – they fought alongside each other. And why was Abraham Clemens in the Continental Line? We’ll find out in future posts. They all had a place and they all had a mission – a patriotic cause, liberty. Why else would you sign up for duty? And I find it coincidental that those who served in the 5th battalion (7 of them) were under the command of four officers, one of them Major Benjamin Eyre. He had two other brothers, Manuel and Jehu, and years before the three of them took over the shipbuilders business of Richard Wright of Kensington/Phila. Two of the Eyres married his daughters. And when the Revolutionary War broke out, all of them volunteered for the militia. The coincidence I reference is this – in my upcoming historical fiction novel, the ship Faithful Steward was built by the Eyre brothers. And I wasn’t aware of the Indian Valley connection with one of the Eyres until now. More will follow about these names – more research to do. March 15, 2021

• Abraham Alderfer – Private – 8th Company, 5th Battalion, Phila. County Militia – DOD 4-17-1825
• Jacob Alderfer – Private – 8th CL 8th Company, 5th Battalion, Phila. County Militia – DOD 1797
• John Alderfer – Private – 3rd CL 8th Company, 5th Battalion, Phila. County Militia – DOB 1747 / DOD 12-19-1820
• Joseph Alderfer – Private – 8th Company, 5th Battalion, Philadelphia County Militia – DOB 1751 / DOD 11-14-1831
• Abraham Clemens – Private – PA Regiment Continental Line – Phila. County Militia – DOB 1752 / DOD 9-15-1808
• Gerhart Clemens – Private – 4th CL 8th Company, 5th Battalion, Phila. County Militia – DOB 1745 / DOD 5-1-1820
• Johan Clemmer – Private – 2nd Company, 1st Battalion, Phila. County Militia – DOB 1757 / DOD 12-14-1836
• Jacob Kolb – Private – 4th CL 5th Battalion, Phila. County Militia – DOD 8-2-1820
• Isaac Kratz – Private – 4th CL 8th Company, 5th Battalion, Phila. County Militia – DOB 1749 / DOD 9-15-1823
  • Source – Historical Society of Montg. County – Burial Places of Soldiers of the Revolution in Montg. County – com

The Dielman Kolb Homestead – Part I

Nestled at the western edge of the Indian Valley on Kinsey Road in Lower Salford Township, Pennsylvania is one of the original homesteads of a large German migrant family. Dielman Kolb, the younger of a group of five brothers, all from Wolfsheim, Germany, in the Palatinate, migrated to Pennsylvania in 1717. In my research I found two references to the date his homestead was built, one being 1717 and the other 1740. In either case this construction is very old. The home sits on two and one-half acres and is said to be a modified German floorplan with gambrel roof. A summer kitchen is featured in the right-side picture. Dielman’s brothers, Martin, John, and Jacob arrived in 1707, Henry, another brother came in 1709. As is often the case, another family member was responsible for the reconnaissance mission, and the responsibility fell to their grandfather, Peter Schumacher. An aunt to the brothers, Veronica Schumacher Van Bebber also arrived before the before the band of brothers. The Dielman family of brothers were destined to play an important role in the early founding of the surrounding area. More of their story will follow in Part II. September 14, 2023