Ancestors and Anecdotes

From the Adams County PA Historical Articles a story by Elwood christ about Herman Haupt Wooing Cecilia Keller.

Adams County Pa. Related Historical Articles

Herman's Wooing:
A story from 1830s Gettysburg

Elwood Christ

Ah, yes, with the approach of February 14, a man's fancy turns to the pursuit of the "fairer sex." So for St. Valentine's Day, take heart of a story from 1830s Gettysburg.

Our dashing young blade was Herman. In 1881, he wrote that he "became an inhabitant of this sublunary sphere" on March 26, 1817, in Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love. In his youth, he "gained the reputation of being smart but decidedly mischievous, having an irresistible propensity to climb out windows and run over neighbor's roof-tops." His parents did not spare the rod in disciplining Herman, which he said, "contributed to making me temporarily, if not permanently smart." Indeed, Herman was smart; he gained admission to West Point at the age of 14 years, graduated in 1835, and worked a year for a railroad line near Philadelphia before being "appointed Principal Assistant in the service of the State of Pennsylvania, with headquarters at Gettysburg" at the age of 19.

Herman recalled his early days in Gettysburg: "I attended to my duties closely, and had but little fondness for society, parties I detested and avoided; I formed no acquaintances among the ladies, and resisted all efforts by them to draw me into company." Herman recalled one summer evening "at the principle hotel," where "I was ushered into a parlor and presented to about twenty young ladies. It was too late to run… I was trotted up and down the street all evening, and compelled to promise to join a picnic…." At that picnic, Herman met a daughter of the Rev. Benjamin Keller, Anna Cecilia. Their "acquaintance" continued for several months. One day Herman escorted a wedding party to York accompanied by Cecilia, who was the guest of the Rev. Dr. John George Schmucker. That evening, when Cecilia did not attend a "prayer-meeting," Herman searched high and low for her to no avail. He returned to Dr. Schmucker's home to find her safe. Herman "inquired coldly" at what hour the next day they would return to Gettysburg.

On the journey home, it rained, and the showers drenched them; for Herman's rig, "an open buggy," and the umbrella he carried provided little cover. He glanced over at Cecilia, described by Herman as being "much admired … complexion extremely fair with cheeks full and rosy," and with a "dove-like" disposition. She was crying. "Water is a solvent, and…it dissolved anger and opened lips." She explained what had happened. "These explanations extinguished the last traces of resentment; tongues were loosened and confidence restored. We became oblivious to the storm…." Within a few miles, in pouring rain, Herman proposed. Cecilia answered, "Wait until we reach that big stump in the road on the top of the hill, and then I will tell you…." After waiting a year, Cecilia and Herman were married on August 30, 1838; they were blessed with 11 children and 53 years of marriage before she died in 1891.

Herman's last name was Haupt, and after establishing his Oak Ridge Select Academy and teaching mathematics at Gettysburg College, he went on to operate the Union military railroads during the Civil War and wrote numerous books on engineering and bridges. He died of a heart attack in 1905.

Our line starts with the family of Eystein Glumra the Clatterer/ the Noisy, also called Eystein Ivarsson born ca. 830 in Nord-Trøndelag, Norway was Jarl (Earl) of Oppland and Hedmark in Norway.

This Nordic line ruled the Orkney Islands. Orkney and Shetland were ruled by Norway until 1472. As well as settling on Shetland, the Norsemen colonized Caithness and Sutherland in what is today's Scotland. We see the evidence in the place names. From the Shetlands and Orkneys, the Norsemen travelled on to the Hebrides and from there to the Isle of Man, Cumbria, Wales and, particularly, to Ireland. The Norsemen traded with Ireland and established several towns including Dublin and Cork.
Eystein had three sons as far as I can decipher at this time:

Rognvald I “The Wise” born 830

Sigurd I Earl of the Orkneys born 832

Malahule Eysteinsson, or Haldrick, Malahhulc Eysteinsson Earl of More, born 852.

It is Malahule line we follow for the surname LOWE. He has six sons, the fourth son Richard I De Contentin, was also known as Richard I, De St. Sauveur, Viscount of Cotentin born @ 893.

Richards son Asperling De Vandreuil, who was born in France @ 952, marries Sparta De Senlis and the Lowe line continues with their son Raoul Bayeux born 1022.

Bayeux is a town of Lower Normandy, in France, on the river Aure. It was formerly a very considerable place, and one of the most ancient in Gaul. It suffered much from the incursions of the Normans in the 9th and 10th centuries, and afterwards still more during the wars with the English.

It was taken from Berenger, count of Bessin, by Raoul, who was afterwards duke of Normandy, from which period it became a Norman town. It was taken and burnt by Henry, king of England, during the war which he carried on against his brother Robert, duke of Normandy, and it experienced a similar fate from the English in 1356. It afterwards stood two sieges, one by the English in 1415, and the other by count de Dunois in 1450; and, lastly, it was sacked and pillaged by the Protestants in 1562.

Raoul Bayeux marries Emeburge Ceux, and they have several children. Their son Balso Bayeux was born 930 and married Poppa Of Sulzbach, they have a son Ancitel De Bayeux born 1017 who marries Poppa De Senlis Counte, and they have two sons and one daughter.

Now we start to see the name change more. The particulars of this are still to be traced. One assumes these changes occur due to marriage, conflict, and lands claimed.

Their eldest son known as Alcher was born 1010, his wife is unknown at this time-a guess would be that he married someone within The Fitz Warine/Warren/Lee line who brought with it title and lands. He is the father of Warin Fitz Warine Lee, who married Milletta Peverell Whittington and they had two sons: Warine the Bold/Bald and the more famous Fulk Fitzwarine which brings the family in relation to William the Conqueror.

The Lowe line continues directly with Warine the Bold/Bald who was the first sheriff of Shorpshire. He and his wife Maud Le Vavsur have a son Hugo Fitz Warine and with his son we see the name changes now to De Lega with Hugh De Lega.

William, now called "the Conqueror," had with him Hugh de Lega and Gilbert de Venables, relatives, who fought so valiantly with William that they each were given an estate in Essex (Eastern England). The LEE name was spelled Lee, Lea, Leigh, de Lega and de Lee by this time.

Reginaldus De Lee, Hugo De Lega’s son is found in documents pertaining to Lea Farm. This tenement is adjacent to Hopstone. Reginald de Lega, is mentioned as an Essoignor in a local Suit of 1221, may have been of this place. Richard de la Lee, first Juror for Claverley at the Manorial Inquest of 1255, was undoubtedly so. Again, one Richard de la Lee was eighth Juror of Claverley at the Assizes of 1272.

But this is as much as I can find on Reginaldus De Lee. His son with Reynor is named John De lee. I know John married Matilda Erdington and from their 3 children we follow Thomas De Lee whose second marriage with Johanna Morton gives us Reginald De lee, and it becomes very tangled here for the moment. This area needs a closer look, Thomas De Lee/Lowe Thomas del Lowe, the elder, from whom the Derbyshire families of Lowe derived their descent, and who we assume to have been the younger brother of William del Lowe, appears as a witness to a charter in 1407, and was the father of Geoffrey del Lowe referred to in the proceedings of the Manorial Court of Macclesfield in 1426.

According to an old pedigree, a copy of which is to be found amongst the Wolley MSS. in the British Museum, this Thomas Del Lowe died at Macclesfield at eleven o'clock at night, on the 10th of February, 1415. Geoffrey Del Lowe, his son and heir, is stated on the same authority to have married Margaret, daughter of [Sir Peter?] Legh, of Lyme, in the County of Chester. This marriage is not given in any of the various pedigrees of that family, but there is no particular reason for doubting the accuracy of it.

By a charter, dated at Macclesfield the Saturday next after the feast of St. Kenelm, King and Martyr, in the seventeenth year of the reign of King Henry VI. (this would be in July, 1439), John Rossyndale, the elder, and John Rossyndale the younger, his son and heir, remitted and quit-claimed for ever to Geoffrey del Lowe, of Macclesfield, and his heirs, all their claims and title to certain lands and tenements of Geoffrey del Lowe, situated in "le Dedestrete" in the town of Macclesfield. The witnesses to this charter were Thomas Del Lowe, then Mayor of Macclesfield, Stephen Del Rowe, Alderman, Roger de Falybrome, Thomas Davy, Lawrence Blagg, and many others. Geoffrey Del Lowe is stated to have died at Macclesfield on the Monday in the third week of Lent, 1451, between the hours of six and seven in the morning. His widow survived him for about three years.

Thomas Lowe acquired a considerable estate through his marriage with Joane, eldest daughter and co-heiress of Thomas Fawne, of Alderwasley, on the 23rd of November, 1471. By their charter, dated on the Monday next after the Feast of the Purification, in the eleventh year of King Edward the IV. (February, 1472), Thomas Lowe and Joane his wife together granted and confirmed to Lawrence Lowe and George Lowe, brothers of the said Thomas, and to Humphrey Lowe.

Chapel of Witton

Ottiwell Township is situated in the ancient chapelry of Witton, and within the last three centuries at least twenty-five members of this branch of the family have been interred in Witton Church, as appears from the registers. Unfortunately, that church was re-paved some years since, and not a single inscription to the Lowes, or, indeed, any other family, escaped destruction.

Thomas Lowe gives us Geoffrey Lowe 1432 who marries Margaret Leigh.

By a charter dated in 1453, certain lands in Pexall (a small township about three miles from Macclesfield), were granted by John Hough, of Pexall, and Nicholas Hough, of the City of Oxford, to Laurence del Lowe, son of Geoffrey del Lowe, of Macclesfield, who reconveyed the same to George del Lowe, his younger brother. This George, who was living in 1472, as appears from a charter of Thomas del Lowe, his brother, had no male issue, and Margaret, his only daughter and heiress, became the wife of William Swetenham, of Somerford Booths, about 1479, and carried certain lands in Pexall, Bollington, and Macclesfield, into the Swetenham family.

According to a fine old emblazoned pedigree in Somerford Booths Hall, impaling Gules, two wolves passant argent—the ancient arms of Lowe—this Margaret Swetenham was living a widow in 1491.

Previous to 1473, the Lowes had quitted Macclesfield and were seated in the neighbourhood of Northwich, as is seen from a charter, dated September the 1st, 1473 whereby William Coton, of the town of Derby, Peter del Lowe, of Northwyche, John Halyn, "preste" of Wytton, Thomas del Lowe, William del Lowe, and Laurence del Lowe, all of the same place, testified that they were witnesses to a certain charter whereby Thomas Whytington, of Belper, in the County of Derby, and Margery, his wife, granted a messuage and seven acres of land in that place to John Whytington, their eldest son, therefore Thomas del Lowe of this charter became the ancestor of the Lowes of Alderwasley; Laurence del Lowe was ancestor of the Lowes of Denby; and either from Peter or William del Lowe sprang what, so far as can be ascertained, is now the sole existing branch of the family.

Geoffrey and Margaret’s son Lawrence Del Lowe Born 1451 marries for his first wife the heiress of Rossell, of Denby born 1440, and his second wife, co-heiress of Mylton, of Grafton.

Lawrence del Lowe of the Manor of Denby came into his possession; but evidence of this marriage isvague and even her parentage is unknown. His second wife was Alice, daughter and co heiress of William Mylton, of Gratton, in the County of Derby (son of Ranulph de Milneton, or Mylton, of Milton, in Cheshire, by Mary, his wife, daughter and sole heiress of . . . Gratton, of Gratton), and widow of Oliver de Newton, of Newton, in Cheshire, who died in London of the plague in 1452, and was buried in St. Andrew's Church, Holborn.t

Point of note: according to the Journal of the Derbyshire Archeological and Natural History V 1-3, Alice, the daughter and co-heiress of William Mylton, had, with other issue, a son, Richard de Newton, who married Janet, the daughter of Lawrence Lowe, his mother's second husband. We have here sufficient evidence that Lawrence Lowe must have been twice married. It seems more probable that his son and heir was the issue of his first marriage.

Lawrence appears to have embraced the legal profession and became a Sergeant-at-Law. In 1474, he is said to have been in the service of William, Lord Hastings; he became Recorder of the Borough of Nottingham, in or about the year 1480. The fact that he was twice married is sufficiently established, and there can be but little doubt that his first wife was the heiress of the family of Rossell, of Denby, and that through her the chief share must have been honored prior to 1455, for there is a deed of partition, dated in that year, whereby certain lands of William Mylton are divided between John Massey and Margaret his wife, Ralph Browne and Elena his wife, and Lawrence Lowe and Alice his wife; the said Margaret, Elena, and Alice, being the three daughters and co- heiresses of the said William Mylton.

Lawrence Lowe was living in 1484, when a covenant was entered into on the feast day of St. Clement (November the 23rd), in that year, between Henry Kent, Vicar of Horsley, with the consent of Richard, Prior of Lenton, and Lawrence Lowe, of Denby, to have a priest to say daily mass in the chapel of the Blessed Virgin, at Denby; but he was dead in 1491, when Alice, his second wife is described as a widow.

Humphrey Lowe, Esq,, of Denby, the eldest son of Lawrence Lowe, was living in 1516. He was married prior to 1462, to Margaret, daughter and heiress of John Linstone, and had an only daughter and heiress, Mary, who became the wife of William Sacheverell, Esq. The Denby estate, however, devolved upon Vincent Lowe, the second son of Humphrey Lowe, and continued with his descendants.

There is a charter, dated in 1462, whereby Humphrey Lowe, and Margaret, his wife, united with Lawrence Lowe, his father, in granting certain lands in the meadows of Clifton to John Cokayne and Thomas his son.

Park hall

According to Lysons, this Vincent Lowe purchased the manor of Park Hall, in Denby, from Sir Peter Frecheville, about the beginning of the reign of Henry VIII., and settled it upon his younger son, Jasper Lowe, Esq., who succeeded to the Denby estate upon the decease of his elder brother, Vincent, in 1653; and since that time the manors of Denby and Park Hall have continued to be united.

Jasper Lowe died in 1583, having had issue four sons and two daughters. His eldest son, Patrick, who was twenty-one years of age at the time of his father's death, married Jane, daughter of Sir John Harpur, of Swarkestone, and had four children. On the north side of the channel at Denby, there is a mural monument, which from the armorial bearings may be identified as that of Patrick Lowe; but there is no inscription, and as there are no registers belonging to the church extant earlier than the year 1725, the date of his death is unknown.

Patrick Lowe probably left his estates somewhat involved, for in 1627, a Special Act of Parliament (3 Car. I., cap. 13. pr.), was passed to enable his son and successor, Vincent Lowe, of Denbigh, in the county of Derby, Esq., to sell part of his estate for payment of his debts. Vincent Lowe, the only surviving son of Patrick Lowe, was eighteen years of age at the time of St. George's Visitation in 1612, and was living in 1634. He was living in the second year of the reign of King James I., for the tenor bell of Denby Church is inscribed "PATRICKE LOWE, ESQVIRE, ANNO Do. 1604."

Vincent married Anne, daughter of Henry Cavendish, Esq.,of Tutbury, in Staffordshire, by whom he had a son and heir, John Lowe (married to Katherine, daughter of Sir Arthur Pilkington, Bart., of Stanley, in Yorkshire), and nine younger children.

In 1785, upon the death of Richard Lowe, Esq of Denby and Locko Park, the estates devolved upon William Drury, Esq. (grandson of William Drury, Alderman of Nottingham, who married Anne, eldest daughter of John Lowe, Esq., of Denby); and he accordingly assumed the additional name and arms of Lowe, by royal license, July the 10th, 1790. William Drury Ix1we, Esq., died without male issue, July the nth, 1827, leaving Anne, his widow, a life interest in the estates. That lady, whose maiden name was Steer, was baptized at Burton Latimer, in Northampton shire, July the 23rd, 1745, and died at Locko Park, November the 13th, 1848, in her 104th year. Her only daughter and heiress had married Robert Holden, Esq., of Nuthall Temple, in Nottinghamshire, whose eldest son assumed the name and arms of Lowe, by royal license, upon succeeding to the family estates on the decease of his maternal grandmother, the venerable lady above mentioned.

Nuthall Temple

Their third son Colonel Vincent Lowe Esq was an attorney and planter. He immigrated in 1670 to Maryland, USA where he settled on Great Choptank Island in Talbot County, Maryland. He married Elizabeth foster, daughter of Seth Foster and his wife Elizabeth. Vincent served as Attorney general, Surveyor General, member of the Provincial council, member of the Provincial Assembly, justice of the Provincial Court, Board of Deputy Governors, Sheriff of Talbot County.

Colonel Vincent Lowe and Elizabeth Fosters son Vincent Lowe born1720 is more famous for being his sister Jane’s brother. She marries into the well known Calvert Family of Baltimore.

Have not found Vincent’s wife as yet, but they have a son John Henry Lowe born 1745 and seems established either by birth or land ownership in Rockbridge, Virginia.

John Henry marries Margaret. They have Vincent Lowe born 1800; he marries Martha Seybut and has about ten children.

Child number two, William B Lowe marries Anna, then Lucy and has five children in Washing County, Virginia. Of five children, George William Lowe is the first, born 1863 in Rose Hill, Virginia.

George Lowe is sitting on the left. Son James is at the back center.

George marries first Nancy J Sloan born 1857 and they have two children: James Joseph Lowe 1883 and Charles W. Lowe in 1885. Nancy, also known as ‘Nannie’ dies in January 1886. George will marry twice more and have 9 children altogether. George’s last wife Emily Hill dies 7 years after him.

Emily Hill Lowe

The first child, James Joseph Lowe marries Roxie Cunningham, who he meets while working on the railroad in Blount Tennessee and they have three sons and one daughter:
Charles ‘Toby’,
Fred,
Dolph
Juanita

James contracts tuberculosis and they move to California for his health, where Roxie’s sister and husband have a walnut farm. James dies not too long after they move.