Jacob Light (1756 - 1831)

Born 10 Aug 1756 in Conestoga Valley, Lancaster, Pennsylvania

Ancestors

Descendants

Died 13 May 1831 at age 74 in New Richmond, Ohio Township, Clermont, Ohio, United States

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Biography

Jacob Light is a DAR Patriot Ancestor, A070297.

Notes

1830 Clermont Co OH, New Richmond Twp, p 213. Jacob Light, 0100000001.../001000101...

1820 Clermont Co OH, p 34. Jacob Light, 11302/11111

1810 Ohio censuses not available

1800 Ohio censuses not available

1790 resided in Detroit, censuses not available

Clermont Co Pioneers 1798-1812: 1802 census, election 1804, 1806, 1802 deed, office holder

Jacob and his family made gunpowder during the Revolutionary War. Later, when the British enlisted Indian tribes to wipe out the white settlers in western Pennsylvania, Jacob enlisted in the militia.

1. NSDAR Patriot Ancestor.

2. Many researchers think the service given at the NSDAR site is not our Jacob. There were as many as three Jacob Lights in this company. Capt. John Stone, 2nd Battalion, Lancaster Co. militia.

3. Using the Google search engine, I found a biography of Jacob Light in an unusual site. Geocaching is a hobby using GPS technology to follow physical clues. Information at the site agreed with everything I had about Jacob Light and added many fascinating details. The author of the site grew up in Clermont County, Ohio, where it appears these facts were common knowledge; not being a genealogist, he had no citable sources.

His Revolutionary War service has been confused with that of another Jacob Light. This profile's Jacob was at Lick Run Plantation, Berkeley Co VA [now VW] with his father John Light until 1778, and then in Westmoreland County.

Lancaster Co PA Tax lists PA Archives--3rd Series, XVII:283.

All children were listed correctly by OP Light.

1785, Mingo Botton, now Jefferson Co OH: General Harmar ordered the burning of their cabins because they were squatting in Ohio in violation of a treaty with the indians. [Frank Light]

"River Town, the Story of New Richmond," prepared for the New Richmond OH Sesquicentennial. "Davis Caps Marker to New Richmond's Founder," Clermont Co (OH) Courier, 9 Jun 1966. "New Richmond Founded by Pennsylvania Pioneer," Cincinnati [unidentified newspaper], Oct 1975.

The Forgotten Cemetery Tour III: A  cache by B-G EXPRESS at http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=a62cee70-4fef-4ac2-86b5-b405cb8e430e&log=y has the following: CEMETERY#1: N38 57.491 x W084 17.194 Here you will find the final resting place for some of the early settlers of this area. Not much is left after 192 years of floods! Find the markers for Jacob Light, (G) Co. 2 BN Pa. Militia, and his father John Light, (E) Co. 2 BN Pa. Militia.*

Jacob Light was born on August 10, 1756 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the fourth son of John and Catherine Light. John was born in Palatinate Germany, in 1724 [sic]. He came to America in 1738.

The Lights were devout Christians troubled by war. They did not seek military service. They were industrious farmers. John and his sons made gunpowder during the Revolutionary War to help the cause for American independence. In 1780 the Lights took a new look at war when the British began enlisting Indian tribes to wipe out all the white settlers in western Pennsylvania. New military forces were raised in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. At this time, Jacob and his father and brothers enlisted for service with the 2nd Battalion Pennsylvania Militia.

Jacob married Caty Harmon in early 1782. By April 1785, they had two girls, Elizabeth and Mary.?Around this time, Jacob signed with the federal government as an Indian scout. He was assigned the Detroit area. In early 1786, Caty joined him in the wilderness, leaving the two girls with other family members. A son, John, was born in the Detroit area on February 6, 1787.

Jacob resigned from the service in the summer of 1788. Guided by a friendly Indian, Jacob and Caty walked, carrying their infant son, from Detroit, through a dense forest along Lake Erie, then to the Ohio River near Wheeling, West Virginia. The journey took five weeks. They joined the family in Lancaster County, later moving to Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania. In March of 1789, a daughter Susannah was born there.

In 1791, the fifth child, Daniel, was born in Pennsylvania. In 1791, Jacob, with his brothers Daniel and Peter, came down the Ohio River on a flat boat to Columbia, (Luken airport area). Near Maysville, Kentucky, Daniel was shot in the side by an Indian on the shore. The wound was cleaned by drawing a silk handkerchief through it and the wound healed nicely. Jacob Light was also shot. The bullet entered his left shoulder, causing a paralysis in his left hand, giving him trouble the rest of his life. An eleven year old boy was with him at that time and was kidnapped by the Indians. His story is told in a book entitled "The Indian Captivity of O.M. Spencer" by O.M. Spencer.

The Lights set up a powder plant near Columbia and provided powder to Fort Washington. In 1793 the first bad flood for Columbia occurred. Half the houses washed away including Jacobs. So he moved to Kentucky. There the sixth child (4th daughter), Catherine was born. The seventh child, Samuel, was also born in Kentucky.

In 1797 Jacob moved to the Northwest Territory (Ohio), just downriver from Twelve Mile Creek (then called Cross Creek), possibly in the River Pines RV Resort area. The next four sons, Jacob, David, Peter, and Benjamin, were born in the village.

In 1806, Jacob was elected Justice of the Peace for Ohio Township and on February 15, 1806, he performed the wedding of his oldest daughter Elizabeth to Hugh Rankin.

In 1810, Jacob built the first brick house on what would become Front Street in New Richmond. In 1813, his sister, Barbara Robb, brought their father John, then 89 years old, to live with Jacob, where he made his home until he died in 1822 at the age of ninety-eight years.

In September of 1814, Jacob began to lay out the original village of New Richmond. His nephew, Martin Light, from Richmond, Virginia, did the surveying; thus the name New Richmond.

Jacob died on May 13, 1831 at the age of seventy-four years. Father and sons, fighting side by side for Independence. [I spoke 23 Jul 2009 with Bill Graser, creator of this geocache historical document, who said most of his date was from the books of Aileen M Whitt. KP]

Text: SearchLight 1:II:2, IV:4.

SearchLight 2:II:3, III:7, 8.

SearchLight 3:II:3.

SearchLight 4:I:1, II:11, III:7, 9, IV:1, 2, 3, 7.

SearchLight 5:II:7, 8, III:3, IV:1, 2.

SearchLight 6:I:4, II:2, III:2, 4, IV:7 [errors], 8, V:4, 6, 8, 9.

SearchLight 7:I:7.

Text: "My Early Light Research": copies of letters Ethel Armstrong allowed me to copy in 1966. Letter from Evelyn (Light) Eichor to her sister Ethel Armstrong, 30 Jan 1930; letter from Beulah (Light) Carmack to "Cousin" Urma Yontz, 12 Feb 1961.

Text: Jacob Light will (1831), Clermont Co OH Will Book D, 164. SearchLight I: II: 2, copies a deed record naming his heirs, including David and Harriet Light. Extracted by Bertha Minnick: "To his wife, 40 acres New Richmond, river front; after her death, it goes to his daughter Betsy Rankin and son Benjamin Light, to share and share alike. To his three oldest sons, John, Daniel, and Jacob, each $1000.00 one month after his death. To his son David, 150 acres, to his son Peter, New Richmond, 100 acres, to his son, John Light, Benjamin Light, 100 acres, Betsy Rankin, 100 acres, this off the same tract of land as above. Mary Dorrel and Susannah Conner, $500.00 each. Caty Hardin tract of land his son-in-law Samuel Hardin now living on in the State of Kentucky opposite New Richmond, Ohio. To his four grandsons, being the sons of Caty Hardin, Jacob, John, David and Peter Hardin, all of his lands laying and being in the State of Kentucky, supposed to be 100 acres. All of his town property in the town of New Richmond, Ohio, to be sold and divided between all of his heirs. His two sons Peter and David Light and his brother Daniel executors of his last will and testament. His will made 19 Mar 1831."

Text: Correspondence with Bertha Minnick (PO Box 33, Miamiville OH 45147), early 1970s. Mrs. Minnick included typed copies of many records and book extracts in her letters.

Text: Rocky and Bancroft, History of Clermont Co OH. Everts, 1880, 400 & passim.

Text: Clermont Co OH Cemetery Records, IX: 55.

Text: Revolutionary Soldiers Buried in Ohio, III: 215.

Text: OP Light papers. In 1966, my grandmother obtained from her sister O. P. Light's hand-written family records, which I copied and returned. These papers have since disappeared, probably thrown away by my great-aunt's daughters when she gave up housekeeping. These papers provided dates and several generations of the Light, Prather and Veach families. There was nothing on the Dickinsons but the name and dates of Harriet Dickinson. The Lights he listed are exactly as later research has proven his family to be.

Text: Lineage application of Katherine Alvis Patterson, national no. 554801, National Society, Daughters of the American Revolution, supplemental (Jacob Light), "Add" volume 814, approved 2000.

Text: Louella Lowther wrote summary of this man's life, which was published in SearchLight 6: II: 2. This was written before Mary Kemmerle proved Jacob spent time in Berkeley Co VA (now WV) and has some questionable features. "MDB" noted that the statement Jacob was a minister of the Gospel who performed marriages was prior to registering marriages in Clermont Co. I believe it is possibly a confusion with Jacob's grandson George C Light, whose many marriages are in the records of Clermont Co OH.

Text: From New Richmond, Ohio, Exempted School District web site: "Jacob Light was born August 10, 1756 in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He was the fifth of seven children born. His ancestors, including his mother and father, were from Germany. They were very religious, being Christians of Mennonite faith. They did not believe in war. However, they got involved in Detroit and made gun powder for the Revolutionary War.  Then, shortly after the war, he was married to a woman named Caty (known as Sarah) Harmon. At the time, he was 26 and she was 16. Taking a job as an Indian scout, he was forced to take his newborn child back to his mom in Lancaster. He missed being in Ohio, so he traveled on a flatboat with his two brothers and traveled back around Cincinnati. There he was hit in the head by an Indian bullet. So he took some silk and put it through one side of his skill and pulled it out the other. He would go on to lead a healthy and long life. He died in 1831, at the age of 74.

Jacob reserved two plots of land for public use when he designed the layout of this village in 1814.  The 212 Market Street building stands on Lots 98 and 99.  Nearly two hundred years later, this land is still used for its original purpose ~ public use."

This mini-biography is not always accurate. I have never seen Catherine called Sarah, she was not ten years but eight younger than her husband, Jacob's mother was not back in Lancaster county, and he did not spend the Revolutionary War in Detroit, but was there about 1790. KP

https://www.nrschools.org/

Sources

See also:

• FamilySearch Person: 2QB1-LKF
• Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/16464720/jacob-light: accessed 07 November 2023), memorial page for Jacob Light (10 Aug 1756–13 May 1831), Find A Grave: Memorial #16464720, citing Old Town Cemetery, New Richmond, Clermont County, Ohio, USA; Maintained by Linda (contributor 46865412).

Acknowledgements

• Research at the Ohio Archives in Feb 2000