Johann Balthasar Hinkle (1737 - 1804)

Born 25 Dec 1737 in Frederick Co, Maryland

Ancestors

Husband of Elisabetha Graff — married 26 Nov 1759 in St Michael, Germantown, Bucks, Pennsylvania

Descendants

Died 18 Feb 1804 at age 66 in Frederick, Maryland, United States

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Biography

Baltis Hinkle performed Patriotic Service in the American Revolution.

Baltis Hinkle is a DAR Patriot Ancestor, A055270.

Johann Balthasar was born in 1737. He is the son of George Rudolphus Henckel.

He provided Patriotic Service during the American Revolution by signing an Association Test in Frederick Co, Maryland.^[1]

Census

1790 Frederick Co., Maryland; pg 202
Baltis Hinkle 304; no slaves
males >= 16 3
males < 16 0
females 4

About half of the names in the county are divided into 7 chunks, and the names in each chunk are alphabetized. Baltis Fouts, presumably Baltis' godfather, and Baltis Hinkle are in the same chunk.

In 1800 John Balthasar is probably living in the household of his son John Hinkle in Frederick Co., Maryland.

Research of Robert L. Hess

The following research article was sent to me (Neal Parker) by Robert L. Hess of Oakland, California. He is a descendent of John Balthasar. Numbers in brackets indicate notes which follow. Here the christening date is June 4. In Mr. Hess's article in the Henckel Genealogical Bulletin (page 1428, Vol 36, No 1, Spring 2005) the christening date is January 7.

Johann Balthasar Henckel[20] was born on Christmas Day, the 25th of December, 1737, son of Georg Rudolph (and Anna Maria) Henckel. Balthasar's parents were among the very early settlers in the valley of the Monocacy River, now Frederick County, Maryland. Although this area had been visited by explorers and trappers in the early 1700s, it was not settled until the 1730s, and Balthasar Henckel may have been among the first white children born there.

Although Baltis' grandfather had been a Lutheran minister in Pennsylvania, there were no German-speaking ministers in the Monocacy settlement when his parents moved to Maryland. The occasion for his baptism on 4 June 1738 was a brief visit there by well-known Lutheran pioneer pastor Joh. Casper Stöver, while the latter was on his way from Pennsylvania to Virginia.[4] The sponsors at the baptism were Balthasar Fauth and his wife,[1] members of the Lutheran community who had come to Monocacy from Pennsylvania at about the same time as Baltis' parents.[5] (Baltis' brother Philipp Christoph was baptized in 1740, on a subsequent visit by Pastor Stöver.[1])

There were not many neighbors when Baltis' parents came to the Monocacy settlement, but the population of the area grew quickly. The town of Frederick was founded a decade later, in 1746, and Lutheran congregations assembled both in the new town and in the nearby countryside.[6]

The Indians in the Monocacy area had all peacefully vacated by the 1740s. In 1755, however, when Baltis was eighteen years old, the French and Indian War broke out. Indian tribes west of the Appalachian Mountains were incited by the French to terrorize the frontier settlers in Maryland and other colonies. Although the Monocacy valley itself was not invaded by Indians, fearful massacres occurred only a few miles to the west. Most of the settlers in the Monocacy and surrounding areas fled; those who remained took shelter within the frontier forts or the militia-protected town of Frederick.[8] During this war and for a while afterward, the population of Frederick was much reduced. (No marriages, for example, were recorded at the Frederick Lutheran church from 1753 to 1762.[9]) Most of the plantations in western Maryland were temporarily vacated by their owners.[21]

During this period of terrifying uncertainty on the frontier, Baltis Hinkle's parents apparently moved their family east to the security of Germantown on the outskirts of Philadelpbia, where they had relatives. Baltzer's uncle and aunt, Jacob Anthony and Anna Margaret Henckel and their family, had resided in Germantown, where Anthony had died in 1751; and in 1753 Anna Margaret had remarried there, to a Martin Groff (Grove) [10]

While at Germantown, at age twenty-one, Balthasar Hinckel married Elisabeth Graff (Grove[2]) on 26 November 1759[22] at the Lutheran church there.[11] She may have been a relative of Balthis' uncle, Martin Groff. Balthis and Elisabeth Henckel's first child was born on 3 April 1760 and baptized a few weeks later at Germantown.[12]

By the early 1760s the threat of Indian attacks had subsided, and a large number of the settlers who had fled the Monocacy valley and elsewhere on the Maryland frontier returned to their plantations (probably including Baltis' parents). Baltis and Elisabeth, however, appear to have resided at Germantown during the early 1760s,[23] and their next three children were born probably there.

About 1769 Baltis and Elisabetha did move with their children to the Monocacy settlement. The last five of their nine children were baptized at Frederick, Maryland, between 1770 and 1782.[13]

Baltis did not have military service during the Revolutionary War, for when it began, in 1775, be was already thirty-eight years old and head of a large family. He did sign the Oath of Fidelity to the State of Maryland, and he subscribed to the Revolutionary Fund.[14]

Baltis Hinkle was still residing in Frederick County in 1790, when the census listed him there as head of a family with three males over sixteen years of age and four females.[15] His family resided apparently three or four miles west of the town of Frederick.[26]

Baltis and his family continued to be active in the Lutheran church in the town of Frederick. In 1785 Balthasar Hinckel served as witness to a marriage at the Lutheran church there,[9] and as Balsar Hinckel he signed his name to the governing resolutions of that congregation in June 1796.[16]

His wife Elisabeth died probably during the 1790s, for in the 1800 census Balthasar, but not his wife, appears to have been residing with the family of their married son John Hinkle.[17] "Baltasar Hinckel, Senr." died on 18 February 1804 and is buried at the Lutheran Church at Frederick, Maryland.[18,19] There was no will or administrative account for his estate.[27]

NOTES for JOHANN BALTHASAR HENCKEL:

1. The personal register of Rev. Johan Casper Stöver (as translated by F.J.F Schantz in Early Lutheran Baptisms and Marriages in Southeastern Pennsylvania, reprinted by the Genealogical Publishing Co., Baltimore, 1982); under baptisms: Father: George Henckel (at Monocacy):

• John Balthasar, born 25 Dec 1737, bapt. 7 Jun 1738; sponsors were Balthasar Fauth and wife.
  
• Philipp Chistoph, born 7 May 1740; bapt. 21 May 1740; sponsors were Philip Kunz and wife.

2. W.S. & M.W. Junkin, The Henckel Genealogy 1500-1960, ancestry and descendants of Rev. Anthony Jacob Henckel, 1668-1728, Hill Printing Co., Spokane, WA, 1964; page 154 (#42 Johann Balthasar Hinkle).

3. D.W. Nead, The Pennsylvania-German in the Settlement of Maryland, reprinted by the Genealogical Publishing Co., Baltimore, 1975; Chapter 6, "The First Settlements."

4. A.R. Wentz, The Lutheran Church of Frederick, Maryland, 1738-1938, published by The Evangelical Press, Harrisburg, PA, 1938; pages 52-54 (Pastor Stöver's visits to the Monocacy settlement).

5. G.L. Tracey & J.P. Dern, Pioneers of Old Monocacy, the early settlement of Frederick County, Maryland, 1721-1742, The Genealogical Publishing Co., Baltimore, 1989; pages 161-163 (the Fauth family).

6. C.H. Glatfelter, Pastors and People, German Lutheran and Reformed churches in the Pennsylvania field 1717-1793, The Pennsylvania-German Society, 1980; Vol. 1, pages 188-189 (Frederick, Maryland).

8. Nead; Chapter 12 (The French and Indian War).

9. Register of the Lutheran church at Frederick (as translated by F. S. Weiser in Records of Marriages and Burials in ... the Evangelical Lutheran Congregation in the City of Frederick, Maryland 1743-1811, National Genealogical Society, Washington, DC, 1972); under marriages:

• Balthasar Hinckel served as a witness for a marriage in 1785 (for Jacob and Catharina Lott)
  
• 4 Apr 1784, Margreth Hinckel married Caspar Rhein (witnessed by Jesse and John Hinckle).
  
• 6 Jan 1803, John Hinkel married Eva Runner at the bride's home not far from Fredericktown.

10. The Henckel Genealogy; pages 882-883 (the family of #6 Jacob Anthony Henckel).

11. Register of St. Michael's Lutheran Church at Germantown, Philadelphia, PA (original manuscript document now kept in the Lutheran Archives Center at the Lutheran Theological Seminary, Germantown, Philadelphia, PA): under marriages, in a sequence of six marriage entries each bearing the date 1759, inserted on a page with some other marriages that were in the year 1760:
"den 9ten (illegible) 1759 wurde in d. Stand der H[err] Pf[arrar] eingesegnet Balthasar Hinckel mit Elisabetha Graffin."

12. Register of St. Michael's Lutheran Church, Germantown; under baptisms:
"d. 3ten April 1760 ist Balthis Henckel et Elisabetha ein Sohnlein geb[ohren] welches per Pent[ecost] in d. heilige T[aufe] den Nahmen Georg erlanget. Comp [sponsors] Georg Reute[?] et Elisabetha."

13. Register of the Lutheran church at Frederick, MD (original at Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore; photocopy of original on LDS microfilm #0020487, Items 1 and 2); under baptisms: Balthasar Hinckel & ux [and wife] Elisabetha had the following children baptized:

• Hanna, bn. 26 Mar 1770, bapt. 29 Apr 1770 (sponsors were Christian Steiner & ux Hanna).
  
• Maria Catharina, bn. 23 Feb 1773, bapt. 7 Mar 1773 (sponsors, Christian Scholl & ux Catharina).
  
• Catharina, bn. 16 Sep 1775, bapt. 10 Dec 1775 (sponsor, Catharina Burckard(in)).
  
• [Again] Catharina, bn. 27 Aug 1779, bapt. 17 Oct 1779 (sponsors, Michael Kolb & ux Catharina)
  
• Amälia, bn. 8 Oct 1782, bapt. 25 Dec 1782 (sponsor, Amälia Scholl(in)).
  

Casper Rhein and wife Margareth had six children baptized between 1786 and 1798. (Elisabeth wife of Balthasar Hinckel was godmother for the child in 1787.)
Joh. and Maria Hinckel had a daughter baptized in 1802. Henry Seller and wife Hanna had three children baptized, between 1793 and 1797. (The godmother of the child in 1774 was Catharina Hinckel(in).)

14. B.S. Carothers, 9,000 Men who Signed the Oath of Fidelity to Maryland during the Revolution, compiled from official sources, typescript published at Chesterfield, MO; Frederick County; pages 51-61: ( ... Baltis Hinkel).

15. U.S. Census, Frederick County, Maryland; 1790: Baltis Hinkle: 3 males over 16, none under 16; 4 females. John Hinkle: 2 males over 16, none under 16; 4 females. Casper Rine: 1 male over 16, 1 under 16; 3 females.

16. Wentz; Appendix C (Members of the Frederick Lutheran Congregation in 1796): names signed to the Resolutions of 26 Jun 1796:
Balsar Hinckel
Balsar Faut

17. U.S. Census, Frederick County, Maryland; 1800:

• "John of Baltzer" Hinkle, Dist. 1: 1 m 45+ [Baltis?]; 1 m and 1 f 26-45, 1 f under 10; and 6 slaves.

18. Register of the Lutheran Church at Frederick (photocopy of original on LDS microfilm *0020487); under burials:
"Beerdigt Febr, d. 20t 1804, Baltasar Hinckel, Senr., war krank an der Gelbsucht und starb Feb. d. 18t abends 5 Uhr; seiner alters 64 Jahr 1M. 25 Tag."

19. Register of the Lutheran church at Frederick, Maryland (as translated by F.S. Weiser in "Records of Marriages and Burials in ... the Evangelical Lutheran Congregation in the City of Frederick, Maryland 1743-1811"); under burials:

• 21 Jan 1779, Catharina, little daughter of Balthasar Hinckel, born Sept 6, 1775, died Jan 20 of a chest disease, aged 3 years, 4 months, 14 days.
  
• 2 Jul 1783, Balthasar Hinckel's little daughter Amalia, aged 9 months, 22 days. Dysentery.v
• 1 Nov 1800, was buried Elisabeth Hinkel, née Hinkel. She was born 22 Feb 1773 and married Mr. George Hinkel, whom she left with I daughter. She brought her life to 27 years, 8 months, and some days.
  
• 16 Feb 1802, was buried Rebecca, née Hinkel, wife of Mr. Casper Rein, with whom she ... had 8 children ... Age 40 years [hence born in 1762). She died in childbirth with her 9th child ...
  
• 15 Sep 1803, was buried Eva Hinkel. Her parents were Bernhard Hirschberger and Elisabeth. She married first Michael Ronner, 14 Apr 1798, and had 1 son and 1 daughter; she became a widow in 1801 and married, second, 6 Jan 1803, John Hinkel. [Eva] died 14 Sep 1803, aged 32 years 8 months [hence born in Jan 1781]).
  
• 18 Dec 1803, Reinmond Steiner, ... was married to [H]anna Barbara Streiter ...
  
• 20 Feb, 1804, Baltasar Hinckel, Sr. Was sick from jaundice and died Feb 18 at 5 p.m. His age: 64 years, 1 month, 25 days [hence, born in Dec 1739].

20. Although given the first name Johann at baptism, he was known by his second given name, which was spelled "Balthasar" in standard high German. The English spelling of it was phoneticized to "Baltzer" in Philadelphia and to "Balsar" in Frederick County, Maryland. His nickname, "Balthis" in German, was usually spelled phonetically "Baltis" in English. The family's surname was spelled with "ck" in German but just "k" in English, and on the Frederick County frontier in America, the initial vowel "e" gradually shifted to an "i," both in German and in English. Thus his name appeared variously in different records as:
"Joh. Balthasar Henckel" in his baptismal record, Frederick County, 1738.[1]
"Balthasar Hinckel" at his marriage at Philadelphia, 1759.[11]
"Balthis Henkle" at his son George's baptism at Philadelphia, 1760.[12]
"Baltis Hinkel" in his oath of fidelity to Maryland, l776[14] and in the Maryland census, Frederick County, l790.[15]
"Balthasar Hinckle" in a marriage record at Frederick, l785.[9]
"Balsar Hinckel" in the Lutheran Church register, Frederick, 1796.[16]
"Baltasar Hinckel" in his burial record, Frederick, 1804.[18]

21. There were exceptions, like Balthasar's brother George Hinkle who had married into a Quaker family[38] and apparently, along with other Quakers and others, stayed put in the Monocacy settlement during the entire conflict.[39]

22. Based on an incorrect date for Balthasar and Elisabeth Hinckel's marriage, as well as on an incorrect date for the birth of their first chi}d it was at one time concluded incorrectly that Balthasar was married twice.[2,20] An article in the 'Henckel Genealogical Bulletin" corrected the mistaken birth date but repeated the erroneous marriage date, and on that basis, postulated incorrectly that the baptism was that of another Hinkle's son.[25]

23. One of their sons, Jesse Hinkle, born in 1763, was later remembered by John Grove (a son of Balthasar's aunt Ann Margaret by her second husband, Martin Graff) as a childhood friend in Germantown.[24]

24. Revolutionary War pension application of John Grove, Pennsylvania (original in National Archives, Washington, DC); Application #W1756:
" [I was] born 23 July 1750, seven miles from Philadelphia on the Germantown Road ... I lived at the place of my birth when I first served [in the Army) in 1775. [There] I knew John Hinkle ... and Jacob Grove ... "

25. The Henckel Genealogical Bulletin; page 178 (an item on Balthasar Henckel, correcting the birth date of son Georg, but repeating the incorrect 1760 date for Balthasar's marriage to Elisabeth Graff).

26. In 1793 a son of the Rev. Paul Henckei of Virginia described in his diary a trip made with his father from Staunton, Virginia, to Philadelphia: on Sunday 15 May 1793, they traveled from Shepherdstown to beyond Middle Town, Maryland, where they stayed the night with Baltzer Henkel, obviously a kinsman."[41] Assuming that Paul and his son traveled the main road from Shepherdstown to Philadelphia (via Boanesboro, South Mountain, and Middle Town), this would locate Baltzer Henkel's place somewhere between Middle Town and Frederick - probably three or four miles west of Frederick.

27. After 1800 there was no will registered in Frederick County for any Hinckel/Henkel. (By then all had moved on -- to North and South Carolina, (now West) Virginia, and places westward).

41. Correspondence from John P. Dern of Redwood City, CA, to R. L. Hess, 6 Aug 1993.

Confusion Dispelled

An article by Robert L. Hess on pages 1316-17 in Vol 33, No 2 of the Henckel Genealogical Bulletin elucidates the confusion surrounding the legitimacy or illegitimacy of John Balthasar's first child, whether he had one or two wives, whether his name might have been Jacob Balthasar, and whether he might have been the same person as the "Jacob Hinkle of Spread Eagle". The author concludes that he had one wife, that his first child was legitimate, and that the confusion surrounding these two issues was due to a misreading of dates. There was never a person named Jacob Balthasar, and the "Jacob Hinkle of Spread Eagle" was a son of [HG#2] Gerhard Henckel. The Spread Eagle was a tavern on the Philadelphia-Lancaster Road, 12 miles from Philadelphia which Jacob Hinkle operated for 5 years.

The full text of the article follows. Numbers in brackets indicate notes which follow.

In The Henckel Genealogy appears the marriage of [HG#42] John Balthasar "Baltis" Hinckle and Maria Elisabeth Graff on 26 November 1760, while son [HG#421] George was born in 1759 and baptized on 3 April 1759. Based upon this, it was deduced that this son George of Balthasar must have been by an earlier wife, also named Elisabeth. Both the above marriage date and George's birth date, however, are incorrect. In the original of the German Lutheran Church Book of Germantown (which has been carefully examined by this author), the actual birth date of this Georg(e) Henckel was 3 April 1760,[1] and his parents' marriage date (which is badly faded but still legible) was in 1759.[2]

In the Henckel Genealogical Bulletin, Editor Mary Harter corrected the above date of George's birth, to 3 April 1760, however she accepted the marriage date as being in 1760, rather than in 1759, because it appeared in a sequence that was both preceded and followed by some marriages in 1760.[3] Reasoning that George's birth could not have been illegitimate because the exacting pastor did not annotate it thus at the baptism, she deduced that George's parents, Balthasar and Elisabetha Hinckel, therefore must have been a different couple from the Balthasar and Elisabetha Hinckel who were married at that church apparently in November 1760. The solution Mary Harter proposed was that the marriage reported in the church book could have been that of "Jacob Hinckle of Spread Eagle," whose baptismal name might have been "Jacob Balthasar" and his second name only used in the church record.[4]

We can now be assured that it was indeed [HG#42] Balthasar Hinckel who married Elisabeth Graff in 1759, and that their first son George, born in April 1760, was thus legitimate. Confirming these dates, there exists a transcript of the Germantown marriage register that was made over a century ago (presumably at a time when the original pages of the Germantown marriage register were more readily legible -- before they faded so badly). It reports that this marriage of Balthasar Hinckel and Elisabeth Graff(in) took place on 26 November 1759,[5] and that it was listed among a sequence of seven marriages in 1759, with marriages in 1760 entered both before and subsequently.[6] So their son George, born in April 1760, was thus legitimate (a bit early, perhaps -- but this would not have been considered noteworthy even by the strictest of American Lutheran pastors in the 18th Century). Thus it appears there is no longer a reason to postulate that George's father was the hypothetical "Jacob Balthasar."

This conclusion is supported by the evidence of later events. In all of the church, legal, land, census, and other records in North America there is evidence of the existence of only a single Balthasar/Baltis Henckel/Hinkle/etc. until nearly the end of the Eighteenth Century (and he turns out to be [HG#42] of The Henckel Genealogy). The respective biographies of [HG#42] Balthasar Hinckle and of "Jacob Hinckle of Spread Eagle" can be traced over the years, concurrently, as two separate individuals.

Bottom line: there was no person named "Jacob Balthasar Hinckle".

NOTES:

1. Register of St. Michael's Lutheran Church, Germantown, now part of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (original, in German, in the Lutheran Archives, Germantown): under baptisms: "d. 3 April 1760, Balthasar Henckel et Elisabetha ein Söhnlein und erhielt der Pent[ecost] in der h[eilige] T[aufe] d. Nahm Georg gelanget . . . ."

2. Register of St. Michael's Lutheran Church: under marriages: "d. 26t M___ [or Nov?] 1759 wurde in d. [Ehe]stand . . . eingesegnet Balthasar Hinckel mit Elisabetha Graff(in)."

3. Henckel Genealogical Bulletin, 178.

4. Henckel Genealogical Bulletin, 178.

5. Archives of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia; church records, Vol 7L1 (translation/transcript of St. Michael's Lutheran Church, Germantown, PA).

6. The sequence of marriage entries in the Germantown church book includes, specifically: 22 marriage entries in 1760, followed by seven marriages in 1759 (among which is the Hinckle-Graff marriage), followed by 13 more marriages in 1760.

The Henckel Genealogy

The following is on page 154 of The Henckel Genealogy:

42 John Balthaser (Baltis) Hinkle (Hinckel), born December 25, 1737 on Israel's Creek (Monocacy Settlement) now in Frederick County, Maryland; died February 20, 1804, Frederick County, Maryland; married (1st) ______(_______) One (1) son. He resided at this time near Germantown, Pennsylvania. He married (2nd) November 26, 1760, Germantown, Pennsylvania to (Maria) Elisabeth Grove (Graff), daughter of Daniel Graff and grand-daughter of Hans Graff of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Eight (8) children.

John Balthaser (Baltis) Hinkle baptized January 7, 1738 by Reverend John Casper Stoever in the old Monocacy Lutheran Church near Creagerstown. Sponsors were Balthaser Fauth and wife. (Stoever Records, p. 12). He was married in St. Michael's Lutheran Church at Germantown, November 26, 1760 by Pfarrer, P. H. Raph (St. Michael's Church Record). The above included in the family record of Herbert Lee Alexander, a descendant.

Baltis Hinkle sometime after his second marriage, returned to Frederick County, Maryland.

Sources

1. ↑ Daughters of the American Revolution, DAR Genealogical Research Databases, database online, (http://www.dar.org/ : accessed 23 Oct 2023), "Record of Baltis Hinkle", Ancestor # A055270.

• The Henckel Genealogy 1500 - 1960; Ancestry and Descendants of Reverend Anthony Jacob Henckel 1668 – 1728 by William Sumner Junkin and Minnie Wyatt Junkin; 1964
• Henckel Genealogical Bulletin, Vol 36, No 1 (Spring 2005), pgs 1408-32
• Henckel Genealogical Bulletin, Vol 33, No 2 (Fall 2002), pgs 1316-17