HISTORY OF THE SIR RICHARD HERINGTON FAMILY
as remembered by his granddaughter
KATHERINE HARRINGTON COWAN BUNCE
(1864 -1954)
at the age of 86
During the Revolutionary War, Grandfather Richard Herington was one of a group
of guards banded together to protect King George III of England. It was at this
time that Grandfather happened to find out about an uprising against the King, in
which the rebels planned to kill the King and replace him with a man of their own
choice. After the war, Grandfather was knighted as a reward for his part in saving the
King.
About the year 1803, Sir Richard, along with three of his brothers and their
families, left England to seek a home in the "New World". They first settled near Lake
Champlain, and then moved on to Lake George. I especially remember hearing
frequent mention of the Lucerne Mountains. I don't recall much about Sir Richard's
brothers-or where they finally located. Some time ago, I got a letter from a
niece, Florence Harrington Bohman, just after she 'had made a vacation trip into New
England. She said, in part: "At Lexington, Mass., the sight-seeing bus driver told
more about the Harringtons than about anyone else. Seven fought in the Battle of
Lexington, and two of them lived in houses facing the "Common". The houses still
stand and may be entered. Also, some Harrington (he pointed the tree out) planted an
elm tree along the highway the year George Washington was born. Could you write down,
sometime, everything that you know about the family?" I wish I knew if these were
some of our family.
Sir Richard's wife Sarah was a Holland-Dutch woman, and to them were born
fourteen children, six boys and eight girls. They were: Elijah, Deuteronomy,
Camaralzo, Isaac, Eleroy, Henry, Rosetta, Sarah, Prudence, Lydia, Elizabeth, Celestia,
Justine and Susan.
While living in the Lake Champlain-Lake George area, Rosetta, who was fourteen at
the time, had to walk three miles up the mountain; work at spinning all day, and then
walk back home at night. Once, on the way hone, she and a bear were equally startled to
meet each other on the road. The bear reared up on its back legs and watched her as
she froze in her tracks! Finally, he dropped down on to all four legs and scuttled off;
and so did she—for home!
It was while they were living in this same place, that the
b o y s t o o k t u r n s t a k i n g the corn to be ground for corn meal. It was a full
day's trip by horseback and if anyone else was first in-line at the mill, it meant
he would be late getting hone.
On one such day, one of the boys was escorted home by a pack of wolves, and was
thankful to be able to tell about it.
When Uncle "Lije" (Elijah) was about 2, Sir Richard and family migrated in an
Easterly direction, following waterways and carrying on his trades of blacksmithing
and lumbering. They evidently spent some time in Glens Falls, New York as Aunt Lydia
Ogden lived there at the time of her death. I have the telegram sent to my father,
Duty, by her daughter, Mary Ann, on Aug. 11, 1884, telling of her mother's death. Also
a letter, written later, telling my father of the changes in Glens Falls, and how he
would not recognize it.
They first settled in this area (Chautauqua County) at Prendergast Flats, working
with the Garfields and the Fentons in the lumbering business. It was here, that Uncle
"Lije",then just a young lad, killed a bear. There were plenty of deer, turkey, geese,
ducks, etc., for the hunting; and Uncle Lije, who had a new jack-knife, had gone out
into the woods with his hunting dogs to see what he could find in the line of "game".
The dogs had run on ahead and were barking furiously. When Uncle Lije came up to the
dogs, he found they had "treed" a young bear. Being a foolish young boy, he tried to
shake the bear out of the tree for the dogs. Finally, the cub could hold on no longer
and down he fell. Uncle Lije jumped on the cub's back, opened his new jack-knife with
his testh, and cut the bear's throat. This was one of Grandfather's favorite
stories.
After "lumbering" around Prendergast Flats, Fentonville, and Kiantone,
Grandfather finally took up 300 acre tract of land between Clark and Kennedy from
the Holland Land Co. Here he settled to his blacksmithing trade. My father, Duty,
also bought land in the Town of Carroll and settled in what is now Ivory, but was then
known as Pope Hollow. He had a saw mill, and when I was a young girl, I would gather
the round eggs that I found on the banks of the "mill-race", deposited there by
turtles, and use them to make long strings of "pearls" after carefully picking
holes in the egg shells and "blowing out" the insides. My brothers used to swim
in the mill-race, and many times found it necessary to disentangle spotter
adders (snakes) that had twined around their legs. Needless to say I didn't
care about swimming there.
Uncle Elijah settled on Woodchuck Hill (near Ivory). I think he married a widow Schuyler.
Later he wandered off, and no-one knew how, when or where he died.
Camaralzo lived at
the top of Coxts Hill, just outside of Frewsburg, toward Ivory, I can't remember what
happened to Oleroy and Henry for sure, but two of the boys married English girls who had
recently come over from England to teach weaving in the Jamestown mills; and I think
these two finally returned to England with their families to make their homes.
As for my Aunts: Rosetta Bartlett lived in Oil City, and when finally left alone,
came back to make her home with Grandfather at Clarks. Prudence Stockwell also lived
at Clarks after her marriage. Lydia Ogden lived at Glens Falls; Justine Kelsey in
Onoville. We often visited Aunt Susan and her husband, Joel Hapgood, at Ellery Center.
Sarah married a Willsie, Elizabeth Norman lived at Mud Creek, near Clark; and Celestia
Burdick at Kinzua, Pennsylvania.
Uncle.Isaac's neck was broken at the age of seventeen, when the horse he was
riding ran under a tree and a branch brushed him off to the ground. He was buried in
the Myrtle Cemetery at Clarks where Aunt Rosetta, Grandfather and Grandmother are also
laid to rest. The tall, thin, old-time markers, once standing up-right, are now
"flush" with the top of the ground, and each Memorial Day, the Veteran's Flag again
flies over Grandfather's grave. The two stones in the graveyard read:
Sir Richard Herington
died
Feb. 8, 1839
67 yrs - 9 mo - 7 da.
Sarah, His Wife
died
Aug. 4, 1847
7 4 y r s - 4 m o 3 da.
as told to her grandaughter, Julia Love Covey, in 1950