Edgar-Greene County IL Archives Biographies.....HEFFELFINGER, BERNTHISEL February 1820 - 
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J. Robison normadeplume@wmconnect.com October 3, 2008, 10:46 am

Author: Anonymous

From ’Historical and Biographical Record of Wood County, Ohio, 1897  

HENRY BERNTHISEL, a well-known pioneer agriculturist, now residing at Haskins, 
was born in February, 1820, in Perry county, Ohio.  His reminiscences cover an 
interesting period, and he is one of the few men now living who attended the 
great mass meeting at Fort Meigs in 1840, during the "hard cider and log cabin 
campaign."

His parents, Jacob and Jane (WILLEY) BERNTHISEL, were born in Pennsylvania, the 
father in the year 1784, the mother in 1772.  They came to Ohio a few years 
after their marriage, and located first in Perry county, where they remained 
fifteen years before finally settling in Wood county.  They were the first to 
locate on the bank of Tontogany creek, and the land on which they made their 
home was originally a swampy forest.  Their goods, which they unloaded under a 
large white oak tree, had been brought from Perry county with two teams, one of 
oxen, the other of horses.  They were devout members of the Methodist Episcopal 
Church.  Mrs. BERNTHISEL died November 11, 1857; Mr. BERNTHISEL on September 
28, 1858.  Nine children were born to them:  Anna, deceased, the wife of James 
BRADLEY; Levi, who went to California, and was never heard from afterward; 
Jane, the wife of David MARDOOK, both now deceased; Sarah, the widow of Thomas 
HEFLINGER (HEFFELFINGER), of Scotland, Ill.; Henry; Parmelia, who married 
Daniel BLODGETT, of Weston; Mary Ann, deceased wife of Charles HOLLOWAY; Susan, 
who died in infancy; and Isaac, who lives at Whitehall, Illinois.

Mr. BERNTHISEL was a boy when his parents came to this county, and his early 
schooling was obtained in a log cabin in his distict.  He worked for his father 
until he was twenty-three, and then farmed on shares for others some four 
years, after which he engaged in farming on his own account, buying some wild 
land at Haskins, which he cleared and improved.  On May 23, 1844, he married 
Miss Julia Ann JENKINS, who was born in Pennsylvania, in 1825, and died October 
23, 1861.  They has six children:  Samuel, deceased in childhood.  Nettie, who 
married David BASH, and has three children-Willie, John and Julia (of these, 
John is a school teacher at Dickey, and is married to Ida ROBINSON, by whom he 
has two children).  Lottie married Joseph GARRETT, of Bowling Green, and has 
two children living-Charles and Fray (Julia died when twelve years old).  
Ollie, who married Peter PENNY, of Tontogany, and was murdered there in 1895.  
Wallace married Alice ASHLEY, and has five children-Willey, Willie, Floyd and 
Burnette, living and one that died in infancy; and Charles, who married Miss 
Frankie PITCHER, and lives at the old homestead; they had three children Henry, 
Electa and Stella.  After the death of the mother in 1861, Mr. BERNTHISEL 
married Mrs. Matilda (nee BARNES) SARGEANT, widow of William SARGEANT.  Two 
children were born of this union, one of whom died in early childhood; Lillie, 
the survivor, is the wife of WILLIAM GARRETT, the adopted son of Elwood 
GARRETT; they have on son, Ross.  Our subject's wife died in 1883, and August 
14, 1883, he was married to Mrs. Emma J. RIGG, daughter of Clark and Elizabeth 
(STACKHOUSE) CHAPMAN, natives of Vermont; the latter was of German descent, and 
died in 1846, leaving five children.  Mr. CHAPMAN, by trade a cabinet maker, 
died in 1876.  Emma J. CHAPMAN was born in Seneca county, 
N. Y., Januarly 26, 1840, and was quite young when she accompanied her parents 
to Ohio.  By her first husband, Joseph RIGG, she had six children, named 
respectively:  William, Hiram, Charles, Sherman, Alice and Albert.  Mr. Rigg 
died in 1879.

About three years after his first marriage, Mr. BERNTHISEL left his old home 
and moved to a farm a half mile from Haskins, where he now owns 150 acres of 
land.  In 1882 he retired into the village, there to spend his declining years 
free from business cares.  He owns an eighty-acre farm on the river, forty 
acres west of Haskins, besides a good home in the village and his old home 
above alluded to.  In politics he is a Democrat, as was his father before him, 
and has held some minor township offices.  Socially he is a member of the I. O. 
O. F., Roche-de-Boeuf Lodge, No. 387, Haskins.  In religious belief they are 
members of the Baptist Church at Haskins, with which organization he has been 
identified several years, and has served as trustee thereof.


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