Bucks County PA Archives Biographies.....Stover, Ralph
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Joe Patterson, Patricia Bastik & Susan Walters Dec 2009

Source: History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania; edited by 
J.H. Battle; A. Warner & Co.; 1887
Tinicum Township


   RALPH STOVER retired, P.O. Point Pleasant. The ancestors 
of this gentleman came from Rhenish Germany, on the 
invitation of the great Founder, at the time of the 
religious troubles there, in the beginning of the 18th 
century. Henry Stover settled on a farm in Bedminster 
township, on part of which Bedminsterville now stands. He 
had four sons:  Ralph, Ulrich, Jacob, and Henry. The latter 
retained the homestead; Jacob bought the mill property on 
Tohickon creek, near Pipersville, which is still owned by 
his son, Samuel, over eighty years of age; and Ulrich bought 
the mill property on Tohickon creek, in Haycock township, 
and his descendants still own it. Ralph was the grandfather 
of the subject of this sketch. He bought a farm of three 
hundred acres on the Tohickon, where the Easton road crosses 
that stream, where he died in 1811, aged fifty-two. He was a 
prominent and influential citizen, was a justice of the 
peace for many years, and represented the county in the 
legislature. His oldest son, Abraham F., was born on the 
Bedminster farm in 1786, and in 1833 sold his share of the 
homestead property, and removed to Fauquier county, Va., 
where he died in 1854. He was justice of the peace, a 
surveyor, and was twice elected to the Pennsylvania 
legislature. He married Rachel Fretz, who was born in 1787, 
and died in 1870. They had three sons who lived to maturity: 
 Charles and Albert, both of whom died in Virginia, and 
Ralph, who was born September 28, 1811. He went to Virginia 
with his parents, and in 1841 returned to Bucks county. He 
bought from his wife's father the house in which he now 
lives and the mills and farm adjoining. In October, 1838, he 
married Eliza, daughter of Henry S. and Barbara Stover. She 
was born in 1815. They have had twelve children. Those 
deceased are:  John Henry, a Union soldier, who was wounded 
at Cold Harbor, Va., in 1864, and died in Washington; and 
Emeline, Rachel and Horace, who died young. Those living 
are:  Robert C. and Mary G. (wife of Charles E. Keyser), 
both in Virginia; Eliza B., wife of F. W. Troemner; Ella, 
wife of John B. Lequear, in Germantown; Adelaide, wife of A. 
L. Thomson, living at Avon, N. Y.; R. Chester, married and 
living in his father's house; Annie, wife of Albert Stover, 
of Kintnersville; and Albert, married and living in his 
father's house in Point Pleasant. Mr. and Mrs. Stover have 
nineteen grandchildren living. He has passed a busy and 
successful life. He was one of the projectors of the 
Delaware river bridge at Point Pleasant, and also of the 
Danborough and Point Pleasant turnpike. He and his wife are 
members of the Point Pleasant church.