HISTORY: Commemorative Biographical Encyclopedia, Chapter 7, Balsbaugh, Dauphin County, PA 

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Commemorative Biographical Encyclopedia of Dauphin County, 
Containing Sketches of Representative Citizens, and Many of the 
Early Scotch-Irish and German Settlers.  Chambersburg, Pa.: 
J. M. Runk & Company, 1896, pages 86-87.
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                          THE BALSBAUGH FAMILY.

  Among the earliest of the German settlers on Spring creek, in what is 
now Derry township, Dauphin county, was George Balsbaugh, a native of 
Fahrenbach, in the Pfaltz, Germany, where he was born in 1706.  He 
married Eva Minich, born in the same neighborhood, in 1716.  With their 
little family them came to America in the year 1743, and located among 
their old neighbors in the Fatherland, near Derry church, on the farm 
now owned by the late venerable Wendel Henry.  Mr. Balsbaugh 
subsequently removed to Hanover township, six miles further north, and 
purchased a tract of land of two hundred acres - most of it hilly and 
sterile - which has ever since been known as the "Balsbaugh Place."  
Mr. Balsbaugh died there in 1775, his wife ten years later.  They had a 
large family, and their descendants were quite numerous in Dauphin and 
Lebanon counties sixty years ago, but like their Scotch-Irish 
neighbors, they have gone out from the old homestead and sought new 
locations south and west.  The record we have been able to make of them 
is meager, it is true, and that mainly of one branch of the family.  
George Balsbaugh and Eva his wife had among others the following 
children:
        i.  George, b. 1736; d. March 10, 1802.
       ii.  Peter, b. June 27, 1738; d. June 26, 1796; m. Mary _____, 
b. December 12, 1742; d. June 19, 1798. 
      iii.  John, b. 1740; d. March 24, 1802.
       iv.  Catharine, b. 1743; d. at sea. 
        v.  Elizabeth, b. 1745.
       vi.  Eva, b. 1749. 
      vii.  Gertrude, b. 1752.
     viii.  Valentine, b. February 14, 1755; m. Elizabeth Miller. 

  VALENTINE BALSBAUGH  (George) was born near old Derry church, 
February 15, 1755.  He was, however, brought up on the old Balsbaugh 
Place in Hanover, to which his parents removed about 1760.  Although a 
practical farmer, he was a minister of the German Baptist Church, and 
emphatically a self-educated man.  His knowledge of the Holy Scriptures 
was wonderful, and his grasp of revealed truths deep, spiritual and 
far-reaching.  He was what is termed a "weeping" minister of the 
gospel, and was never known to preach without shedding tears and 
causing others to weep.  To the close of his long and influential life, 
he never used glasses.  He died suddenly of apoplexy at the homestead 
on the 26th of November, 1851, in the 97th year of his age.  Mr. 
Balsbaugh married August 3, 1777, Elizabeth Miller, daughter of the 
saintly George Miller, the first bishop of the German Baptist Church in 
Dauphin county.  She was born May 2, 1753, and died in September, 1821.  
They had issue as follows:
        i.  George, b. May 5, 1778; was a black-smith by trade, and was 
noted among his Scotch-Irish Presbyterian neighbors as much for his 
mental strength as for his leonine physique; he was well read, and with 
his strong reasoning powers was the leader in debate - a veritable 
Elihu Burritt in knowledge.  He married late in life and died at three 
score. 
       ii.  Christian, b. 1779; d. s. p. 
      iii.  Daniel, b. 1781; d. s. p. 
       iv.  Henry, b. February 8, 1783; was a farmer; represented the 
county of Dauphin in the Legislature of 1843; died September 1, 1848.  
He married Hannah, daughter of Jacob Smith who died at Forreston, Ill., 
at the age of eighty-five.  Dr. George Balsbaugh, of Forreston, Ill., 
is a son. 
        v.  Catharine, b. May 26, 1785; a woman of fine personal 
appearance and noble, self-sacrificing disposition; she accomplished 
great good in her long life.  She married Rev. Daniel Reichard, of 
Ringgold Manor, Md., a bishop of the German Baptist Church.  They had a 
large family most of whom were prominent in the church.  The Rev. 
Reichard was a profound theologian, and the professors of St. James 
College said of him, "he is 
 
DAUPHIN COUNTY.   87

as tough as a fiddle string and genial as tough."  He was born May 1, 
1760; died January 28, 1856.  Mrs. Reichard died December 22, 1870.  
They had twelve children. 
       vi.  Elizabeth, b. February 14, 1787; m. the Rev. Lawrence 
Etter, "an eloquent man and mighty in the scriptures," many years a 
minister in the German Baptist Church.  He died November 9, 1853, in 
his sixty-seventh year.  Their son John is now a bishop in that church.  
Mrs. Etter died at the early age of thirty-four. 
      vii.  John, b. November 4, 1788; d. in his ninety-first year, 
near Highspire; married a Miss Zeigler, sister of a prominent minister 
of the church in Lancaster county.  Their son, John, Jr., who died 
recently, represented Juniata county in the Legislature.
     viii.  Mary, b. October 7, 1790; d. February 27, 1882; married 
William Gibson, of York county, near Dallastown, Pa., where they 
resided all their married life. 
       ix.  Peter, b. June 4, 1793; d. November 21, 1871, at the old 
homestead; was for years a director of the poor; in the early days of 
common schools he was one of the most strenuous advocates of that noble 
plan of education, and all through his long life he took the deepest 
interest therein.  A plain, practical farmer, he was as influential as 
generous.  He married Elizabeth Longenecker, who deceased on New Year's 
Day, 1874.  Their children were Valentine, b. March 19, 1827; m. Mary 
daughter of the Rev. Jacob Hollinger; Abraham, b. October 12, 1819; m. 
Susan Seltzer; Benjamin, b. November 14, 1821; m. Mary, daughter of 
Rev. Miskey, of Berks county; Daniel, b. February 15, 1825, founder and 
first principal of Lebanon Valley College, d. in 1860; m. Laura, 
daughter of Andrew Henry, of Palmyra; Maria, b. September 18, 1828; m. 
John M. Zortman, a farmer near Palmyra; Christian-Hervey, b. April 16, 
1831, now of Union Deposit, Dauphin county; Lizzie, b. July 3, 1834; d. 
at the age of twenty-eight; David, b. November 23, 1836, died at 
sixteen, and Samuel, b. July 30, 1839; m. Sarah, daughter of Rev. Mr. 
Keefer, of Dauphin county. 
        x.  Christina, b. December 10, 1795; d. May 23, 1863; married 
Michael Friese.  Their son Michael was a leading homeopathic physician 
who died in Harrisburg in 1880.  Another son, Valentine, a graduate of 
Dickinson College, died in 1875 at Fort Wingate, New Mexico.
       xi.  Anna, b. July 26, 1798; d. December 23, 1868; married Peter 
Gingrich, a substantial farmer.  Their son Aaron is a prominent 
physician in Virginia.