BIO:  Hervey Hammond, York County, PA

Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Kathy Francis

Copyright 2005.  All rights reserved.
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History of York County, Pennsylvania.  John Gibson, Historical Editor.
Chicago: F. A. Battey Publishing Co., 1886.
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Part II, Biographical Sketches, Newberry Township, Pg 152

HERVEY HAMMOND.  About the year 1634, William Hammond, son of Admiral Hammond, of 
the English navy, embarked in the ship Francis, from Ipswich, England, and 
immigrating to America, joined the Boston colony, and settled at Watertown, Mass.  
He descended from a prominent family of his native country, and from him and his 
brother, Thomas, also an immigrant to Massachusetts, most of the Hammonds in this 
country descended.  Like many other people of the thrifty and intelligent classes 
of England, these brothers determined to seek a new home in the Western world, 
where civil liberty and religious freedom would be honored and respected.  It was 
contemporaneous with the emigration, that the tyranny of Charles I was greater 
than the liberty-loving people could endure, consequently most of the members of 
the Boston colony were generally enterprising and intelligent Puritan stock, and 
some of their descendants have become prominent and influential in the history of 
America.  Among them were the ancestors of President Garfield and Gen. Sherman, 
who also settled in Watertown and intermarried with the Hammonds.  Jabez (or 
Jason) Hammond, grandfather of the subject, located in Canterbury Township, 
Windham Co., Conn., about 1760; when the Revolutionary war opened, he entered the 
military service and participated in several hard-fought battles in that 
prolonged struggle for American freedom.  Elisha Hammond, his son, was born in 
Connecticut, February 7, 1769.  He received an excellent education in the schools 
of his native State.  He was acquainted with I. M. Singer before he invented the 
sewing machine; met him in Pittsburgh and examined his rough model, approved, 
suggested some improvements and loaned him $10 to go ahead with his invention, 
but the money was never returned.  Elisha afterward became a skillful and 
successful teacher; understood the higher mathematics and theoretical surveying.  
While yet a young man he removed to Marbletown, New York, and taught there in 
1791, and later followed the same profession at Owego in the same State.  His 
endorsements of qualifications and success in his work are still kept by his 
grandson as family relics.  Leaving Owego, he entered the Wyoming Settlement in 
Luzerne County, Penn., and from thence came down the Susquehanna River on an ark, 
then a common craft for floating lumber and produce down the stream to market.  
He located in Fairview Township, in the vicinity of Lewisberry, about 1797.  He 
bought with him many books of science and literature, and soon afterward engaged 
to teach the youths of the intelligent Quaker settlement.  He was a man of 
undoubted integrity.  He married Rebecca Frankelberger, of a prominent family in 
the Redland Valley.  They had ten children, viz.:  Hervey, Maria, Mary, David, 
William Hannah, John, Thomas, Philip and Sarah.  Elisha Hammond died March 28, 
1824, at the age of fifty-five years.  He was highly respected in the village in 
which he lived.  His widow survived him until January 31, 1863, and died at the 
advance age of eighty-two years.  Hervey Hammond was born December 23, 1800; grew 
to manhood in his native town; attended his father’s school and that of Isaac 
Kirk, the distinguished surveyor.  The youth soon became the most active pupil of 
the school, and early in life followed the same profession as his father.  From 
his ancestors he inherited a thirst for study, and soon became proficient in the 
ordinary branches of learning, and under his father’s private instruction, 
pursued advanced studies.  As early as 1825, he introduced the study of 
scientific English grammar in his neighborhood.  The book used was Greenleaf’s 
Practical Grammar.  He was also of a mathematical turn of mind, which endowment 
he turned to practical account by his invention of the famous Hammond Window Sash 
Spring, which has since had an immense sale.  It was patented in 1837, and during 
the following year he placed his springs in the windows of the White House at 
Washington; received a recommendation for them from the noted orator, Henry Clay, 
and from other distinguished persons.  Mr. Hammond traveled extensively 
wholesaling goods and merchandise and introducing his window springs and 
appointing agents for the sale of them.  In those times there were very few 
appliances for window sashes, in general use, and Mr. Hammond had to first teach 
the people the necessity of ventilating their dwellings in order to create a 
market or demand for his springs.  In the year 1840, the annual sales of springs 
numbered 35,000.  He introduced many improvements into the village of Lewisberry; 
was a supporter of the cause of free education; became one of the first school 
directors under the new school law, and was an active director, present at the 
election of his friend and neighbor, the Hon. Jacob Kirk, as the first 
superintendent of the schools of York County.  He was married at Carlisle, Penn., 
September 15, 1825 to Katherine Ann Harman.  They had nine children, viz.:  
Andrew (deceased); Bennett, died of cholera at Aurora, Ind., in 1849; Caroline 
E., in Wichita, Kas.; Delliah A., in Missouri; Edward W., in Oregon; Rebecca R., 
in Cantrall, Ill.; Mary (deceased); Winfield Scott, and Ida C., in Waynesburgh, 
Green Co., Penn.  Mrs. Hammond was born August 31, 1807, in Warrington Township; 
was a daughter of Adam and Rachel (Diceman) Harman, members of the Methodist 
Church, and representatives of intelligent families.  She, herself, was possessed 
of a well-trained mind.  She died July 31, 1863; Hervey H. died August 27, 1855.