Person:Ruth Rising (1)

Children of Reuben & Ruth Rising Harmon

During the Revolutionary War, Reuben Harmon, Jr., served in the patriot army, and his wife [Ruth Rising Harmon] was either residing with his father, at Sunderland, Massachusetts, or was there on a visit, when that town was burned by the British and Indians. Mrs. Harmon caught an unbroken colt in the field and mounted it, bare-back, and, carrying in her arms a babe three weeks old, fled while the smoke of her husband's early home rolled up behind her. Such a person was well fitted to be the first white woman on the frontier of Ohio, as she afterward became. Fearless amid semi-hostile Indians and strong in every hour of trial, she was a typical pioneer. The babe previously mentioned, she afterward carried in her arms during the long journey to Ohio, where it was scalded to death in 1802...

His [Reuben Harmon's] widow, however, proved equal to the emergency [Reuben's death, 1806], meeting all her trials with rare fortitude and sagacity. She passed a life of usefulness, and spent her declining years in Warren, at the homes of her sons, Dr. John B., and Heman R. Harmon, dying at the latter's house, of congestion of the lungs, April 10, 1836, in the seventy-eighth year of her age, leaving many friends to mourn her loss. Her life was characterized by cheerfulness and activity, and she enjoyed a large share of the pleasures of a ripe old age. She was for many years a member of the Methodist Church in Warren, and died in the hope of that faith. She [Ruth Rising Harmon] was the mother of eleven children....

John B. Harmon,... was born in Rupert, Vermont, October 19, 1780, and was named after John Brown, a friend of his father in the Vermont Assembly. John Harmon's early experience fitted him for the part he was to play in life. He helped his father conduct a large farm in Vermont, and early became inured to exposure, often going through the winter storms on foot, with his dog and gun, from the home farm in the valley to one several miles up the mountains. He had a fair knowledge of the English branches, and of Latin, and, in 1796, when sixteen years of age, commenced the study of medicine under the tuition of Dr. Jonathan Blackmer, a relative by marriage, who resided in Dorset, Vermont. In 1800, on the removal of his parents to Ohio, John Harmon accompanied them, being then prepared to practice so far as the wants of the family and the few scattered settlers should require. From 1800 to 1806, he aided his father in the salt works, which were carried on extensively, furnishing that necessary commodity to distant settlers as well as to those in the vicinity. He enjoyed the common sport of the day, deer and bear hunting, and was considered an expert shot. One winter he had some twenty deer strung up on a hill a mile west of the springs, the law of hunters in that day rendering property more safe than bolts and bars can now make our hams and bacon. In lieu of lard, the fat of the bear was used in cooking, and the Doctor often said that with a shortcake in his bosom, made with bear's oil, he could travel farther on a hunt or ride, than with any other food.

Anna, born in Rupert, Vermont, February 20, 1782, died in Bristol, Ohio, in March, 1841. She was for many years a school teacher in different townships of Trumbull county, and is still remembered by some of the older descendants of the pioneers as the woman who could teach them arithmetic.

Clara, born April 12, 1785, married William Leavitt, son of John Leavitt, Esq., of Warren, from whom she was divorced because of his intemperance. She afterward married Dr. John Brown, and moved to Lancaster, New York, where she died January 22, 1844. She was an exemplary and interesting woman.

Betsey, born November 12, 1788, died November 7, 1853. She married Samuel Gilson, and had a son, Reuben H. Gilson, and two daughters: Mary, who married Henry McGlathery, of Bristol, Ohio; and Julia, who married Hugh Lackey, of Youngstown, now deceased. She now lives in Hart's Grove, Ashtabula county. After Mr. Gilson's death, she married Albert Opdycke, and lived in Hubbard until 1836, when they moved to Pulaski, Williams county, Ohio, where they were greatly prospered, and were one of the happiest families to be met with. Mr. and Mrs. Opdycke had six sons and one daughter, the last named having married O.H. Patch of Warren. He died in Denver, Colorado, in the spring of 1888.

Lucretia Harmon, born February 11, 1791, married William Draper of Weathersfield, who lived but a short time. She then married William Frazier, of Hubbard, and moved to Trenton, Ohio, later to Dearborn, Indiana, in which latter place her husband died in May, 1862. Mrs. Frazier died at Dillsboro, Indiana, in January, 1871, being the last survivor of the eleven children, four sons and seven daughters, nine of whom were well known to the pioneers of Trumbull county.

Hiram R. Harmon, the ninth child and second son, was born in Rupert, Vermont, December 18, 1793, and died at Ives Grove, Wisconsin, October 15, 1852. He was a blacksmith and resided for a few years in Liberty and Brookfield, later removing to Bristol, Ohio, where he bought the Potter farm, and kept a hotel for a long time, also working some at his trade and farming extensively. He afterward sold his farm and moved to another a mile west of the village, but a few years later went West, where he died of apoplexy in the harvest field about three years afterward. He was an active, industrious, honest and capable man, a zealous advocate of temperance and of anti-slavery.

Heman R. Harmon was born in Bennington, Vermont, February 12, 1798, and died December 1, 1859. He was one of the first merchants of Warren, and also dealt extensively in cattle, large droves of which he took East, and conducted a large farm near the springs. He was at different times a member of the firms of Harmon Brothers, Harmon & Stiles, E.E. Hoyt & Co., and Harmon & Johnson. He served two terms as Sheriff of the county, was an ardent politician and an indefatigable worker in all that he undertook. He aided in the manufacture of the Heath mowing machine, of which he started the first one in this county. Liberal-minded and generous, he did work enough to have amassed a fortune. His losses grew out of adverse circumstances and not from special failures of his own.

1. ↑ Biographical history of northeastern Ohio, embracing the counties of Ashtabula, Trumbull and Mahoning: containing portraits of all the presidents of the United States, with a biography of each, together with portraits and biographies of Joshua R. Giddings, Benjamin F. Wade, and a large number of the early settlers and representative families of to-day. (Chicago [Illinois]: Lewis Publishing, 1893)
   pp. 422 - 424.

   See "Children...

2. ↑ Ruth Rising Harmon's grave inscription is not found in Old Mahoning Cemetery, although she may be memorialized at the bottom of husband, Reuben Harmon's gravestone, that part of which is no longer legible.