aka Reason/Manis

Pipe Creek Township

Location: north side of CR 900N, between CRs 500W and 575W

    The Howard Cemetery is the resting place for many of Pipe Creek Township's first settlers.  In 1834, Joseph Miller and family from Wayne County, Indiana, were close behind the Shells and Siglers in pioneering the farmland along Pipe Creek.  Actually arriving before any improved roads, Joseph, in fact, was the area's first blacksmith, an indispensable position among pioneers.

    Henry Plummer is safe-guarded at the Howard as well.  He was born in Randolph County, North Carolina, in 1806.  He decided to homestead in Madison County in 1836, after having previously resided in Wayne and Rush counties.  Only five years after arriving, Henry started in local government, being elected as county commissioner in 1841.  He also served as township assessor and trustee.  Samuel Hardin, county historian from the 19th century, knew him personally:

    "Mr. Plummer is a  prominent member and exhorter in the Christian Church.  He is regarded as a number one man, plain and unassuming in his manners, and a Christian gentleman.  He resides two miles north of Frankton, where he owns a fine farm.  The writer first met him while gathering material for this work, when he tarried overnight with him and received the hospitalities of his family."

    Also represented here are the Johnson, Ebert, and King families, all of whom had members residing in the township before 1840.  The families of Tharp, Worley, Douglass, Hagerty, and Griffee, etc., soon followed.

Below right is the obelisk for settler Daniel King who was "55y 5m 21d" old when he died February 24, 1876.  Below left is the marker for younger relative Washington King who was twenty-two years old when he passed away in 1871. 

 Above left is the memorial for Isabel wife of Edmund Johnson.  The Edmund Johnson family is recorded as early homesteaders to Pipe Creek Township.  The clasped hands at the top represent the partnership of this married couple.  Isabel was born February 23, 1812, and died August 23, 1870. 

Above right is the large base for Dr. William H. Ebert.  The importance of medical professionals in an agricultural community cannot be overstated.  The "good doctor" must have been influential spiritually as well since on the side of his stone is the symbol for the bible. Dr. Ebert died December 19, 1896, when he was seventy-nine years old.  A "W.H. Ebbert" is listed as an early settler.

    Although not listed as early settlers, Aaron and Elizabeth Pickenpaugh must be the oldest couple having legible gravestones at the time the transcriptions for this cemetery were made. 

Aaron, below left, died October 30, 1866, at "70y 3m 4d," making his birth year around 1796.  Elizabeth, center left, was born around 1795 since she died January 31, 1864, at sixty-nine years of age.  From the next generation, Henry Pickenpaugh, far right, is recorded on the burial list below.  Possibly a son, he died five months before Aaron and was forty-one years old.  William, center right, has a stone that, other than the name, is illegible.

The harsh pioneer life certainly took its toll on the female members of families.  Many of the well-preserved gravestones in this cemetery are for women.  One of the earliest is that for Minervia Ridegway, left, who died January 4, 1849.  Another woman who died in her twenties was Sophia Messner, right.  By contrast in the middle, Sarah Allen, who died March 24, 1857, lived to be sixty years old; she was born around 1797.

The three stones below illustrate the high death rate of children during the 19th century.  The average rate was one out of four.  When disease was more prevalent, one out of three died.  Omitted from the burial list by some oversight, at left is the stone for "Phebe J. Dau. of Thomas & M. Halpin died Jan. 31, 1865..." and at right "Nancy E. dau. of W & S.A. Denney died Mar. 1, 1862..."  Center is the stone of another child of the Denney couple.  James M. is recorded as passing away  "Feb. 8, 1861."  He was just eleven days old.  The lamb at the top of the Denney stones symbolizes the innocent young.  Sometimes only the stones for the children who have died represent the family who attempted homesteading in an area from which the parents later moved on.  No Halpin or Denney adult is known to be buried at this cemetery.

    The burial ground, itself, is fortunate: it is well-preserved with many stones from the 1840s and '50s still intact.  This is in spite of the fact that it has not been protected by a modern cemetery association, business, or church.  The Howard is a jewel among pioneer cemeteries.  Its pristine condition is to the credit of surrounding land owners and the township trustees.