Page:Historical and Biographical Annals of Columbia and Montour Counties, Pennsylvania, Containing a Concise History of the Two Counties and a Genealogical and Biographical Record of Representative Families.pdf/524

 COLUMBIA AND MONTOUR COUNTIES ly superintendent of the Biy-n M aw r Hospital, and of the Good Samaritan Hospital at L e x ­ ington. K y .: H ester K. Eckm an, now the wife o f (ieorge V. Darby, of the city o f H arris­ burg. P a., and who, in turn, have two chil­ dren, Elizabeth and Christine Darby. Declining years lured Colonel Eckman back to the soil, and he spent his last years in his Roaring Creek home. T he roar of a mountain stream called another Cincinnatus back to the plough. H is home life was ideal. T o know him there was to love him. He had no ene­ mies. H is friends were everywhere. In van­ ishing arm y circles they still affectionately call him "the old w ar horse of the 93d’'— the regiment o f four flags. T he camp of the Sons o f Veterans at Danville, Pa., still bears his honored name. H e was the soul o f honor and the badge of in t< ^ ty . H e never left a duty and he never betrayed a trust. 1-lc was a rliodcst man. The world never saw his scars. H e told no story o f nutchless conflict. Tor years he suffered in silence tlte renewed pangs o f Cedar Creek and then there fell on ids asted brow the breath of the eternal morning. He died May 3. 1906, r<^rcitcd by all who ever knew him and to all o f whom his life is still a gentle memory. "Sed gw ick," his faithful steed, has long since ceased to graze along the shady hillside. A bridle without a rein and an old saddle, once flecked with blood and foam, still hang ciii|ity on memorial walls. But his magnifi­ cent sword— the g ift o f his soldiers—is still as spotless as his life. Tim e has tarnished neither. In the City of the Silent he sleeps as modestly as he lived. H is monument is a reunited nation. Colonel Eckm an was a Friremason. belong­ ing to the blue lodge and commandery at Dan­ ville. and to the chapter at Bloomsburg. He also held membership in the G. A. R. post at Danville. H e w as active in politics for years, working long and effectively in the interest of the Republican party, in which hi.s influence did much to shape local affairs. He was brought up in the Methodist Episcopal Church. Colonel Eckman was a grandson of John Eckm an. a native of New Jersey, who settled with his fam ily at Kline's Grove, Northum­ berland Co., r a ., where the fam ily is still represented. -He was a farm er all his life. Isaac Eckman. son o f John, and father of Colonel Eckm an. was born Nov. 8. 1809. in Northumberland county, and died N ov. 3, 1874. He was a carpenter by trade and abo followed farming. M rs. Sophia Starker (G earhart) F.ckman

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continues to make her home on the old place in M ayberry township before mentioned, where she was born Jan. ^ 1, il^ 6, dat^hter of Mayberrv* and M ary Catherine (N ixo n ) Gearhart. Her godmother w as a Mayberry, of the family which at one time had such e x ­ tensive holdings o f land in that part o f Mon­ tour county named in thcir honor. T he Gearhart family, to which M rs. F.ckman belongs, has been numerous and promi­ nent in Xorthumberland county since shortly after the close of the Revolutionaiy war, and one township of the county has b « n named in thcir honor. T w o brothers, Jacob and William Gearhart, came to Northumberland county about 1790. the former settling in what is now Gearhart township, the latter in Rush township. William Gearhart, brother of Capt. Jacob Gearhart, was l>orn in Strasburg. A lsace-Lor­ raine (now part of Germ any), and came to .America in 1754. He settled in Hunterdon, N. J. When the Revolutionary war broke nut he enlisted in the Hunterdon county mili­ tia and w as promoted to ensign. A fte r the war. about he came to .Northumberland county, (’a., and purchased a large tract of land to the southeast o f his brother, Capt. Jacoh Gearhart’s tract, settling in Rush town­ ship. In New Jersey he married Eleanor DeKiiight. and they were the parents o f four sons and three daughters, as follow s: William, .-aron, Tobias, Jacob, Elizabeth (M rs. A m cns), Ann (M rs. Am cns) and M aiy (M rs. Lom ison). William Gearhart, son o f William, was l)om in New Jersey, married Sarah Boone, and had children as follow s: M ayberry, born •May 26, 1 8 1 3; H arriet. 18 15 (m arried Lew is Y e ttc r ); Juriann, 18 18 (died Nov. 8. 19 10 . aged ninety-two y e a r s ): Eleanor. 18 19 (marric'l David G a r k ), and .-Amelia Douglass, 1821 (n u rried Gideon M. Shoop). M ayberry Gearhart, born M ay 26, 18 13 , was a prominent man in the township which was named in his honor. In his early life he was a school-nuster and singing teacher, and in his later manhood, as a farm er, he was one of the most successful and substantial citi­ zens o f his neighborhood. H is remarkable constitution enabled him to withstand the trials and hardships which beset the husband­ man o f fifty years ago. and such was the con­ fidence imposed in his integrity his neighbors all considered his word as good as his bond. He possessed an excellent memory, and his recollections of the old training days and the early history o f this section of the State were