Martin Barnhart on West Prairie

(July 24, 2008, continued) Two miles west of Girard, I stopped to take a photo of the old home at the intersection with River Road, just in case there was a history connection I’m supposed to know about. Then some coneflowers got more of my attention than the house did.

Tonight I finally got around to checking out the ownership of the land where the house is located, and found that there is indeed a connection of the type that I’m looking for. The original purchaser of that land was Martin Barnhart.

Barnhart was one of the men who served in the Michigan militia at the time of Black Hawk war. Le Roy Barnett’s book says he served in Bolton’s company. Bolton was from Coldwater, just a few miles to the south. Barnhart’s service dates were May 21 to June 3 and June 14-21, 1832. (The James B. Tompkins of the incident with the apple trees was also on Bolton’s roster, but was listed as “absent.”)

Barnhart’s purchase was made at the Monroe land office, which means it was made before the land office opened in White Pigeon in 1831. The 1879 Branch County history says he came to live here on January 1, 1831. I suppose moving here in the middle of winter would have made it a memorable New Years Day. The history doesn’t say whether he had built a log cabin earlier, or what. Some settlers did things like that. The man might come and build a log cabin, then go back east to get the family.

In Barnhart’s case, “back east” would have meant Ypsilanti. When he bought his first land in Branch County, he gave his place of residence as Washtenaw County. He had bought land there earlier, at a place that’s south of town, south of I-94. From the satellite view in Google Maps, it looks like much of it is still agricultural, though it’s bordered by a golf course and other developments. Barnhart may not have been there long, but when he bought that Washtenaw County land at the Detroit land office, he gave his place of residence as Washtenaw County.

The 1879 Branch County history says that in 1839, Barnhard had “395 acres wild land, 85 improved, 4 horses.” I don’t know when he died or when the land passed to other hands. I’ll have to check out the nearby cemeteries sometime. By 1872 the land was owned by a C. Prentice.

This area in Girard Township was known as the “West Prairie,” as opposed to the “East Prairie” where the village of Girard is located. It credits James B. Tompkins as the source for the statement that at settlement time, “Upon the ‘West Prairie’ were the families of Benjamin H. Smith, Martin Barnhart, Samuel Craig, Henry Van Hyning, and John Parkinson.”

All but one of these men served in Bolton’s company in 1832. And the surname of the one who didn’t (Craig) is a surname that’s also listed on the roster of Bolton’s company. A brother or son perhaps? I’ll look into that another time.

On a future bike ride I’ll try to find out if one of those other West Prairie people still has descendents living on the same homestead today. It was a name I knew about at the time of my July ride. I had stopped at the house before I got to this one at River Road, but nobody was home. I’ll leave the name out until I have a chance to talk to the people.

These coneflowers were my last photo stop of the day. I didn’t attempt to ride all the way back home, which would have made it a ride of well over 100 miles, a lot of which would have been after dark. Myra was willing to come to Union City Athens to pick me up, so that made it a ride of 66 miles.

That’s about as much as I’ve ridden in all of 2009 so far. Today I rode home from work, bringing me up to 67.5 miles for the year.