Seeking burial places for area Revolutionary War vets

FINDLAY — Four members of the Hancock County Chapter Genealogical Society have been busy since fall searching the county's cemeteries. Their mission has been to locate, verify and document the final resting places of Revolutionary War veterans. An estimated 7,000 such graves are believed to exist statewide. But many of the markers are disappearing as inscriptions fade and stones crumble. This is an America 250-Ohio program, said Sherri Wells, chair of the Hancock County Revolutionary War soldier tombstone project. All of Ohio's 88 counties were asked to undertake the project, she noted. "And as you can imagine, the further east you go, the more people they have," said Wells. Based on different sources available, the group — which includes society President Sue Haugh along with Gay Jones and Kay Hochstetler, who are also members of the Daughters of the American Revolution — have identified eight Revolutionary War veterans buried in Hancock County. The project has taken them countless hours, according to Wells. "There are a lot of cemeteries in Hancock County, and the records for some are not very good," she said. "We want to do it right." Wells said they started with information Jones had collected to present a DAR program about Revolutionary War soldiers buried in Hancock County. Jones has a notebook with names, pictures of the graves and other information she compiled. "She also had a list done in the late 1920s. The state of Ohio DAR published a book of Revolutionary War soldiers buried in Ohio, and it's by county," said Wells. That was list they worked from initially. It had 14 names, Wells said. "So eight we've confirmed off that list. A few of them we can't find evidence they ever existed, I mean can't even find them on Ancestry or FamilySearch Tree. They're not in land records. You can't find them anywhere," she said. They also used a list from 1950 compiled by DAR members who read all of the cemeteries in the county. The genealogical society repeated the project again in the late 1980s or early 1990s, she said. "They referenced the ones the DAR found that they (the genealogical society) did not find. So we go back to that 1950s reading a lot," said Wells. She said the Hancock Historical Museum and the Findlay-Hancock County Public Library also have copies of lists done by different people over the years. "We found some of the people are actually War of 1812, not Revolutionary War," she said. One man on the list is actually buried in Marion County, she said. Another veteran who was said to have been buried in Hancock County is probably buried in Fairfield County. "Then when they started Wyandot County, they pulled Ridge Township from Hancock County. So there's people in that area that are probably in Wyandot County now," said Wells. A memorial stone for Nathaniel Babcock is located in Houcktown Cemetery. Wells said he also has a tombstone in Dublin, Ohio. "Most of the county's cemeteries, the townships control them, the paperwork and all that stuff," she explained. "The township didn't have anything more than what was on the tombstone." The grave in Houcktown Cemetery also has a newer marker, said Wells. "You can tell. It's the big gray granite type. Just by the shape and the style of it, it's newer," she said. Babcock died in 1839, more than 180 years ago. The women determined that he's buried with his wife's family in Dublin. "I found a map online from the city website that shows the actual plot where he is. Two different people have registered him already for the project, in Dublin," Wells said. Nathaniel and his wife, Rachel, did not have a tombstone in Hancock County when the DAR read the cemetery in 1950, she said. Their son, Jacob, daughter-in-law, Nancy, and grandson, Lewis, were all buried in Houcktown Cemetery and had headstones there, but not Nathaniel and Rachel. "The stone for the son, his wife and the grandson is just like the one for Nathaniel. So it's been replaced as well. And they actually have the grandson on the tomb with the grandparents, not with the parents," she said. The stone in Hancock County is a memorial stone, said Wells. "He's not buried here. He never came here," said Wells. "His son came here several years after Nathaniel and his wife died, so would he really have dug up his parents and brought them here, in the 1850s, 1860s?" The group has frequently run into these kinds of mysteries, she said. Most recently, they are still researching names and making trips to cemeteries in search of gravestones. "The four of us have been having quite a time going out to cemeteries," she laughed. The initiative was spearheaded by the Ohio History Connection and its State Historic Preservation Office. Engineering firm, Terracon Consultants, Inc., built a mobile-friendly submission portal using the Survey123 app which allowed anyone with a smartphone to photograph a grave marker, record inscriptions and log a cemetery's GPS coordinates. According to the America 250-Ohio website, around 350 volunteers responded to photograph and map more than 4,000 grave markers across the state. Submissions were submitted from more than 1,300 cemeteries in dozens of Ohio counties. On Monday, the digital dashboard was locked so entries can be reviewed, verified and finalized ahead of the release of its findings on July 4, the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Wells said the research has led her to some other historical curiosities. "I found information on a cemetery that used to be here in town, before Maple Grove," she said. "So I've kind of been accumulating that stuff, too." Eagle Creek Cemetery, she said, was located near the 300 block area of South Blanchard Street. Most people who died were buried there, unless there was a family plot. "But there are no records of the early burials there," said Wells. When Maple Grove Cemetery was started in the 1850s, city council passed an ordinance requiring that all of the bodies be removed from Eagle Creek and taken to Maple Grove Cemetery in preparation to give the right-of-way to the railroad.