♂Johannes Walrath

Johannes Walrath (11 September 1783 – April 1850), known in Iowa as John Walrod, was a farmer, a private in the New York militia in the War of 1812 and a pioneer settler of Clinton County, Iowa. He was the great-great-grandfather of Ora Emogene Walrath (1925–2014), through his son Nicholas Walrath (1810–1896).

Early life

He was probably born at German Flatts in Herkimer County, New York, and christened there on 9 October 1783. A transcription of the German Flatts church register enters the birth on 11 September and the baptism on 9 October 1783 of a Johannes, child of Nicolas Walrath and Anna Barbara, with a single godmother entered as “Magdalena, Johannes Schultz Wittibbe”, the widow of a Johannes Schultz and likely his grandmother. That this child is the Johannes who married Leah Bradt and died in Iowa rests on the name and on the family typescript of 1942, which gives the same birth date and may have taken it from this entry; no record of him as an adult names his parents. On that reading his father was Nicolaus Walrath, given as born on 3 March 1750 by a Sons of the American Revolution application and the typescript, and his mother Anna Barbara Schultz.

In 1806 he married Leah Bradt (1785–1845). No known record names her parents; a compiled conclusion places her in the family of Henry Bradt and his wife Catharina of Springfield, Otsego County, where the Walraths also lived. The 1942 typescript lists eleven children, born between 1806 and 1828; an earlier summary list in the same book gives ten names, but two of them, “John Henry” and “John William”, each merge two children. In the War of 1812, while living at Camillus in Onondaga County, he served as a private in Captain Michael Redman’s company of the 159th Regiment (Hecox’s) of New York Militia, entered on his service card as “Walradt, Jno”.

Iowa

He moved his family to Iowa. The History of Clinton County, Iowa, published in 1879, says that John Walrod and his family, four sons and three daughters, settled on what was known by 1879 as the Black farm in Welton Township, then part of De Witt Township. The Find a Grave memorial preserves an account told by his granddaughter Mahala Walrod, recorded at DeWitt at the age of 77, that he bought a farm six miles north of DeWitt from the government at fifty cents an acre, less than half the $1.25 an acre that the Land Act of 1820^W had set as the federal minimum for public land. The figure comes from family memory, and how he came to pay so little is not recorded.

Mahala remembered that Leah died first and was buried on a knoll about forty rods north-east of the house, and that he then married Sarah Paine, a widow with one son. His son Henry was killed on the farm while out hunting on Silver Creek. In Mahala’s account his gun discharged as he tested the ice with its butt, and the howling of his dog by the creek led to the discovery of his body. The 1942 typescript dates his death to 9 December 1844 and the 1879 county history gives 1844 as well; a letter from a Lepper relative puts it in the fall of 1840.

Death and burial

The 1850 federal mortality schedule for Clinton County, Iowa, lists John “Walron”, aged 65, a farmer born in New York, who died in April of pleurisy after six days’ illness, in the year ending 31 May 1850. A transcription of the 1849 Iowa state census lists John Walrod at De Witt with five in his household. A Find a Grave memorial and the 1942 typescript give another date, 9 April 1856, for his death on the family farm at Welton, Clinton County, Iowa; the memorial adds that, according to family tradition, he died after being thrown from a horse. The 1879 county history says instead that “John Walrod died in the year 1848”, and he does not appear in the 1850 census of Iowa, although Leah had died in Welton in 1845.

On 6 May 1850 the probate court at De Witt granted letters of administration on the estate of John Walrod, who had died intestate, to Jacob Lepper, the husband of his daughter Lucia; the estate was most likely his, and the grant came some weeks after his death.

Mahala’s account has him buried on the same knoll beside Leah and Henry, and the memorial, quoting the 1942 typescript, adds that the farm passed out of the family and the fence around the plot was removed. The typescript records that by 1942 the graves had been ploughed over and “all marks” were “obliterated”. The site was then known as the Donnegan farm on the DeWitt–Welton road.

Notes

Name

The Iowa branch of the family adopted the spelling Walrod, while most of the relatives who stayed in New York kept Walrath.

Year of death

The 1850 federal mortality schedule for Clinton County, Iowa, dates the death to April 1850. Its year ran from 1 June 1849 to 31 May 1850, and the entry gives the cause as pleurisy after six days’ illness. It gives his age as 65, where the birth date of 11 September 1783 would make him 66 that April, and marks him married, although Leah had died in 1845. The April date agrees with the administration of 6 May 1850 and with a transcription of the 1849 state census, which lists John Walrod at De Witt with five in his household. At the Clinton County probate court in De Witt on 6 May 1850, Jacob Lepper said “that John Walrod died intestate as he believes” and that there was personal property at risk; he was granted letters of administration, the inventory was filed at the same term, and on 3 June 1850 the court ordered the personal property sold at auction. The entry names no heirs and no residence. That this John Walrod was Johannes rests on Lepper being his son-in-law and on his absence from the 1850 census. The 1879 county history gives 1848, and the Find a Grave memorial and the 1942 typescript give 9 April 1856. A federal bounty-land warrant under the Act of 3 March 1855 was issued in favor of John Walrod, private in Captain Redman’s company, and was assigned by Abram Walrod as administrator of his estate. The records do not explain how a warrant under that act came to be issued in his name.