♂John Kunz

John Kunz (23 September 1786 – 11 December 1865) was a Pennsylvania German of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, who married Cattarina Gingerich at Salem Lutheran Church^W in Lebanon in 1811 and raised a large family there. He was the great-great-grandfather of Ora Emogene Walrath (1925–2014) by two separate lines of descent, through his sons Samuel Kunz (1825–1904) and Jacob John Kunz (1814–1866); his will of 1864 names Jacob among the sons it appoints executors.

Early life

Compiled family records, with the 1916 family letter for the dates, give John Kunz’s birth on 23 September 1786 in Lebanon Township, then part of Dauphin County; Lebanon County was formed from parts of Dauphin and Lancaster counties in 1813. He was a son of Lorentz Kuntz (1752–1838), whose will of 1838 names him first among ten children and makes him an executor with his brother Lawrance. Compiled family trees give his mother as Anna Maria Gingerich (1767–1846); the will calls Lorentz’s wife only “my loving wife Mary”, without naming her as John’s mother, and her Gingerich surname is not documented. The family name appears in the records as Kuntz, Kunz, Kuns and later Koons. Two boys named Lorenz and Jacob, sons of Lorenz Kunz and his wife Ana Maria, were born in 1801 and 1805 and baptized together at Christ Lutheran Church, Stouchsburg, on 10 October 1815, when they were fourteen and ten; they are taken to be his younger brothers, on the strength of the parents’ names, the dates and the nearness of Stouchsburg to the family’s home, though the entries do not name their grandparents.

Marriage and family

On 5 February 1811 John Kunz married Cattarina Gingerich at Salem Lutheran Church in Lebanon. The parish register, which writes the names “Johannes Kunz” and “Catarina Gingrich”, records the marriage with two witnesses, Henry Kunz and Johannes Gingrich.

Pennsylvania christening entries name John and Cattarina as the parents of seven children, among them Samuel, christened at Jonestown in 1825. A family letter written on 22 December 1916 by a descendant, David Koons, says the couple had nine children, five sons and four daughters, and names all nine with the people they married; the seven christened children are all on its list. Its eighth name is Jacob, called “J. Jacob” and married to Magdalena Holdeman, and its ninth a daughter, Catherine, who married Samuel Lightner. John’s own will, made on 29 July 1864 and signed “Johannes Kuntz”, appoints “three of my sons namely Jacob, John, and Lorentz, to be my executors”, which settles Jacob’s place in the family. All of the nine except Catherine appear in the family record.

Jacob stayed in Lebanon County, farming near Jonestown, while Samuel moved west to Henry County, Indiana, in the later 1850s. In 1876 Samuel’s son Thomas married Jacob’s daughter Magdalena M. Koons in Indiana; the two were first cousins, both grandchildren of John and Cattarina.

Death

Cattarina died on 7 December 1861. Compiled family records give John Kunz’s death four years later, on 11 December 1865, at East Hanover, Lebanon County, aged 79. The 1916 letter says that he and his wife were both buried at Zion Church “above Harpers”, in Lebanon County.

Lines of descent

The lines meet again when Thomas Koons married Magdalena M. Koons on 24 December 1876 in Henry County, Indiana, first cousins and both descendants of John Kunz. Their daughter Mary Magdalene Koons (1885–1977) was Ora Emogene Walrath’s mother.

Notes

The 1916 letter gives John’s birth and death to the day, the dates used here, but reckons his age at death as 79 years, 2 months and 11 days, seven days short of the 79 years, 2 months and 18 days that the two dates give. It is still a family compilation rather than a register. It gives his wife’s birth as 19 March 1792, where other sources give 1793. Of his father’s wife it says only “Of his wife we know nothing”, so his mother’s name does not come from the family’s own tradition.

The will is recorded in Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, Register of Wills, Wills Vol. C-D, pp. 304-305. It is the will of John Koons of East Hanover Township, dated 29 July 1864, signed “Johannes Kuntz” and recorded on 17 October 1865, which is earlier than the 11 December 1865 death date given by the 1916 letter and the compiled records.