Claude Eddleman Farm (1938-1958)

Our Ancestors

My earliest proven ancestor is Catherine Eddleman who was granted land in Kentucky for settling on it in 1778. The legal requirement for "settling" was the successful production of a crop of corn. We have not found any document showing the name of Catherine's husband. Those were trying times. Many people in that community were killed or carried away by the Indians led by the British out of Detroit. About February 1778?, the British developed a war plan to bring the land west of the Appalachian mountians under British control even if the Colonists won the war and established a nation east of the mountains. The British found plenty of Indians in present day Ohio who were desperate to stem the flow of Colonists over the mountains into their lands. The most important part of the British plan was to eliminate the white settlements and stations in Kentucky and western Pennsylvania. Catherine Eddleman and her familly were in the wrong place according to British policy of 1778.

Our family has no family records or traditions about the 33 years in Kentucky and very little about the first 30 years after they came to Indiana in 1811. Claude Eddleman, my father, said, "The family history was written in a geography book which was lost coming over the mountains." As a youngster, I supposed they came down the Ohio River, but I guess I mainly pictured the book falling out of the wagon as they passed through the Cumberland Gap. I guess I pictured them coming through Kentucky in a few weeks to arrive in Indiana in the early 1800s. However, I think my father may have said something about the Indians tearing up the family in Kentucky. If so, as a teenager, I probably pictured that as a wild west skirmish of a wagon train with a roving band of Indians. If the family had any written records it would have been difficult to save them in the looting and burning of the houses and forts just east of Lexington, Kentucky, by the British and Indians.

While I was in the US Army in Germany during 1957, I wrote Dad asking for a restatement of our family history and I then photographed some Edelmann names in church records of the time I judged to be about the time my ancestors came to America. Upon my return home, I realized I had misread his letter and was looking one or two generation too late. My lack of progress on Eddleman Geneology during my post college years was mainly due to my dedication to my schooling and jobs which were in Northern Indiana and western States. I also did not know that many books on German immigrants had been published before World War II.

In February 1978, I began my unsuccessful campaign for the Indiana Legislature. That campaign took me into courthouses serving locations where Eddlemans had lived. While checking country voter records, I took a little time to check county records for Eddleman, and I was startled to find many Eddleman records. I had supposed fires and floods had destroyed all the early records but many land and estate records were intact. That was the beginning of my successful work on my family history.

Earlier, while I was in the army in Germany, I had received a letter from Louise Eddleman of Springfield, Kentucky, asking what I knew of my family history. My biggest break came about 1978 or '79 when Louise Eddleman sent me a copy of the deed wherein Catherine Burgher and her sons John Eddleman, Daniel Eddleman, and husband, John Burger sold the 1778 farm as they prepared to move to Indiana. Then I found the records where all had purchased land in Indiana, in 1811, at the Jeffersonville Land Office (US Government). About 1980, I found an 1859 map of Floyd County showing the location of four Eddleman family farms. A more detailed discussion of my ancestors in given on this web site. Thus, it appears that Catherine Eddleman's husband died in Kentucky before 1780 and she remarried to John Burger (sometimes spelled Burgher). According to a Decataur County, Indiana, history, Daniel Eddleman was carried away from a fort east of Lexington, Kentucky about 1778 by Indians and lived among them many years near Lafayette, Indiana.

My Eddleman Geneology web site gives the details of a potential lineage. A Hanss David Edelmann, citizen of Rott, Alsace, left there in 1733 and arrived 1733 Sep 28 in Philadelphia on the ship Richard and ann with his family, including his married son Filb (Philip). While the records are not proven to be my lineage, a Philip Edelmann had a son David, and a David Edelman with his wife Catherine and childern lived on Abbott Creek south of present-day Salem, North Carolina, and this Edelman left for the Holston River area with his family during the summer of 1777? according to church records. Some key dates in this possible lineage are Rott (1733), Philadelphis (1733), Maryland (1750s - 1763), North Carolina (1765-1777), Kentucky homestead (1778), Indiana (1811).

I now return to 1811 to cover my immediate ancestors in Indiana. John Eddleman, son of Catherine, settled on Little Indian Creek, in present-day Floyd County, where it was crossed by the Buffalo Trace. Buffalo Trace was the buffalo trail from the salt licks near the Eddleman 1778 Kentucky farm to the Falls of the Ohio and on to Vincennes. It was the first road in Indiana. John Eddleman built a sawmill there and later a grist mill. There is a small Eddleman Cemetary on his old farm. On Census records, John said he was born in North Carolina and he was married in Kentucky but time, place and bride's maiden name was not given. In Census records, she said she was born in Virgina.

James Eddleman, son of John Eddleman, was born 1813 May 26 on the Eddleman Mill farm. He married Mary Ann Windell 1838 Nov 11 and inherited Eddleman Mill after his father's death about 1840. Jim sold the mill a few months later to Cook and it became known as Cook's mill. James spent his life as a farmer one mile northwest of Milltown. Two of his sons Francis and Adam served in the Civil War. The captain tried very hard to get Jim's only other son, a young lad, to enlist as fifer, but his mother said two sons for the Union were enough! Both boys survived the Civil War but a cousin in the same regiment, son of Noah Eddleman of Georgetown, died in enemy hands of wounds at Chickamunga.

Francis Marion Eddleman, son of James Eddleman, above, was my grandfather. After the civil war, he purchased a farm in a large bend of Blue River just north of Milltown. The land sloped fairly steeply to the river. It is a delightful location known on geology maps as Eddleman Bend , but it has never been a sucessful farm due to the poor soil and slope. It has always been mostly in oak and hickory forest. On geology maps, it is known as Eddleman Bend. Prior to the Civil War, Francis was known as a successful horse trader. During the war, his regiment served an exceptionally long period and in a huge number of battles with only a couple weeks of rudimentary training before the first battle in Kentucky at Bardstown. My father said Francis Marion suffered brain fever in the war and he apparently never recovered from "shell shock". I have never heard of anything outstanding about Francis except his military service. While he had 11 childern, most died at a young age and it appears he lived his live as a subdued man mostly supported by the efforts of his childern to wrestle subsistence from the poor soil of that farm. Marion's sons were mechanically inclined like their great grandfather and were greatly respected by their townsmen.

My father was the10th child of 11 in the above family and due to the death of his wife, he was left on the family farm to care for his parents. They traded the farm for a house in Milltown. My father's story is told on the next page.

Some additional notes:

There are livstock and tax records of a David Eddleman in North Carolina on Abbott Creek about 1765-76 and there are several church records of David and Catherine Eddleman in that area. Two church records record for the same week that Mister Eddleman arrived from Holston River to take his family thither. A David Ederman was listed in Martin's milita near Catherine's land grant; perhaps that was David Eddleman. In early Kentucky a strong cabin refuge was called a "Station". One of the better known near Catherine's land grant was Bryan's Station.