My Genealogy Hound

HON. ISAAC E. KOONTZ (deceased). The subject of this sketch was a native of Ohio. His ancestors were from Switzerland, and immigrated to America three generations back, settling in Pennsylvania in the vicinity of Lancaster, where many of their descendants still reside. His maternal grandfather, Emanuel Carpenter, moved from Pennsylvania to Ohio as early as the year 1800, and settled in the town of Lancaster, in the present county of Fairfield. He was one of the earliest settlers of that part of the state, and made his home there when the country was only inhabited by wild beasts and Indians. He became a leading citizen of Ohio, and was several terms a member of the legislature, and helped frame the constitution of the state on its admission to the Union. His father, Isaac Koontz, was eighteen years old when he left Pennsylvania for Ohio. He was married to Sarah Carpenter, and was a farmer in Fairfield county, and raised eight children, of whom the fifth is the subject of this sketch, born Dec. 6, 1821. The judge was reared in Fairfield county, having his home in what is now the city of Lancaster. He was given a good common school education, and having mastered civil engineering at the age of eighteen, assisted in laying out the Hocking Valley Canal. At the age of twenty he married Miss Priscilla Pease, a native of Lancaster, Ohio, a daughter of Andrew and Maria Pease. Her father was a native of Virginia, of an old Virginia family. Her mother’s family name was Carpenter, distantly related to the maternal ancestors of her late husband. After his marriage he engaged at farming. On the breaking out of the war he accepted a position as assistant in the internal revenue department, and was thus occupied until the war was over, and President Lincoln assassinated, when he resigned. In 1867 he sold off over 200 acres in Ohio, and removed to southwest Missouri, and purchased a fine farm five and a half miles northeast of Carthage, where his family still resides. In the fall of 1868 he was chosen one of the justices of the county court on the Republican ticket. While a member of this body he identified himself with various movements for the improvement and progress of the county. He was originally an old-line Whig, but became a Republican at the organization of that party. He acted with that party and did what he could toward sustaining the administration in its efforts to crush the Rebellion. He was an earnest advocate of the Greenback party during the last years of his life. He died at his home in Jasper county, Jan. 23, 1879. During life Judge Koontz was a remarkable man, possessed of many peculiar ideas; was such a man as is met with but seldom in this vale of tears; his nature was to love humanity; his heart ever went out to the poor, lowly, and suffering, and was generous and charitable even to his own disadvantage. He looked upon this life as something to be enjoyed, and loved sociability, and was famous for his joviality. Friendship to him was not a poet’s song, but a living principle. He was a man of fine intellectual capacities, an entertaining speaker, and splendid conversationalist. In him there was no such thing as deception; his words were fair and frank. He was strong and faithful in his conjugal attachments, and idolized his life’s companion, as well he might. He left a family of five sons and one daughter. Their names are Samuel P., George W., Albert E., Isaac E., John Van M., and Fanny, wife of Joshua Shaffer. Albert E. and John Van M. are single and live with their mother on the farm, which consists of 390 acres. Mrs. Koontz is a lady of remarkable intelligence and business sagacity, and manages the fine property left in her charge with judgment and ability.