My Genealogy Hound

CHARLES S. MANN, of Maple Glen, in Horsham township, Montgomery county, Pennsylvania, is a descendant of colonial ancestry, his forefathers having been identified with the early settlement of the country and with the establishment of the present form of government. He was born at the old homestead on which he resides, being of the fifth generation who have occupied the place. He was born January 26, 1863. Mr. Mann was reared to farm pursuits, receiving liberal education in the public schools of the vicinity, at the Friends’ Central School in Philadelphia, and at the State Normal School at West Chester, Pennsylvania. The Mann family, according to the records which have been preserved, were originally a Norse or Teutonic seafaring people of the Black Isle, locked in by the waters of Cromarty and Moray, firths along the bleak and tempestuous northeastern coast of Scotland. From this unpromising habitation which they occupied for uncounted generations, branches of the race were transplanted to other sections of Scotland and to Ireland.

James Mann and Mary, his wife, were born in Scotland, and in childhood emigrated with their parents to the north of Ireland. This was about 1690. Both families settled in county Antrim. James Mann married Mary Carroll about 1709. Their children were: James, Jr., born in 1710, died in 1748; John, born in 1712; William, 1714; and a daughter Mary, the date of whose death is unknown. John, the second son, became the progenitor of the family in America. He was the only member of the Mann family who left Ulster, which had become the abiding place of the Manns. His mother died in 1730, and his father in 1736. John, at the age of twenty years, in 1732, embarked at Donegal for America in company with the McNairs and other Scotch-Irish emigrants bound for this country. They landed at Philadelphia and proceeded to Bristol in the autumn of the same year, locating at different points in Bucks county among Scotch-Irish emigrants, chiefly at Makefield and the Neshaminy settlements. John Mann purchased a farm in Warwick township, and later bought another tract of land in Philadelphia county, now Horsham township, Montgomery county. In 1736 he married Margaret Mitchell, born in Ireland in 1707. Their children: William, born in 1738; Mary, 1740; John, 1742; James, 1747; Ann, 1750; Samuel M., 1755.

In 1748 John Mann, Sr., purchased a tract of 164 acres of land in Horsham township, Montgomery county, Pennsylvania, to which he removed with his family. Their first house was a log cabin, but in 1754 he erected a two and a half story stone house, the dimensions being twenty by thirty feet, which now forms a part of the Mann residence and is in a good state of preservation. The timber used in the structural part of the building was solid oak, and the partition boards of broad poplar boards. Thus John Mann established the Horsham homestead. He died June 17, 1779, aged sixty-seven years. His wife died in 1777 at the age of sixty-two years. Both were interred at the old Neshaminy cemetery.

Samuel M. Mann, the youngest son, married Margaret Keith, of Upper Makefield township, Bucks county, Pennsylvania, May 13, 1777. She was the daughter of William and Margaret (Stockton) Keith. Both the Stockton and Keith families were distinguished by their earnest and unswerving support of the cause of Independence during the Revolutionary war. At the residence of William Keith, General Washington established his headquarters when his army was encamped in the shelter of Jericho Hills in the darkest period of the Revolutionary struggle, and there was planned the attack on the Hessians at Trenton which became the turning point of the great contest for liberty. From that vicinity the American army set out on that stormy Christmas night, after a scanty supper of beef toasted on the coals on the points of their bayonets, and battled with the drifting ice as they rowed across the Delaware river and came upon the enemy in the midst of their Christmas festivities.

After his father’s death, Samuel M. Mann came into possession of the homestead, and his older brother, John, Jr., bought the Upper Dublin tract of 150 acres of his father’s estate. Samuel and John Mann, as well as their brother-in-law, Samuel McNair, were in the Fourth Battalion of Philadelphia county militia in the Revolution. John was a captain, and raised a company in Upper Dublin. Samuel Mann and Samuel McNair were in Captain David Marple’s Horsham company, in which also Captain John Simpson, maternal grandfather of General Ulysses S. Grant, the hero of the rebellion, had also enlisted.

Samuel and Margaret Mann were the parents of twelve children: Isaac, born in 1778; Martha, 1779; Samuel M., 1781; Margaret, 1783; Mary, 1785, died in infancy; Mary 2d, born in 1786; Elizabeth, 1788; Josiah, 1789; Anna, 1791; James A., 1792, died young; Sarah L., 1793; Hannah R., 1798. Of these twelve children, ten lived to ages ranging from fifty-five to eighty-five years, and all married with a single exception. Samuel Mann was for many years a justice of the peace in Horsham township. Both himself and his wife were the greater part of their lives active members of Neshaminy Presbyterian church. Samuel M. Mann died in 1826, at the age of seventy-one years, and his wife, Margaret Mann, died in 1830, at the age of seventy-three years.

In the settlement of Samuel Mann’s estate the old home and ninety-one acres of land passed to the oldest son Isaac, and the remainder, about eighty acres, fronting on the Welsh road, was taken by the youngest son, Josiah, a dwelling and outbuildings being erected thereon after Josiah was married in 1811 to Susan Yerkes, of Abington. Two of Samuel M. Mann’s children, Margaret, who married her cousin, Samuel McNair in 1805, and Samuel M., Jr., who married Susan Burrows, in 1806, emigrated to the frontier settlements of western New York, where they became prosperous farmers of the Genesee Valley.

Charles S. Mann is the son of John and Hannah (Shoemaker) Mann. John, his father, to recapitulate what has already been given, was the son of Isaac and Hannah (Huston) Mann; Isaac was the son of Samuel M. and Margaret (Keith) Mann; Samuel was the son of John and Margaret (Mitchell) Mann. All of the abovementioned resided on the homestead where Charles S. Mann and his children now reside, forming the fifth and sixth generations of the same family who have lived thereon. Isaac Mann, grandfather of the subject of this sketch, died on it in 1852. He was a soldier in the war of 1812, being quarter-master of militia from 1801 to 1814. He actually belonged to the militia from 1801 to 1821, was elected major in 1811, and served in that position until 1814. He served in the war of 1812 in the same regiment with the grandfather of General Winfield Scott Hancock and with John Simpson, the maternal grandfather of General Grant. Isaac was a prominent and influential citizen, filling many township offices, and also positions in the Presbyterian churches of Hartsville and Neshaminy. He was a trustee of the Hartsville church until his death. He was active in local politics, being a Democrat. The children of Isaac Mann: John (father); Isaac Keith, born March 12, 1834; James A,, born November 7, 1836. James A. has resided in the far west since 1856, and Isaac and James served in the rebellion.

John Mann (father) was born May 7, 1832, and succeeded to the homestead, where he reared his family and died January 9, 1903, at the age of seventy years. He gave his attention very largely to his farm, and was a practical and successful agriculturist, widely known and highly respected like his forefathers, and enjoying the respect of the community in which he lived. He married Hannah Shoemaker, born May 3, 1839, daughter of Enoch and Rachel (Mitchell) Shoemaker, of Springfield township, Montgomery county. Mrs. Mann belonged to a colonial family, the ancestor of which came from Germany and settled at Germantown in the time of William Penn. The family have been mostly tillers of the soil, and were prosperous and God-fearing people, being members of the Society of Friends. The children of Enoch and Rachel Shoemaker were: Charles, a prominent farmer; Hannah (mother); Sarah J., unmarried. The children of John and Anna Mann: Charles S., subject of this sketch; William H., born July 16, 1864; Albert, born April 6, 1866; Rachel J., who died in infancy, and Enoch, who died young; Sarah L. died in 1886, at the age of fifteen years; James W. died at the age of ten years; Anna Cornelia, unmarried.

Charles S. Mann remained under the parental roof, assisting in farm duties and attending school, and after leaving his studies taught school for a few years, spending about ten years away from the homestead. On December 25, 1888, he married, and then rented a farm on which he continued six years, and then returned to the home farm, where he still resides. He is much interested in agriculture, and is a practical and successful farmer. Politically he is an earnest Republican, but has never sought or held office. He has been a delegate to county conventions, and a member of the township election board, and of the State Forestry Association. He enjoys the respect and confidence of the community. In religious faith he and his family are members of the Lutheran church, and he is a trustee and a member of the church council.

Mr. Mann married Miss Anna J. Houpt, of Jarrettown, in Horsham township. She was born December 6, 1863, a daughter of Charles and Mary (Stout) Houpt. Charles Houpt was a successful farmer, and a member of the Lutheran church. He was also a trustee and church worker. He and his first wife are deceased. His widow, his second wife, resides at Norristown. Mrs. Mann was the only child of her parents. The children of Charles S. and Anna Mann: Elsie S., born July 1, 1894; Charles A., born September 21, 1896; Edna D., born January 18, 1899. Mrs. Mann died December 29, 1902.

Mr. Mann is a person of historical tastes, and is highly intelligent and cultured. He is a member of the Montgomery County Historical Society, and has occasionally read papers at its meetings.