Capt. Andrew Sharp and Ann Woods
Husband Capt. Andrew Sharp 1 2 3 4
Born: 1750 or 1752 - Cumberland Co, PA 5 Christened: Died: 8 Jul 1794 - Pittsburgh, Allegheny Co, PA 2 Buried: - First Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, Allegheny Co, PA
Father: Thomas Sharp ( - ) 3 4 6 7 Mother: Margaret Elder ( - ) 3 4 6 7
Marriage: Apr 1783 - Hopewell Twp, Cumberland Co, PA
Wife Ann Woods 1
Born: 1757 - Pennsylvania Christened: Died: May 1809 - Armstrong Twp, Indiana Co, PA Buried: - Elderton, Plum Creek Twp, Armstrong Co, PA
Children
1 F Hannah Sharp 1 5 8
Born: 14 Feb 1784 - Cumberland Co, PA Christened: Died: 6 Oct 1869 - Venango Twp, Butler Co, PA Buried: - East Unity Presbyterian Cemetery, Allegheny Twp, Butler Co, PA 9Spouse: Robert Leason (Abt 1779-1863) 1 5 8 10 Marr: 1802
2 F Agnes Nancy Sharp 11 12 13
Born: 21 Feb 1785 - Indiana Co, PA 1 12 13 Christened: Died: 2 Aug 1862 - Indiana Co, PA 1 12 13 Buried: - Crooked Creek CemeterySpouse: David Ralston ( -1809) 11 14 Marr: 1803Spouse: James Mitchell (1777-1845/1847) 1 13 15 Marr: 1810
3 F Mary Sharp 1
Born: 1787 - Indiana Co, PA 1 Christened: Died: while young Buried:Spouse: Did Not Marry
4 M Thomas Sharp 16
Born: 1788 - Indiana Co, PA 1 Christened: Died: Bef 1880 Buried:Spouse: Isabella McCullough ( -Bef 1880) 16
5 M Joseph Sharp 5 17 18
Born: 1789 - Shelocta, Indiana Co, PA 1 Christened: Died: 1854 - Armstrong Twp, Indiana Co, PA 1 Buried:Spouse: Sarah "Sallie" Ramsey (Abt 1797-1839) 17Spouse: Catherine "Kate" Neal (1813- ) 19
6 F Margaret Sharp 5 16
Born: 1790 - Indiana Co, PA 1 Christened: Died: Mar 1863 - Indiana Co, PA Buried:Spouse: John McCullough (1786-Bef 1880) 5 15 16 Marr: 1810
7 F Ann Sharp 1 5 20 21
Born: Cal 27 Jun 1794 - Pittsburgh, Allegheny Co, PA Christened: Died: 7 Mar 1858 - Winslow Twp, Jefferson Co, PA 22 Buried: - McCreight Cemetery, near Reynoldsville, Jefferson Co, PASpouse: Andrew McCreight (1787-1861) 1 5 15 20 21 23 24 Marr: 1812 - Armstrong Co, PA
General Notes: Husband - Capt. Andrew Sharp
Among the pioneers in the Plum Creek region, Armstrong County, Pennsylvania, was Capt. Andrew Sharp, who had been an officer in the revolutionary service, under Washington. He, with his wife and infant child, emigrated to this region in 1784, and purchased, settled upon and improved the tract of land, consisting of several hundred acres.
Capt. Sharp, after residing about ten years on his farm, revisited his kindred in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, procured a supply of school-books and Bibles for his children, and returned to his home in the wilderness. Determined that his children should have facilities for education which did not exist there, he traded his farm there for one in Kentucky. In the spring of 1794 he removed with his family to Black Lick Creek, where he either built or purchased a flatboat, in which he, his wife and six children, a Mr. Connor, wife and five children, a Mr. Taylor, wife and one child, and Messrs. McCoy and Connor, single men, twenty in all, with their baggage and household effects, embarked on the proposed passage down the Kiskiminetas and Allegheny rivers to Pittsburgh, and thence on to Kentucky. Low water in the Black Lick rendered their descent down it difficult. They glided down the Conemaugh and Kiskiminetas to a point two miles below the falls of the latter, at the mouth of Two Mile run, below the present site of Apollo. Capt. Sharp tied the boat there, and went back for the canoe which had been detached while crossing the falls. When he returned the children were gathering berries and playing on the bank; the women were preparing supper, and the men who led the horses had arrived. It was about an hour and a half before sunset. A man then came along and reported that the Indians were near. The women and children were called into the boat, and the men having charge of the horses tied them on shore. It was then thought best that the party should go to the house of David Hall to spend the night. While the men were tying the horses, seven Indians, concealed behind a large fallen tree, on the other side of which the children had been playing half-an-hour before, fired on the party in the boat. Capt. Sharp's right eyebrow was shot off by the first firing. Taylor is said to have mounted one of his horses and fled to the woods, leaving his wife and child to the care and protection of others. While Capt. Sharp was cutting one end of the boat loose, he received a bullet-wound in his left side, and, while cutting the other end loose, received another wound in his right side. Nevertheless, he succeeded in removing the boat from its fastenings before the Indians could enter it, and, discovering an Indian in the woods, and calling for his gun, which his wife handed to him, shot and killed the Indian. While the boat was in the whirlpool, it whirled around for two and a half hours, when the open side of the boat, that is, the side on which the baggage was not piled up for a breastwork, was toward the land, the Indians fired into it. They followed it twelve miles down the river, and bade those in it to disembark, else they would fire into them again. Mrs. Connor and her eldest son-a young man-wished to land. The latter requested the Indians to come to the boat, informing them that all the men had been shot. Capt. Sharp ordered him to desist, saying that he would shoot him if he did not. Just then young Connor was shot by one of the Indians, and fell dead across Mrs. Sharp's feet. McCoy was killed. All the women and children escaped injury. Mr. Connor was severely wounded. After the Indians ceased following, Capt. Sharp became so much exhausted by his exertions and loss of blood, that his wife was obliged to manage the boat all night. At daylight the next morning they were within nine miles of Pittsburgh. Some men on shore, having been signaled, came to their assistance. One of them preceded the party in a canoe, so that when they reached Pittsburgh, a physician was ready to attend to them. Other preparations had been made for their comfort and hospitable reception by the people of that place.
Capt. Sharp, having suffered severely from his wounds, died forty days after he was wounded, with the roar of cannon, so to speak, reverberating in his ears, which he had heard celebrating the eighteenth anniversary of our national independence, which he, under Washington, had helped achieve. Two of his daughters were the only members of his family that could follow his remains to the grave. He was buried with the honors of war, in the presence of a large concourse of people. His youngest child was then only eleven days old. As soon as his widow had sufficiently recovered, she was conducted by her eldest daughter, Hannah, to his grave.
Mrs. Sharp and her children were removed to their kindred in Cumberland County. Having remained there three years, they returned to the farm near Crooked Creek, of which they had been repossessed, where the family remained together for a long time.
His daughter Hannah stated later that the Indians who had attacked and followed the above-mentioned party on and down the Kiskiminetas River consisted of twelve, who had previously been to Pittsburgh, and, because the people refused to trade with them, became indignant and determined to kill all the whites they could. Speaking of her father's family after their return to the farm on Crooked Creek, says, "Providence was very kind to them." [HAC 1883, 28]
His brother Robert came to America first, and afterward went back to Ireland and brought over the rest of the family. They first settled in the forks of the Delaware river, in the eastern part of Pennsylvania, but later nearly all of them moved into the Cumberland Valley. Andrew settled in that part of the state now in Indiana County, and was killed in what was probably the last Indian fight that took place in Pennsylvania. Early in the summer of 1794, he and three of his neighbors and their wives started down the Kishkiminitas in a flat boat on their way to Kentucky. Just before reaching the Allegheny river they landed for the night. While the men were preparing to camp they were surprised by a band of Indians. Two of the party darted into the woods, but Sharp and the other man ran to the protection of their families on the boat. While they were pushing the boat into the stream the Indians opened fire upon them, severely wounding Sharp and killing his comrade. There being four rifles in the boat Sharp kept up a running fight with the Indians while his strength held out, the women loading the guns while he fired them. The next day what remained of the party reached Fort Pitt, where they received all necessary attentions. Andrew Sharp had been shot in three different places, but notwithstanding the serious character of the wounds had prospects of recovering, but the heavy concussions of guns, fired in celebration of the 4th of July, started hemorrhages from which he died. He was buried in the cemetery of the First Presbyterian Church of Pittsburgh, with the honors of war, he having been a soldier in the Revolution. Many of his descendants resided in western Pennsylvania and the West, and one, Capt. Alexander McCracken, was commander of the United States cruiser "Des Moines."
1 —, History of Indiana County, Pennsylvania (Newark, OH: J. A. Caldwell, 1880), Pg 428.
2 Robert Walter Smith, Esq., History of Armstrong County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: Waterman, Watkins, & Co., 1883), Pg 28.
3 —, Biographical Annals of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: The Genealogical Publishing Co., 1905), Pg 17.
4 —, Biographical Annals of Franklin County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: The Genealogical Publishing Co., 1905), Pg 64.
5 —, Biographical Annals of Franklin County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: The Genealogical Publishing Co., 1905), Pg 65.
6 —, History of Cumberland County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: Warners, Beers & Co., 1886), Pg 394.
7 John W. Jordan, LL.D., Genealogical and Personal History of the Allegheny Valley, Pennsylvania (New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1913), Pg 201.
8 —, Jefferson County, Pennsylvania, Her Pioneers and People, Vol. II (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Company, 1917), Pg 328.
9 Venango County Historical Society, Venango County Pennsylvania Cemetery Records and Early Church Histories, Vol. 3, Scrubgrass Township (Franklin, PA: Venango County Historical Society, 1995), Pg 88.
10 —, Armstrong County, Pennsylvania, Her People Past and Present (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Co., 1914), Pg 581.
11 —, History of Indiana County, Pennsylvania (Newark, OH: J. A. Caldwell, 1880), Pg 428, 516.
12 Robert Walter Smith, Esq., History of Armstrong County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: Waterman, Watkins, & Co., 1883), Pg 29.
13 J. T. Stewart, Indiana County, Pennsylvania - Her People Past and Present (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Co., 1913), Pg 653.
14 Robert Walter Smith, Esq., History of Armstrong County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: Waterman, Watkins, & Co., 1883), Pg 203, 591.
15 Robert Walter Smith, Esq., History of Armstrong County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: Waterman, Watkins, & Co., 1883), Pg 203.
16 —, History of Indiana County, Pennsylvania (Newark, OH: J. A. Caldwell, 1880), Pg 428, 511.
17 —, History of Indiana County, Pennsylvania (Newark, OH: J. A. Caldwell, 1880), Pg 428, 468.
18 J. T. Stewart, Indiana County, Pennsylvania - Her People Past and Present (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Co., 1913), Pg 850.
19 J. T. Stewart, Indiana County, Pennsylvania - Her People Past and Present (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Co., 1913), Pg 850, 1546.
20 —, Commemorative Biographical Record of Central Pennsylvania, Including the Counties of Centre, Clearfield, Jefferson and Clarion. (Chicago: J. H. Beers & Co., 1898), Pg 1096.
21 —, Jefferson County, Pennsylvania, Her Pioneers and People, Vol. II (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Company, 1917), Pg 44, 495.
22 —, Jefferson County, Pennsylvania, Her Pioneers and People, Vol. II (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Company, 1917), Pg 495.
23 —, Armstrong County, Pennsylvania, Her People Past and Present (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Co., 1914), Pg 462.
24
—, Commemorative Biographical Record of Washington County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, IL: J. H. Beers & Co., 1893), Pg 475.
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