The history of Huntingdon County's 'William Templeton' line of the Templeton family in Pennsylvania is hard to write. There's not a lot to go on about our 'First Settler.'

It seems that our first William was typical of his generation and of his origin: he was a man of strong religious conviction and was self-assured in prospecting for a better life for himself and his progeny, out in the wilderness.

He showed up to defend his community from Indian raids – either British-incited, or just the simmering outrage among the indigenous people that carried over from the French & Indian War; depredations that the heathen men among 'em carried out against European women and children, then, in Central Pennsylvania, 'round the Juniata Valley and parts beyond – through the Revolution; but our William didn't press himself upon his neighbors, much.

William Templeton, our First, was self-reliant, and therefore did not demand much 'public space' in his County Leader's records.

He associated with others of similar mind, and instilled a love for both education and of hewing a new territory for others that would follow, teaching his child, William, how to both secure an income [William 'D.' Templeton carried mail for a still nascent Federal Government, about the time George Washington came to calm the 'Whiskey Rebellion.'] and, to reach for the promise of exploration and settlement upon the frontier, out the Northwest Territories in 'Ohio'.

Both William, 'the First,' and his son, William, prospected promising farm land in the wilderness north of the Ohio River, up around the salt lick in the Connecticut Preserve, in the interregnum between the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812

To our regret, William, our first, was unassuming in seeing to it that the factotums of History [the frontier County recorders of property, wills and such] noted his passing. William I left little trace in the historical record and on the ground that we latter-day trackers can seize upon to rush up and surprise his camp because he settled many miles, and a few years in advance of the more 'Pubic' types whose wealth depended upon careful survey and recording of property and notation of 'service to the community', that followed along, later.

William left only a sparse record by his executing his Civic Duty as a Ranger in Pennsylvania's frontier militia, through the months that his wife was great with child, in 1776, and then again, a couple of years later, in another County muster.

In life, he defended his community and guided those that followed into the wilds of new territories, toward the American West.

Our first William Templeton was a North American pioneer, and Allie Monteith accompanied him.

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Templeton came to America, most likely from Glasgow, probably as an economic refugee finding passage on one of the many ships that traded emigrants TO America from the disaffected "dissenter" religionists that objected to prayer books imposed upon the Presbyterian Calvinists of Scotland, those active religionists and readers of scripture that resided in Ayr, along with the impoverished farmers and weavers of his "Billy-Boy" brethren in Ulster, that found themselves in similar circumstance.

Our "William" probably arrived on these shores between 1750 and 1775.

{Since we don't know when or where our 'brick wall' William Templeton was born, nor to whom, we are surmising that he was part of the bulge of Scots and Ulster Scot immigrants that arrived in this country closest to his first documented appearance in Huntingdon/Bedford County, in 1776.}

The period between 1754 and 1775 occasioned pretty severe economic hardship for lowland Scots harvesting wool, and also for their Ulster brethren. Many left for America, "for bread and freedom," in the words of one William Templeton, arriving in New York with his wife, Margaret, in 1775.[]

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What we know as central Pennsylvania now, was the far reaches of the frontier of civilization in pre-Revolution America. The "Scotch-Irish", Scottish, German, and few English colonials that settled these backwoods were hearty and self-reliant pioneers. The forest provided for the men and women that felled trees and cleared fields for planting while cutting and preparing flax for weaving, stretched and tanned hides for clothing and trade, cooked soap and put themselves about the myriad daily tasks that took priority over improving the basic log shack thrown up for shelter upon coming upon a likely spot for settling, found in a wholy new clearing, out in the rills and mountains ofan entirely new notion of "citizenship."

They became founders of a Nation.

Neighbors visited rarely — a basic trade economy in home-woven cloth, tanned hides, and any other handmade product or particular skilled craft was exchanged among neighbors at Sunday meeting days, towards town. In a place where a household may not see another person for days or weeks on end, raids by bands of Delaware, Ottawa or Conestoga Indians were an ever-present threat. When there was a band of warriors in the neighborhood, the news flew from isolated homestead to neighboring farms by an older son riding bareback or running moccasin through the woods.

Samuel Stewart settled in Dauphin County over the mountains near Philadelphia, well east toward "civilization" of William Templeton's Juniata River/Huntingdon County homestead. Stewart's township was almost exclusively settled by Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, and was on the wild frontier, according to contemporaries, and was contiguous to the Kittatinny mountains. His farm was well near Civilization, seen from William Templeton's place:

The French and Indian War of the 1750s seasoned those on the frontier to the uncertainties of woodlands fighting. Major actions were fought at Fort Duquesne, which became Fort Pitt (now Pittsburgh) once it fell firmly into British hands in 1763. With that event, there was an influx of settlers to the West. The land swindles and high prices for trade goods that came along with the settlers made the Native Americans angry, with open warfare breaking out in 1763.2

One '70s backwoodsman, Felix Hughes, erected a blockhouse as protection against the Indians and "animals of the forest". It was a building of only one story and a half, about 12 feet by 18 feet, made of roughhewn logs and crudely fashioned boards. To judge the primitiveness of most settler's homes of the period, this edifice was looked upon as "an elegant house!"3 by his neighbors.

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The American Revolution came to the Juniata River Valley with the news of the action at Lexington and Concord in 1775. Militia "Committees of Association" had been set up at the behest of Benjamin Franklin in answer to Indian depredations on the frontier years earlier. Now, the colonies started organizing for war in earnest.

Massachusetts was the flash point, and also the best organized at the outbreak of hostilities. Virginia's young Patrician elite was quick to respond to the call. The 1st Virginia Regiment under Patrick Henry sent recruiters to many town greens and church meeting places. The 1st contained 2 rifle companies and 6 musket companies; the 2d Virginia Regiment under William Woodford also had 2 rifle companies but only 5 musket companies. The rifle companies -- intended as light infantry -- came from the frontier districts including the Cumberland Valley; the musketmen, from more settled communities.

The riflemen recruited in the Cumberland Valley for Virginia's 1st and 2nd Regiments of the Continental Line made an impression when they arrived as relief to George Washington's army outside Boston after the Battle of Bunker Hill. One contemporary observer wrote, "They are remarkable for the accuracy of their aim, striking a mark with great certainty at 200 yards distance. At a review a company of them while on a quick advance fired their bullets into objects of seven inches in diameter and at a distance of 250 yards. They are stationed in our outlines and their shots have frequently proved fatal to British officers and soldiers who exposed themselves to view, even at more than double the distance of a common musket shot."4 These marksmen were recruited largely from the valleys of central Pennsylvania, and their backwoods-machined rifles became known as "Kentucky Long Rifles" by a quirk of history.5

Washington came to value his frontier riflemen, forming a corps in June, 1777, selected for their marksmanship and woodcraft, to be used as light infantry and skirmishers.6

The compromise which created Virginia's first two Continental Line regiments also included the raising of five independent companies to garrison strategic frontier posts. These were under the overall command of Capt. John Neville, who established his headquarters at Fort Pitt.

Four of his companies were rather large for the Continental Line: they were under a captain, 3 lieutenants, an ensign, 4 sergeants, 2 drummers, 2 fifers, and 100 rank and file. The Fifth had only a single lieutenant and 25 enlisted men. Two of the large companies manned Fort Pitt while the small one garrisoned Fort Fincastle at the mouth of the Wheeling River. These three companies were recruited in the West Augusta District, a partially organized region on the northwest frontier7 that extended north through central Pennsylvania's Cumberland Valley.8

(For a first-person account of Revolutionary War service in Pennsylvania, this with the 4th Virginia Regiment, Continental Line,, read the recollections of Pierce Dant Hamblen.11)

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William Templeton had become a father probably early in 1776 with the birth of his son, William Junior, but he went ahead and joined Captain Thomas Paxton's company of Bedford County Rangers, serving active duty from September 18 through November 13, 1776.9 The State of Ohio, in conjunction with the Daughters of the American Revolution of Ohio also say he served as a Ranger with the Berks County Militia. The Pennsylvania Archives record William Templeton on "Inactive Duty" for three, sixty-day enlistments in the Cumberland County Militia from late 1777 through the end of March, 1778. William Templeton signed the Oath of Allegiance in Bedford County (parent county of Huntingdon County) in 1778.10

We do not have documented accounts of Bedford County Ranger actions nor those of the Berks County or Cumberland County Militias, but we do know that the "Abstract of Graves of Revolutionary Patriots" tells us that William Templeton Sr is buried in a cemetery at Cornersburg, Canfield Township, Mahoning County, Ohio. And, with the acknowledgment by the Daughters of the American Revolution, that our grandfather aligned himself with the aspirations to the rights of an independent America in those trying times.

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NOTES:

(1) - _____, Pennsylvania Genealogies, ____, p. 582
(2) - Morris, Jeffrey and Morris, Richard; Encyclopedia of American History, 7th Ed.; New York, 1996.
(3) - O'Brien, Michael J.; Irish Settlers in America, Volume I. Excerpted and reprinted from "The Journal of the American Irish Historical Society"; Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc. Baltimore, 1979, 1993.
(4) - O'Brien, __; ibid.
(5) - "During the 1700's, most ethnic immigrants had a wide variety of landscape to choose from in the colonies, and so they settled in lands similar to home. Much of Appalachia was settled by Scotsmen, as itŐs steep mountains and scarce population were almost identical to the Scottish Highlands. In the case of the Germans, the deep, rolling forests of Pennsylvania were remarkably similar to the Black Forest, both in topography and weather. The relatively settled nature of the area gave easy access to the materials and machinery needed to ply their trade. Thus, it was only natural that the Germans would settle in that area, and German gunsmiths would reproduce the forest hunting rifle." The Kentucky Rifle, <johno@iglou.com>, http://johno.myiglou.com/kyrifle.htm -- 031020.00:53
(6) - US Army, Virginia Militia 1775-83.
(7) - Van Screevan, Revolutionary Virginia, 3:343, 404; Reuben Gold Thwaites and Louis Phelps Kellogg, eds., The Revolution on the Upper Ohio, 1775-1777 ; Wisconsin Historical Society; Madison, 1908; pp. 12-17.
(8) - Augusta County; www.co.augusta.va.us/history.html; 2001.
(9) - Pennsylvania Archives, Vol. 5, p.53.
(10) - Bedford County (Pennsylvania) In The American Revolution, Whisker, James B., quoted at www.motherbedford.com 2002.12.07
(11) - Hamblen, Larry A.; Our Hamblen Heritage, 1st edition; Brooks Publishing Co.,Dallas; 1989