The 2014 edition of Cumberland County History includes articles on a wide variety of topics stretching from the eighteenth century to the twentieth century. The articles focus on individuals, caves, tugboats, schools, and flags — quite an unusual collection.
Tiny Carlisle, with perhaps half a hundred males of fighting age, contributed no fewer than eight colonels or generals to the War of the Revolution. None of these, from Armstrong to Watts, made quite the contribution to victory that Ephraim Blaine did.
Beneath Saint Patrick's Church on East Pomfret Street in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, are the mortal remains of Peter Helbron. He was a German Capuchin priest, his parish being in Westmoreland County. His subterranean presence in Cumberland County raises obvious questions, and those questions lead to a glimpse into the daily life of a country priest in early nineteenth-century America. This paper will look at Father Helbron's life, with special attention to the inventory of his estate.
Author's note: The Trout Gallery at Dickinson College presented an exhibit entitled "The Carlisle Indian School: 1879-1918" from January 30 to February 28, 2004. Visitors to this exhibit were able to see several pictographs that were once part of an album of drawings presented to Mason D. Pratt by his father, Richard Henry Pratt. The front cover of that album is embossed in gold letters "A Kiowa's Odyssey", and the Kiowa whose drawings formerly rested inside the red covers was Etahdleuh Doanmoe, the subject of this article.
Ten rural religious societies of Presbyterians evolved in the Cumberland Valley of Pennsylvania prior to 1745. This account of the chain of self-starting societies in the seventy-mile Valley is drawn principally from the Minutes of the Presbytery of Donegal, which exercised rigid control over ecclesiastical activity, including such matters as scheduling each Sabbath of sermons until such time as a resident preacher was in place.
EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION While driving a team of horses as part of a wagon train crossing the American west in 1865, Jeremiah Zeamer, aged 23, kept a diary. Thirty-one years later, Zeamer, now the owner and publisher of the American Volunteer in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, published his diaries in serial form in the newspaper. A chapter was presented each week from November of 1896 to June of 1897. As far as staff at the Cumberland County Historical Society has been able to ascertain this work was published only in serial form.
It seems to be an axiom of geography that settlements arise along rivers and heavy trade routes. One has only to consider the city-states of ancient Mesopotamia, or Rome, Paris, or London. In many ways Pennsylvania in the eighteenth century was similar more to an ancient or medieval land than to anything of the twentieth century.
AIthough the record of John Armstrong, Senior, is fairly complete, and biographies of his sons James and John are available because, like their father, they both served as Congressman, that of his wife and her family, his father, brothers and sisters are sketchy. This paper undertakes an examination of the family with emphasis on those members.
I have never forgotten my first solitary walk through Camp Michaux. The sun was setting and visitors had gone. I explored in silence, hearing only a gentle breeze create an eerie creaking in the trees that made me strain my ear as if listening for voices of the past.
The 1863 shelling of Carlisle during the American Civil War left indelible marks on some of the town's buildings. It crystallized into stories passed down in family histories. Its presentation in print was a fascination for local residents who relished the collection of facts and opinions in their newspapers. A piece in the Carlisle American gave the popular opinion that the Confederate leader in charge of the shelling, Major General Fitzhugh Lee, was "the dastard ... not only lost to pity but destitute of humanity".