THE HARTZOGS OF SOUTH CAROLINA
THE HARTZOGS OF SOUTHCAROLINA
This is thestory of a remarkable family, even without reference to its most famousancestor, General Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox, that small, wizenedeagle-nosed, vinegar-drinking tormentor of the British during the RevolutionaryWar.
My Aunt Frankie, Frances Marion Hartzog, used to say that all sheever got from her namesake was his nose. I recall taking what I was told washis pewter spoon to a school assembly, a glorified show-and-tell, in sixthgrade.
The General married late in lifeand never had any children. He adored his nieces and nephews, and raised hiscousin’s son Nathaniel after the death of Nathaniel’s parents when the boy wasstill young. Nathaniel was my direct ancestor.
I began the first version of this history of theHartzogs with George Hartzog, who was born in 1635 in Bavaria. According tofamily lore, George at the age of 41 was granted a coat of arms by the Bavarianking. The honor suggests that George was wealthy and powerful. A parchment copyof the coat of arms and photos of it are in various Hartzog households.
In that version of our history oneof George’s sons, George Jr. (ca. 1690-1737) did not stay in Bavaria. He movedto Switzerland and at the age of 18 married Anna Waber. When he died, Annasailed for South Carolina with her five children: Tobias, Barnard, George,Barbara, and Elizabeth.
My nephew Jon Seed has given me abook by Virginia Buckalew called The Hartzog and Hardy Families.Virginia spent 40 years collecting information for that book, and traveled toGermany for much of her research. The records she found in Germany match ourtraditional family history beginning with George Jr.’s children, but in herbook they aren’t his children. They are the children of Bernard Hertzog. It seemsI might not be the direct descendent of the Hartzog who received the coat ofarms.
Bernard’s father, Hans Henrich(1695-1744) and his father Henrich, who was born in about 1660, lived and diedin Sandhausen, and both married young women by the name of Katharina. Seven ofBernard’s nine brothers and sisters died before the age of 20. We have noinformation on the other two.
In The Hartzog and HardyFamilies the chapter called “Hartzogs in America” begins with BernardHertzog’s petition for land which was entered in the court records inCharleston as follows:
The petition ofBernard Hertogs humbly setting forth that the petitioner came into the Provinceby the “Cunliffe,” Capt’n Cleater, from Rotterdam on the encouragement given byforeign protestants. He has payed his freight to Mess’s. Austin and Lauerenceand desires to settle on land between Savannah and Santee Rivers and that hehas a wife and four children viz. Tobias, about 18 years, George, about 16,Barbara and Elizabeth about 10 years old and never has had any land for themnor for himself, and therefore he humbly prays his Excellency and their Honorsto order the Surveyor General to lay out for him 300 acres as above.
BernardHertogs
Charles town the 19thday of Oct’r 1752
Note in the petition that Bernardnever had any land in Germany, but at least he was able to pay his own way anddid not have to become an indentured servant, so he was not as poor as manyothers. Note also that the names of the children are the same as those of ourtraditional family history, so from that point on there is no difference ofaccounts.
Bernard Hertzog was born in 1707 inSandhausen, near Heidelberg, Germany. The Germans and Swiss that immigrated toSouth Carolina in the first part of the eighteenth century left a landdevastated by continuous warfare. The year of the voyage was the year BenjaminFranklin flew a kite in a storm to prove that lightning is electricity. Shipsin those days had not changed much since the time of the Mayflower. The trip forBernard, his wife, and their four children took many weeks.
Bernard’s petition for land wasgranted in 1754. He received 300 acres in Cow Castle Swamp below OrangeburgTownship, SC. He and his family probably followed the trail from Charleston toFort Charlotte, walking about 75 miles from Charleston. The Orangeburg Districtis where the first Hartzogs from Germany settled in 1735, clustering theirhomes and their Protestant church on the banks of the Edisto River.
Bernard married Maria Saloma Meyerin 1732 or 1733, but he married his second wife Anne Mary Chevilett in Februaryof 1755, so Maria did not survive over three years in the new land after thelong journey across the ocean. She was born in Germany in about 1712. Bernardand Anne had two children.
Bernard and Maria’s son George ismy direct ancestor. He was born in Sandhausen, Germany, November 23, 1738, sohe was not yet 14 when he joined his parents on the trip to America. I take hisage from the German records, despite what the land petition says.
There is a story of George’sservice during the Revolutionary War. He and his friend James Berry on oneoccasion hid in Berry’s Bay from the Tories. Berry’s Bay was then a densewilderness on the other side of Berry’s home near the Edisto River.
Old Tom, a slave of Hartzog’s, washung by the Tories to a walnut tree on the edge of the swamp to make him tellwhere his master and others were hiding. While the Tories were thus occupied,Francis Marion’s men came upon them, gave the rope a slash with a sword anddashed on after the Tories. Tom, then a young Negro, lived to be quite aged andhanded the story down to the young.
In the last year of the conflict,1782, after hostilities had almost ended, a Tory stabbed and killed George atRush’s Mill in Orangeburg District. George was 44.
George’s brother Tobias, whosupplied the Continental Army with corn, forage, and at least 1,200 pounds ofbeef, had over 750 acres of land on and near the Edisto. Tobias died sometimebefore 1790.
The men of the next two generationslived to age 55. John Hartzog (1766-1821) married Margaret Felder (1774-1851).Henry Barnard Hartzog (1791-1846) married Rebecca Reed (1798-1871). Henry andRebecca had thirteen children.
One of these children, namedRebecca after her mother, wrote in 1898: “My mother told me many times thatJohn Hartzog’s father, George, was killed by Tories in 1782 and his wifeCatherine was killed by lightning coming down the chimney where she was sittingin the corner of the fireplace.” Rebecca was born in 1836. Her father Henry wasmy great-great-great-grandfather.
The Hartzogs were a part of theworld of slavery. In 1828 Henry Hartzog bought the slave Cuffee for $413.00.
In 1844 Henry’s brother George Felder Hartzog evidently died; hisgoods were auctioned off that year. His horse and buggy sold for $30.00, cowand calf for $7.12, spinning wheel for $2.00, ten logs for $5.00, and somecowhide for $.62. No slaves are mentioned. Perhaps they were so valuable thatHenry kept them.
Henry was wealthy enough to give atleast one of his sons, Samuel, a good elementary school education. Henry hadsix sons. Four were killed in the War Between the States. Nine of eighteenHartzogs died in that war.
Samuel Jackson Hartzog (1823-1890)was Henry’s oldest son. Sam was a quiet and unassuming man who commandedrespect. Because of his elementary education, he was in demand for writingwills and other tasks requiring academic skill.
Samuel owned 30 slaves on a 930acre plantation. His lovely home was of brick, as were the slaves’ quarters inback. There was a mill pond at the bottom of the hill in front of the home.
By this time the farmers of thissection of the state had a special benefit. Until 1833 they and their Negrowagoners hauled cotton and other produce to Charleston. They camped out at night on the long dusty trip,and again in the “wagon yards” in the city. Then in 1833 the railroad fromHamburg to Charleston after years of labor was finished. It was the first inthe United States and at its completion the longest in the world. It served thefarmers well.
In 1855 Samuel at age 32 married22-year old Mary Eliza Owens. She had a keen mind, and was a goodconversationalist and a practical housekeeper. Plantation life was good, and itwas profitable.
Then came the war. Samuel sends aletter home in June, 1864. After listening to the shrieks coming from thehospitals, he writes, “Freedom should be appreciated when it is won for ourcountry.” Sam hears of Confederate successes. He hopes the armies willterminate the war soon, but it is hard for him to get information.
The war was soon to be terminated.When Samuel wrote his letter, William Tecumseh Sherman had begun his march tothe sea. Early in 1865 Sherman turned north from Savannah and entered SouthCarolina. His forces reached the Hartzog plantation in February or March.
By that time Samuel had beenwounded and had returned home in very poor health. The Union soldiers stoleevery bit of food the plantation had stored and then demanded the familysilver. Sam would not tell them where it was hidden. The soldiers put a ropearound his neck and pulled it tighter and tighter. They almost strangled Sam,but he would not tell them where the silver was.
Finally the troops left, takingwith them the only cow left on the plantation. At that point a slave followedthe Yankees, abusing them at every step, because without the milk from that cowa baby at the plantation was surely going to die. “You give that cow back,” shekept saying. She got the cow. The child died in 1869.
Neighbors brought the family alarge sack of peas, which kept everyone alive until they could do better.
Samuel had a younger brother Henry(1824-1879), who also had a plantation. Henry was a successful farmer andbusinessman. He amassed a small fortune. He was widely regarded as the mostoutstanding citizen of Bamberg County, and represented his district in thestate legislature in 1878. Wade Hampton, the Confederate general, was governorthat year. Governor Hampton was famous in this violent time for leading hisfollowers away from repression of Negroes, and into a policy of seeking theirvotes.
Henry was married to Ann GoodwinGraham (1826-1882). After living for many years in Olar, Henry and Ann built afine colonial home about two miles outside of Bamberg.
Of the six brothers, Samuel andHenry were the two who survived the war. The South began its recovery from thatconflict, and the brothers reestablished lives of prosperity.
It was a time when there was norunning water or refrigeration, no ice for an icebox, or fans overhead, and noeasy travel on the dirt roads. But it was a time of many pleasures. It was atime of bad dentistry, but good food and good activities.
There was hunting (everyone had agun), and there was fishing. There were fruits and vegetables to pick and eat.There were five-cent novels.
For the children there were raftson the ponds and egg fights at Easter. There were sociables, when the boysinvited their belles by sending Negro messengers at a cost of five cents. Hoopsand bustles disappeared. A circus came to town. Students studied in primers.Baseball was played with underhand pitching. The Hartzogs were neither borednor unhappy.
There were also robberies, Negrokillings, and almost a lynching of a Negro robber. There was a fire in town.There were the deaths of three of Samuel’s children, at the ages of one, three,and four. The three-year old was a girl, who fell down the well. The four-yearold was a boy, who died of brain congestion.
Although the new hotel in Bambergwas made of brick, the churches remained old-fashioned wooden buildings. Thesaloon prospered, but religion was at a low ebb. The town was given to gaiety,dancing being the most popular amusement for the young people.
In imitation of those giddy youths,the school children on June 5th, 1866 held their customary dance inthe lower story of the Masonic Lodge, then in use as a schoolhouse. As theydanced, a cyclone struck, destroying the building and killing seven of thechildren, while wounding many others.
Many of these things were recordedby Samuel’s son Henry S. Hartzog (1866-1953) in his memoirs of 1944. Henryrecalls the trip to his family’s new home at Bamberg in 1871, “in a widecarriage with two side lanterns.” This home had been one of those in which GeneralSherman had set up headquarters, and was the best house in town.
Henry S. loved visiting his uncleHenry, whose colonial home was only two miles away, out in the countryside.Fire destroyed the house in 1892 or 1893.
Henry S. became the president of ClemsonUniversity. Later he became the president of the University of Arkansas, andabout that time, when he was speaking on trends of education in the South, heshared the speakers’ platform with three United States presidents, TheodoreRoosevelt, William Howard Taft, and Woodrow Wilson.
The youngest brother of Henry S.Hartzog was Sidney, who was the mayor of Greenwood for many years.
Henry S. Hartzog’s son was Kim, whomarried Louise (“Weezie”) Hodges. Louise was a lively and spirited woman whotaught Sunday school even past the age of 94, and who took pleasure inorganizing her own 100th birthday celebration in January of 2001.She died the following summer.
We have followed the line ofHartzogs descended from Samuel, the survivor of the War Between the States.Samuel’s younger brother Henry, the other Hartzog survivor of that war, whobuilt the fine colonial home outside of Bamberg, also has descendents today, ofwhom I am one. Bamberg is in the part of South Carolina where the firstHartzogs coming from Germany settled.
Henry had a son, Henry GrahamHartzog (1846-1925), who married Ann Melissa Tarrant, called Annie. Annie waspetite. Her wedding band was so small, it looked like a baby ring. She wore itfor 75 years.
Henry G. (called Graham, or the Major)joined the Bamberg militia when he was 20 years old. The militia was formedafter the Battle of Gettysburg. Graham was first a captain in the militia, andlater a major.
Eventually Graham moved toGreenwood, where he built many homes. His cousin Sidney followed him there, asdid Kim and Louise Hartzog.
When Louise Hartzog was the head ofthe Physical Education Department at Lander College in Greenwood, she invitedAnn Hartzog at the age of 90 to come to a student assembly, where Ann was givena corsage in recognition of her fine posture. Everyone always noticed howstraight Graham and Annie sat up in their buggy as their horse pranced down thedusty road. Annie at 90 still had perfect posture. She started early, she toldLouise’s students, and never wavered.
Graham and Annie died in Greenwoodin a spacious bungalow which stood on land now owned by the PresbyterianChurch, on the corner of East Cambridge and Bailey Circle.
One of Graham’s three sons was mygrandfather Percy Graham Hartzog, whom I knew as a fine elderly gentleman. “PG”was tall and slim.
I spoke recently with Ruth Hartzog,who married Ted Hartzog, the son of PG’s youngest brother Mott. Ruth remembersPG as a kind, quiet, and easy-going man who cooked a huge turkey, about 30pounds, every Thanksgiving and Christmas. He basted and roasted the bird allday in a big oven, then carved it for the family.
PG and his wife Mary (Mamie) VassHartzog, and their four children, lived for a time in a spacious bungalow whichstill stands on Presley Street, first house on the right as you turn off ofCambridge. Louise Hartzog remembers being fascinated when she visited thatfamily, since they had been up north and had stories to tell of that region ofthe country.
PG bought the lovely home withwhite columns which our family called Tranquility. PG’s second daughter was mymother, Ann (Nancy) Tarrant Hartzog, who met my father on one of those trips upnorth. Nancy was married in Tranquility, which now houses the Greenwood Women’sClub.
PG was a tire salesman. During theDepression he traded Tranquility and its 100 acres for a home on BarksdaleStreet and cash. I visited that home and recall a bed in a screened-in porch on the second floor.
It became the lot of my AuntFrankie to care for her mother and father. She did so cheerfully, and also tookloving care of her nephew Sidney, whom PG and Mamie had adopted. Frankie nevermarried.
Mamie Vass was the daughter of afine South Carolina man. John Leland Vass was pastor to the FirstCongregational Church in Spartanburg and was the first superintendent for theConnie Maxwell Children’s Home in Greenwood. He met his wife, Emma Brown, whileselling Bibles and religious books during summer vacations. He was capturedduring the War Between the States and was shipped off to a northern jail.
I knew Mamie as a kind, gentle, andgracious lady.
Ruth Hartzog says that Mamie waxedher floors until they gleamed. If you were going fast and hit a rug, you were agoner.
Of PG’s siblings, Ruth says sheloved the two ladies she knew, Bessie and Ann. Few people loved Gerard, who wasnot affectionate and had a temper. Gerard shot a cow that kicked him.
Everybody loved Mott, the youngestof PG’s bothers and sisters. He was a jovial man fond of dancing, smoking, andoccasional drinking. Bridge-playing parties started after dinner and lastedmost of the night.
Mott had a garden full of tomatoes,peppers, onions and other vegetables, and he also raised turkeys. The lastturkey he raised weighed 40 pounds. The entire neighborhood feasted on it, butRuth couldn’t take a bite. She had petted that friend too often.
Mott loved to cook. One day he musthave been commenting on his wife Emmie’s skills in the kitchen. She took offher apron, and said to Mott, “Here. From now on you do the cooking. I’ll cleanup.”
Mott hated FDR. If someone placed adime face up on the table, Mott would jump up and dance in a fit, saying, “Getthat thing off the table! I don’t ever want to see that head on my table!”
Mott fought in World War I, as didhis nephew Hal. Hal was gassed, always had lung problems, and died when I wasyoung. Mott was wounded, also, though his appearance, like Hal’s, was fine.Mott received disability pay and worked at odd jobs. He returned from Europe in1917 with a valuable Burma ruby. He lived most of his life in Greenwood. Hedied in Asheville in 1954 at the age of 69.
Mott’s son Ted, whom Ruth married,was a pilot in the Air Force.
From Virginia Buckalew: Hartzog, a variant of Herzog, one who led an army; a duke or lord. German.
SOURCES
I regret a lack of cited sources or a bibliographyfor this offering. I decided to do something with the material I had in thetime I felt I had. Source materials include the following:
1. the memoirs of Henry S. Hartzog, 1944
2. a book on the Hartzogs at my cousin Peter Pelham’s house
3. the book my nephew Jon Seed discovered called The Hartzogand Hardy Families by Virginia Hardy Buckalew, who engaged in familyresearch for 40 years. The book is extremely well documented. It covers manybranches of the family.
4. conversations and correspondence with Louise “Weezie” Hartzog
5. notes called Commsoft Roots III given to Louise at church froman unremembered source who served as town clerk in Bamberg, 1866-68 and “as aboy made occasional visits there previous to 1866”
6. conversations and correspondence with Ruth Hartzog
7. conversations with my aunt Frances Marion Hartzog
8. books on the Swamp fox
9. books on ocean voyages of this time