SAMUEL CRAIG, Senior Pioneer to Western Pennsylvania AND HIS DESCENDANTS COMPILED BY JANE MARIA CRAIG PRINTED FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION GREENSBURG,PA. 1915 CONTENTS Page Introduction . .. Chapter I- 5 Samuel Craig, Senior, ( the Pioneer -to Western Pennsylvania) ........ Chapter rf- 14 John Craig and Descendants ...•...... Chapter III- 23 Alexander Craig an.d Descendan· ..• _•.. Chapter .IV- 45 Samuel Craig, Jr., and Descendants. Chapter V- 59 Rose Craig Elliott and Descendant,s ... Chapter VI- 68 Elizabeth Craig Thom and Descendants,. Chapter VII- 72 Esther Craig McClelland and Descendants, . Chapter VIII- 79 Andrew Craig and Descen.~ants ...... Chapter IX- 95 Jane Craig Wallace and Descendants, Chapter X- 98 Joseph Craig and Descendants, ...... Chapter XI-111 Agnes (Nancy) Craig Moorhead and Descendants .............. Chapter XII-123 Rebecca Craig Shield,s and Descendants ChapterXIII-140 A FOREWORD This history of Samuel Craig and his Descendants was begun by Mrs. Margaret Campbell Craig. She wrote partly from her own knowledge of events and also collected data from other ;-Sources. After her death, her granddaughter, Miss Jane Maria Craig, who had inherited her grandmother's love for genealogy, took up the work. Miss Craig had hoped to have the results of her work published in her lifetime and she had made some plans toward that end. At her death, the manuscript copy (:ame into_ the hands of her executors who had the same printed practically as Miss Craig had written it. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION There is a legend that the Craigs obtained their name from· an ancestor who in the remote past discover­ ed in a battle that by striking an enemy between the helmet and armor ( or on the craig or neck) that he could bring off a head at each stroke, and called to his follow­ ers, "The Craigs boys, the Craigs", and ,so gained for himself the patronymic of Craig. Craig is identical with the word crag, one definition. of which (now obsolete) is given by Webster as "the neck or throat", and was so used by the early English poet, Edmund Spenser. The original home of the Craigs was Scotland, and two men of the name, John and Thomas Craig, were prominent there in the 16th century. John Craig was a man of considerable learning and ,singular abilities. He was born about the year 1512, and having obtained a good education, removed to England, and became tutor to the children of Lord Dacre. In consequence of war arisip.g between that country and Scotland, he returned home and entered a Dominican monastery, but being suspected of heresy he was cast into prison and kept there for a time. On obtaining his liberty he traveled first to England and France, and then removed to Rome, where he was in such favor with Cardinal Pole, that he was appointed to instruct novices of the Dominican cloister at Bologna. Here being ad­ vanced to the rectorate, he had access to the library, where, happening to read "Calvin's Institutes", he soon. imbibed and openly professed the Protestant doctrines. He was sent to Rome, tried, and condemned to be burn­ ed; but the Pope (Paul IV.) having died the day before his intended execution, the people broke open all ~~~ -6- prisons and set the prisoners free. John Craig escaped to Vienna and obtained some favor at the court of Maximillian II ; but the news of his being there reached Rome, and the Pope demanded his surrender as one condemned for heresy. The Emperor, however, instead of complying with the request of his holiness, gave Craig a safe conduct out of Germany. He n.ow returned to Scotland and was appointed the colleague of John Knox in the parish church of Edinburgh. Thinking the mar­ riage of Queen Mary and Bothwell contrary to the word of God, he, while holding this position, boldly refused to proclaim the bans. In 1572 Craig was sent to "illuminate the dark places" in Forfarshire and Aber­ deenshire,, and remained in the north until 1579, when he was appointed minister to King James the VI in Edin­ burgh. He now took a leading part in the affairs of the church; he wa,s the writer of the "National Covenant" signed by the King and his household in 1580, and the compiler of a catechism, commonly called "Craig's Cate­ chism", which was first printed by order of the Assembly in 1591. He appears to have been a man of unusual resolution and activity, and was 1so conscientious and courageous that he did not fail to reprove the King and his Court when he thought they did not do right. He died in 1600, when over eighty-eight years of age. (Scots Worthies and Chambers Encyclopedia Vol. IV., page 705.) Sir Thomas Craig was an advocate at the Scottish Bar, and a literary man of great ability, also an anti­ quarian of note. In the latter part of his life he acted as advocate for the Church of Scotland. He was so highly esteemed by the king that he wished to confer the honor of knighthood upon him, and upon his refusal to accept it, ordered all persons to address him as though he had accepted the title. He died in 1608. (Chambers En.cyclopedia, Vol. IV, page 705.) -7- During the bitter persecutions in Scotland in the 17th century no doubt many of our name endured sufferings that are unrecorded. In an old Scotch book, "The Cloud of Witnesses", there is a record that Rev. Donald Cargill, who suffered martyrdom in 1681, "For about three years usually resided in the house of Margaret Craig, a very godly woman., where he lectured morning and evening to such as came to hear him'\ and also in the appendix of the same book, page 370, we learn that John Craig, of Glassport Parish, was in the battle of Bothwell Bridge and one of the 250 prisoners who were sentenced to be banished to America and sold as slaves. These men. were placed on a vessel and the vessel was wrecked and 200 of them drowned, among them John Craig. The battle of Bothwell Bridge was fought June 22, 1679. A number of Craigs came at different _ dates to America, both before and shortly after. the Revolution, who probably had a common ancestry in Scotland, but whose descendants cannot now trace any connecting link. The year 1684, the date given for the arrival of our ancestors, is also the date recorded for the coming of an Andrew Craig to 1-{ ew Jersey. Andrew Craig be­ came the owner of land situated southwest of the Rahway river within the present bounds of Westfield Township, in. Union County, New Jersey. He was born in 1662 and died October 6, 1739; Married Susanna ----. Children :-Andrew, John, William, Margery, Elizabeth, Mary and Martha. Andrew Craig, the 1st, was made an Associate of the Elizabethtown Purcha,sers in 1699 or 1700, and Andrew, the 2nd, was on the Town. Committee in 1740 and also 1750. Andrew Craig and his wife Susanna and their son John are buried in Old St. John's churchyard, Elizabethi $ New Jersey. The following 1s inscribed on John Craig's tombstone:- "Weep not for me my friends, For why? My race is run. It is the Will of God. And let His Will be done." Among the settlers imported by Lord Neil Camp­ bell, as of December, 1685, were John Craig and his son Archibald and a James Craig ( supposed to be John's son). These Craigs later became influential in Mon­ mouth County, New Jersey, and were among the found­ ers of "Old Scots Church", near Freehold, organized about 1692. This church, now called "Old Tennent'\ occupies historic ground, as the battle of Monmouth, June 28, 1778, was fought in the vicinity, and in its graveyard was buried the British Colonel Monckton, who was killed in that battle. Here are also buried six Craigs who were soldiers of the American Revolution:­ David, two Johns, Samuel and vVilliam Craig. The church edifice, built in 1751, is still used as a place of worship. The home of one of these John Craigs was used as a hospital by the British; before abandoning the house, Mrs. Craig put her silver in the bottom of the well, but the British soldiers fastened an iron kettle to the well sweep, and being very thirsty, drank the well dry and got the silver. The iron kettle is still in the possession of her descendants. Much of this informa­ tion was received from Mr. Samuel Craig Cowart, a lawyer of Freehold, and an elder of the Presbyterian church there, who is a descendant of the Craigs, who were among the founders of "Old Scots" church, and whose family still own the land their ancestors possessed more than two hundred years ago. (Other records from "History of Old Tennent.") About 1700 a family of Craigs, consisting of four brothers and three sisters, Daniel, Thomas, James, William, Sarah, Margaret and Jane, came from the North of Ireland-presumably from Derry-to Eastern -9- Pennsylvania. Daniel Craig had a daughter Sarah who married John Barnhill; their daughter Margaret mar­ ried Cornelius V. S. Roosevelt, and their son Theodore married Martha Bullock, and their son is ex-President Theodore Roosevelt of the United States. In 1728, Thomas, James and William Craig, with their sister Jane and her husband, John Boyd, went from Philadelphia to a place on Catasauqua Creek within the bounds of the present Northampton County, Pennsyl­ vania, and founded the "Craig Settlement", later known as· the "Irish Settlement." There were at least six (perhaps more) descendants of these Craigs who served in the war of the American Revolution; among them a grandson of Thomas Craig-also Thomas Craig-, who served from the beginning to the close of the Revolution in 1775 as Second Lieutenant, promoted ,suc­ cessively to the offices of Captain, Lieutenant Colonel and Colonel in 1776 and 1777, Brevetted Brigadier General 1783, and in 1807 become Major General of the 7th Division Pennsylvania Militia.