Emanuel Becher
(1776-1858)

 

Family Links

Spouses/Children:
1. Elener Chesney

Emanuel Becher 1 2 3 4 5 6 7

  • Born: 21 May 1776, , Lancaster, PA 3 4 5 6 7
  • Marriage (1): Elener Chesney
  • Died: 4 Jun 1858, , Lancaster, PA at age 82 4 5 6
  • Buried: New Holland: Zeltenreich Reformed Church, Lancaster, PA 4 5

   Other names for Emanuel were Manuel Becher,8 Emanuel Beckard,9 Emanuel Becker 2 10 and Emanuel Bucher.2

   FamilySearch ID: 9JHZ-9J9.

  General Notes:

The 1900 Census for Emanuel's son, John (born 1826) indicated his father was born in Germany and his mother in Ireland. The 1850 Census indicated both were born in Pennsylvania. Further research is needed.

This family is related to my line of Becher, Bicher, Beecher, etc. ancestors, who also are found in records in the same church as this family. Read below "Relatives To Research." Please contact jonathan@seachtrees.com to learn our latest research on your family.

If you are related to this ancestor and a male with the Becher or Beecher surname (or variant spelling) you are invited to participate at our expense in our Genealogy Y-DNA Research that uses a two-minute mail-in test to prove which family lines are related. Visit http://www.searchtrees.com/dna to see the latest research findings and email jonathan@seachtrees.com to get tested for free. If you match my Y-DNA pattern as expected, we will know for certain our trees join into one family.

  Burial Notes:

82.0.14.
G.A.R.

  Noted events in his life were:

1. Relatives To Research: For the latest on who his father is, see https://SearchTrees.com/becher and contact searchtrees@gmail.com. Y-DNA tests show he is unrelated to most PA Beecher ancestors and the CT Beecher families.

2. Relatives To Research: May be brothers (need proof): Emanuel Becher b.1776 http://www.searchtrees.com/tree/4462.htm ; Daniel Becher b.1777 http://www.searchtrees.com/tree/4455.htm ; John Becher b.1780 http://www.searchtrees.com/tree/12429.htm.

3. Relatives To Research: Likely related to Philip Becher born in the mid 1700's attending churches in New Holland. See http://www.searchtrees.com/tree/15904.htm, 1750, New Holland: New Holland United Methodist Cemetery, Lancaster, PA.

4. Census in 1820 in Earl Twp., Lancaster, PA. 9 In the 1820 Census in Earl Township, Emanuel Beckard is listed with this household:
Males (born)
Under 10 (1811-1820) = 1 son
10-15 (1805-1810) = 2 sons
16-18 (1802-1804)
16-25 (1795-1804)
26-44 (1776-1794)
45 & over (<=1775) = 1 father Emanuel
Females (born)
Under 10 (1811-1820) = 4 daughters
10-15 (1805-1810)
16-25 (1795-1804)
26-44 (1776-1794) = 1 daughter or ?
45 & over (<=1775) = 1 mother

Neighbors listed are Diller, Jackson, Stegger, Fallefaum, Johnston, Harding, Kurtz.

5. Census in 1840 in Earl Twp., Lancaster, PA. 8 In the 1840 Census Manuel Becher is listed with this household:
Males (born)
10-14 (1826-1830) = 1 son John
60-69 (1771-1780) = 1 father Manuel
Females (born)
Under 5 (1836-1840)
50-59 (1781-1790) = 1 mother

The next listing on the same page is Emanuel's son Jacob Becher:
Males (born)
20-29 (1811-1820) = 1 father Jacob
Females (born)
Under 5 (1836-1840) = 1 daughter
20-29 (1811-1820) = 1 mother.

6. Elected Officer of Zeltenreich Reformed Church in 1843 in New Holland: New Holland United Methodist Cemetery, Lancaster, PA.

7. Census in 1850 in Earl Twp., Lancaster, PA. 3 Emanuel Becher, carpenter, 74, was with wife Elloner, 67; and daughter Emma, 34. Emanuel's real estate was valued at $700. With them was probably Emanuel's son, John Becher, tailor, 23; his wife, Ann, 22; and Eliza, 1. Elloner was born in Maryland, the others in Pennsylvania.

8. Book: The Bechers as early settlers were mentioned as follows in the History of Lancaster County by Dr. Frederick Klein, 1924. 11
The first settlement in what became the ultimate bounds of Earl township was not however made until 1728. The ship "William and Sarah" had sailed from Rotterdam in the summer of 1727 with ninety families of Palatines, in all 400 emigrants. Among them were, the brothers, Alexander and John Diffenderfer. From Philadelphia, Alexander Diffenderfer went into Berks county, where he settled; John Diffenderfer, however, "in 1728 loaded his family and household goods on a wagon owned by one Martin, of Weaverland, and at length came to a halt beneath a spreading oak in the near vicinity of the present New Holland."

He was welcomed by the settlers of Groff's Dale, and Weber's Dale; and with their aid a log cabin was soon raised, and the newcomers provided with what food they needed, the neighborly solicitude even extending to the gift of a cow to the Diffenderfer family. Thus that family became settled in the vicinity of the later metropolis of the Earls, New Holland, the history of which is separately reviewed elsewhere.

Earl township was one of the seventeen established on June 9, 1729; and at the same meeting of magistrates and citizens township officers were appointed. No supervisors appear to have been appointed for Earl township; indeed, the first township officers of whom there is record were Martin Grove, who was appointed constable in 1729, and Edward Edwards, who was appointed pound-keeper in 1739. The next known record of Earl township constables is that which begins with 1762, and lists Henry Stouffer and Peter Baker as constables. The record is consecutive up to 1774, when William Reynolds was constable. He probably was the last to hold office in Earl township under the Crown.

John Diffenderfer and his family were not destined long to be without near neighbors, for within a few years many other German families settled in the vicinity. Among the family names were Stone, Brimmer, Diller, Brubaker, Koch, Roland, Sprecher, Mentzer, Kinzer, Ranck, Weidler, Becher, Luther, Bitzer, Schultz. It is not possible to give year of settlement, as in many cases the families merely "squatted," taking up land in later years when better circumstanced. Indeed, such was the state of the emigrants from the Palatinate that many were insolvent when they landed in America, and had to bind themselves to labor for others for, in some cases, years, to pay for their passage to America. This condition was more general among those who came in the first and second decades of the eighteenth century than among those who came later. But they would probably have assumed even greater obligations to escape from the persecution to which they had been subjected in their own land.


Emanuel married Elener Chesney. (Elener Chesney was born on 5 Sep 1783 in La Plata, Charles, MD, United States,3 4 5 12 died on 6 Apr 1861 in , Lancaster, PA 6 and was buried in New Holland: Zeltenreich Reformed Church, Lancaster, PA 4.)


Sources


1 Darius William Gerhard, A History of the New Holland Charge of the Reformed Church in Lancaster County, Pa (Ranck & Sandoe, 1877. 140 pages), Page 103.

2 Trinity Lutheran Church, New Holland, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania (Note: Some very early records that appear in this church register were from Muddy Creek Lutheran Church in East Cocalico Township, before the congregation moved to New Holland.).

3 1850 United States Census, Pennsylvania, Lancaster County, Earl Township, Series: M432 Roll: 789 Page: 204.

4 Catalogue of Zeltenreich cemetery, containing a short history of the cemetery along with a family index and a related family index (FamilySearch.org Family History Library Microfilm 0020363 Item 12.).

5 Find A Grave, http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=50972585.

6 Family Bible of John Becher (1826-1906).

7 Ancestry.com, Pennsylvania, U.S., Death Certificates, 1906-1968 (Original data: Pennsylvania (State). Death certificates. Records of the Pennsylvania Department of Health, Record Group 11. Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.), Death Certificate 64476. John Becher. Father Emanuel Becher. Mother Ellen Chesney.

8 1840 United States Census, Pennsylvania, Lancaster County, Leacock Township, Series: M704 Roll: 467 Page: 449.

9 1820 United States Census, Pennsylvania, Lancaster County, Earl Township, Series: M33 Roll: 106 Page: 136.

10 Ancestry.com, Pennsylvania, U.S., Death Certificates, 1906-1968 (Original data: Pennsylvania (State). Death certificates. Records of the Pennsylvania Department of Health, Record Group 11. Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.), Death Certificate 45189. Dan'l Becher. Father Emanuel Becker. Mother Eleanor Chesney.

11 Klein, Dr. Frederick, History of Lancaster County (1924), http://www.horseshoe.cc/pennadutch/places/pennsylvania/lancasterco/townships/earls/earls.htm.

12 1860 United States Census, Pennsylvania, Lancaster County, Leacock Township, Series: M653 Roll: 1121 Page: 582.



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